This is how a small town dies

My father-in-law grew up on a farm in Kansas, and describes it as a life of gray poverty and unending toil. He lit out for California as soon as he could and rarely goes back, though the farm is still in the family.

It's hard work to be nostalgic for such a life, and just because your grandparents did it doesn't mean it's worth preserving.>

Susan: Um, you could try to say that abortion is wrong (but you think it should be legal because of specific instances that warrant it), and marriage is between one man and one woman (but same-sex relationships deserve certain legal protections that the government grants to married couples), and then try to convince Mr. Warner that your economic policies are better than those of your opponent.

Or you could resort to tired Marxist twaddle about "economic self-interest" being the only thing that should motivate anyone, and write him off as a closed-minded bigot.>

you could try to say that abortion is wrong (but you think it should be legal because of specific instances that warrant it), and marriage is between one man and one woman (but same-sex relationships deserve certain legal protections that the government grants to married couples), and then try to convince Mr. Warner that your economic policies are better than those of your opponent.

But there's nothing a Democrat could say or do that would convince someone who places abortion and gay marriage over everything else when they step in the voting booth.

I have nothing to add.

I just wanted to read this again while reflecting on demographics, the history of liberalism, and that this is not some piece of Republican propoganda, but is from Susan, our friendly Democrat supporter.>

I fail to see the point of the last line, other then a little jab at the Democrats. As if either party, or government in general is capable of slowing down social and economic change, and that s assuming economic stagnation is a good thing. Its funny to me when I here these little stories meant to tug on the nostalgic visions of the past because it always involves a ranch or a farm, or something romantic. I never here anyone yearning for the days of the textile mill, or automobile manufacturing plant, at least from a cultural standpoint.

Political groaning aside, the story of this family, and particularly Travis is a touching one. Probably fit for a John Stienbech novel. Turning it into a political story however, and a partisan one at that, makes it more suitable for 60 minutes.>

Hard to know, isn't it? I mean, ag is massively subsidized -- but most of the money winds up in already-well-lined big-agribusiness pockets. So: is the solution to reform and ensure that much of that money winds up in small farmers' pockets instead? Japan and Europe seem to manage this somehow, however imperfectly. Why can they do this and we can't?

Or is America a hopeless place when it comes to ambitious social initiatives? Do they always, always, always get corrupted and wind up serving fatcats and big business? If so, maybe the thing to do is to cheer for wiping out subsidies altogether. But is that any kind of solution? And will matters fall in the good rather than the bad direction?>

Europe floods the world with excess agricultural output. They have massive tariffs with developing nations. Then, those same excess agricultural goods are sold so cheap in those developing countries that local producers are driven to poverty and the developing countries have trouble developing self-sufficientcy.
Even a lefty like Bob Geldof has recognized this.

And, large areas of Europe remain agricultural which could be returned to a more natural (wild) state. All of this is at the cost of taxpayers. The situation is so out of control that a socialist government in France tried to cut it back and the country was paralyzed by strikes.

I don't call that success.>

Don't miss the political point here. This is a man who is losing a way of life that generations of Americans have lived by. Maybe it's time for it to go. But what I hate is this modernist idea that says, "oh well, can't be helped, times change." It is true that the general store gave way to the supermarket which gave way to Costco -- but let's not overlook that something important was lost when the general store disappeared.

What I found so tragic about this story is that there's nothing this farmer can do to stop what's happening. You can't blame his son for wanting to move. What is he supposed to do, become a celibate farmer-monk, and give up on marriage and family just to hold the farm together? That's a big sacrifice for the sake of an ideal, however beautiful the ideal.

On the political side, this illustrated to me what happens when the Democratic Party decides that it has nothing to say to moral and religious traditionalists. Susan, you sneer at this man for voting on the basis of his views on marriage and abortion. What's the matter with Kansas, anyway? you think. Lots of people like you do. But the fact is, this is a simple Midwestern farmer who doesn't understand what's going on in a world in which men want to marry men, and women want to preserve the "right" to have a doctor stick a knife into their wombs and cut their little babies to pieces before sucking the severed legs and arms and head out. And he is asked to vote for a party that believes in these things, and looks down his nose at him for thinking these things are deeply wrong.

If you offered a deal to cultural liberals, saying, "Look, if we bear right on gay rights and abortion, and make room for social conservatives in the party, you're not going to like what these people stand for, but we can build a working majority for a Democratic Congress, and maybe even the presidency. What do you say?" They'd say not no, but hell no. Because this stuff matters to them more than their economic interests.>

Rod, it isn't a "modernist" idea that times change: it's a realistic appraisal of existence.

The past is past; it's gone forever, never to return, barring the invention of time travel. Even Christianity doesn't promise a return to Eden, but entrance into a new Jerusalem.

One hundred and fifty years ago -- a short span compared to cities like Rome and Cairo -- the town of Lebanon, Kansas didn't even exist.

"What I found so tragic about this story is that there's nothing this farmer can do to stop what's happening."

How is he different from anyone else? None of us can stop the sun from setting, or stop summer becoming autumn. Shakespeare will never write another play, Brando and Bogart are dead, U2's greatest album is probably at least 15 years behind us, it's possible that Star Trek will never be as popular -- or as good -- as it was before.

And there's not a damn thing any of us can do about any of that.

Not all change is progress, certainly not. I think we should recognize that there were some very good things about older times, and I think we should give tradition the benefit of the doubt.

But at some point clinging to the past too tightly is spiritually dangerous.


Let me be a little more personal than I've ever been on this blog or ours at Blogspot: my mom passed away two and a half years ago, and I subsequently had to sell our home -- the house I grew up in.

