An abandoned gas station in East Lynn, W.Va., a coal mining town.
Credit: Luke Sharrett/ The New York Times
“If you live in the Midwest, where else do you want to live besides Chicago? You don’t want to live in Cincinnati or Cleveland or, you know, these armpits of America.” So declared Stephen Moore, the man Donald Trump wants to install on the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors, during a 2014 event held at a think tank called, yes, the Heartland Institute.
The crowd laughed.
Moore is an indefensible choice on many grounds. Even if he hadn’t shown himself to be extraordinarily misogynistic and have an ugly personal history, his track record on economics — always wrong, never admitting error or learning from it — is utterly disqualifying.
His remarks about the Midwest, however, highlight more than his unsuitability for the Fed. They also provide an illustration of something I’ve been noticing for a while: The thinly veiled contempt conservative elites feel […]
The contempt Dear Leader and his cronies feel toward the very people who voted for him is not surprising. He and people like Moore know, even admit, how easy it’s been to fool them by using fear and hate as weapons. They think the voters are just plain stupid and thus easily manipulated into believing just about anything.
I don’t. The problem is the appalling state of elementary and secondary school education in this country. The ignorance I see about American history and civics is incredible. Add the fact that kids are not taught to think critically compounds the problem.
It those two facts together and it’s easy to see why millions would vote for people like current Shite House occupant.