I will never again have a relaxing night in that particular den, eating spaghetti or a roast that my mom cooked, and sleeping like the dead in my small but cozy bedroom. Never again.

But if I don't move on from that, if I don't cherish the life I'm building with the woman I married just this past August, and if I do not make our house my home -- my castle, my sanctuary -- and instead think of it as another temporary shelter from the storm that is my mom's passing, I will die a spiritual death: not all at once, but I will die.


We cannot go back to the past. We must recognize that we now have the technological know-how to feed our entire society without most of us working on the farm. We ought to recognize the good that that's wrought: it gives people the opportunity to blog and write books, and am I the only one who thinks that childhood obesity is by orders of magnitude a less serious threat than regular famines and droughts? And we ought to learn how to bring about the good things -- spiritual growth, family, friendship, and a love of art -- in our time. We may do so in a way that's different than in the past, but let's look to bring about the same virtues without fetishizing the methods of our ancestors, methods that may not be suited to the landscape our technology has wrought.


Seriously, Rod, there are levels of nostalgia that are unhealthy.>

One can always look forward to the time, 30 years from now, when the old guard is dead and gone, and social and cultural issues truly don't matter anymore.

When there's 10 billion people on the planet instead of 6, I wonder whether gays getting married and abortion will sound like such horrible ideas?

When there's 10 billion people instead of 6, I surmise health care and food availability will be bigger concerns than who puts what, where.>

And this is different from the GOP how? Social values is where the major disagreements in our culture exist.

Susan, the only difference is that the GOP doesn't expect social liberals to vote their pocketbook. They respect the Dems as true believers. They know they cannot be bought.

The Dems, on the other hand, have a real elitist streak and look down on the poorer Con voter as a fool. They write books like "What's the Matter With Kansas". They should know that gay marriage and abortion are far more important to everyone than the tax code.>

Watsy says, Really, I don't think that there has to be a great big culture war.

Unfortunately, I have to disagree. The current culture war is a clash of world-views. How do we organize our collective lives for good and decent living? Once you've come to a convicting answer regarding this question, how do you compromise with someone who has come to a completely answer? For example, regarding abortion there truly are no gray areas. It is either the murder of an unborn child, or it is a medical procedure. Where is the gray area there?

Watsy further says, The farmers in Kansas would have to get used to the idea that embryos, and especially zygotes, don't share the same rights as a fetus. But maybe with education, they could compromise.

And perhaps with education you will come to the conclusion that an embryo is simply a human being who is not yet able to live outside the womb.

You assume here that those who are anti-abortion are ill-informed. Personally, it has been my experience that those who are pro-abortion rights usually don't fully understand fetal development. In any event, your comment suggests that you have come to the correct conclusion regarding this matter, and that others will naturally do so if they simply have enough information and take their blinders off. The blinders work both ways....>

If the liberals would talk to him about God, family, work and heritage.

Odd the Democratic party does talk about these things in the State that I reside in and they have held the legislative branch of the State since Statehood (and our current Governor is a Democrat and most of our governors have been, too). That said, there isn't much difference between the Democrats and Republicans when it comes to "conservative" and "liberal" here. The Dems are moderates slightly to the right and the Repubs are all way to the right. The Repubs have tried all that fear of gay marriage/marriage equality and abortion stuff here. It doesn't seem to work (they even try the "you pay too much taxes"). Of course people don't forget that it was the Repubs that killed the legislation to raise the minimum wage in the State or other important issues that people in our State actually care about. And for the record, we're a pretty aggie State. Of course, we're just south of Kansas and north of Texas.>

Slavery is too much of an incendiary analogy to be successful. Next time someone tries to pull this "if only people were educated they wouldn't be pro-life" nonsense, or the "Theocracy!" shrieking, just point at that European countries have far, far more restrictive abortion laws (many outlawing post-20 week abortions), and ask if they think that Europeans are stupid theocrats. They'll probably refuse to believe you, though. There's just no educating some people...>

I just want to say that Bubba and Silicon Valley Steve's comments make a great deal of sense to me, though I also agree with Rod Dreher's sentiments about the sadness of losing a way of life.

Not even our home planet or solar system will be here forever, though. Or our universe. All life is mortal, and I suppose that includes civilizations, cultures, and classes of people.>

The basic problem in Kansas is that commercial agriculture has become de-humanizing. Working hard is one thing, spend every waking moment in the fields is quite another. A modern commercial farmer needs to harvest a thousand, or 5000 acres to make his equipment payments, and to buy fuel, synthetic fetilizers, weed killers, bug killers, and genetically modified seed.

And of course, that means that the farms are huge and other people are far away. The village as an institution has already died in this country, replaced by pre-fab migrant labor housing. The towns are on their way out, because the pressure to increase the size of the farm is always there.

And when the old man dies, what will become of the land? Most likely leased out to ADM, or ConAgra to be farmed by hirelings. Very few individuals have the kind of cash or credit it would take to buy enough land to get started.

I do have a suggestion to reverse the trend though. Bust the farm up into 40-100 acre parcels. Sell them cheap to people (there are plenty of them) who want to farm using organic/sustainable or even horse-powered methods. Instead of one family on that thousand-acre parcel, there'll be 10 or 20. The work will be on a human scale, and there will be a place for a people-person like Travis.>

watsy,

"I, also, think that the Democrats should support domestic partnerships and make homosexuals give up the "marriage title" for now."

Tell us, when will be the "corect" time to stand up for equality?

"It wouldn't cost them anything"

I disagree.

"and it would be a fair compromise"

FAIR? To WHOM?>