A Deaf Ear to Heaven

Years ago, roughly when I was around 30, I wrote a detective novel. It was called "Deaf Ear to Heaven" because the bad guy was a rich TV preacher with a powerful hearing aid in one ear. His extremist allies were part of a plot to establish control of the country.

I even secured an agent in Houston to peddle my dime store Raymond Chandler opus, and we met periodically to go over edits and such, usually to the accompaniment of prodigious glasses of scotch. I was not surprised later when told by another client that the woman had died of cirrhosis. I decided eventually that the plot was too derivative, and have been rewriting sporadically over the years. So sporadically, in fact, that should it ever be published, any profits will go to my heirs.

But I had one scene set at a large religious rally held in the old Astrodome, which tells you how long ago it was. As my detective protagonist looked at the adoring faces of the crowd, enraptured by the Swaggartesque preacher, he realized he couldn't blame them for their fealty. They had been snookered by a very talented con man who used their real and sincere faith to make money and gain power.

All by telling them what they wanted to hear. It's society's fault, and he had all the answers to a sinful and misguided world.

Now, I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this. There is a large segment of our American neighbors who are very traditional and confused by the direction of the country. They may have deeply held religious values and are offended by all the talk about gay marriage and trans folks. They might have grown up in a time, as I did, when a kid could earn a good living without a college degree at a local factory.

They went to the movies and watched John Wayne take care of our Indian problems in the Old West. OK, he did avoid service in WWII, but they can ignore that. They watched Scarlet O'Hara and her retinue of loyal servants negotiate the post-Civil War South. And if you tell them the real history of our treatment of African-Americans and Native-Americans, they suspect you hate the country. Even using those names makes them suspicious.

You can explain the dangers of climate change and with memories of the muscle cars of their youth, they can't believe that in one lifetime we have reached a danger point. OK, summers are hotter, storms are bigger, and glaciers are melting, but I don't want to give up my Camaro.

Then someone comes along who tells them they don't have to. They can believe that the Wayne version of history is correct. You can rest easy that with an integrated military and workforce, we have solved all those pesky problems. They are still angry that school prayers over the PA system are no more, so let's put them back. They don't even like hearing a Spanish translation when they call the bank or phone company.

And it's because that's not the world we used to know.

But that world is now more, well, worldly. Traditional American brands and products are just not made here anymore. Want to buy a Winchester, the gun that won the west? Well, they are produced in Belgium, Portugal, Turkey, and Japan and have been since 2006 when the original New Haven plant closed.

What would the Duke say?

Levi's?  China, Bangladesh, Vietnam, India, Mexico and other countries are currently the production and manufacturing countries of Levi’s jeans.

That Daisy air rifle I had as a kid, now looks slightly different. This is their model 25, made continuously since 1914.

And it's still going strong...

But now, you'll see this...

Did you have a Schwinn bicycle as a kid? I didn't because everything I had from bikes to BB guns to blue jeans came from Sears. But there is no more iconic American brand than Schwinn, right? Well, again, think China.

My first wristwatch was a good, old American Timex, and I still have a couple. It is among the oldest watch brands in the world, beginning in Waterbury, Connecticut in 1854. It's older than Rolex, Omega, or any of the other ultra brands.

Nice, eh? Well, thank China and the Philippines now.

And, if you are wondering why, and more importantly in this political climate, why these companies don't come back to the states, the answer is simple. And it's actually simpler than the President will admit. The average Chinese manufacturing worker wage is just over $14,000 a year versus $52,000 in the US.

What will that watch, bike, BB gun or pair of jeans cost then, and are average Americans willing to pay it?

No matter what lame explanation is coming out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the administration chickened out on preventing Nippon Steel from taking over US Steel. They can call it a merger, but like Fiat and Chrysler, the foreign entity will run the show. TACO indeed.

You add these realities to all the rest, and there are a lot of Americans who are just plain angry. What happened to the country I grew up in? Why to I have to listen to things I don't agree with and buy foreign junk?

And why are things so expensive? Thank heavens for TEMU. No, wait, uh...

But, instead of condemning anyone's hypocrisy, I think we should try to understand. There are a lot of folks, good folks, who feel ignored, abandoned, and whose world is upside down. You can understand why simple answers are so appealing.

Don't listen to those climate alarmists. Oh, and they are all probably communists, to boot. And those ivory tower snobs at Harvard? We'll show them. Let's dig more coal and outlaw windmills and solar farms. Court rulings? Aren't they all Clinton and Obama appointees? Screw 'em.

That kind of simplistic, so-called decisiveness is the answer for many when the world gets so complicated.

So, instead of telling them they are sheep and Trump is a dictator in training...

...let's try to understand, and more importantly, act like adults. Let's explain why things are the way they are and help folks face the reality that it's not 1958 and it isn't going to be again.

Unless you want to pay Rolex prices for a Timex, this is how they have to do it. A Timex worker can't live on a wage better suited to a McDonald's worker. No, actually, the average Texas yearly wage at Micky D's is $30,000, which means those Chinese factory workers are really getting shafted. Never mind.

A lot of folks want you to lose your trust in science and you can cure disease with horse paste. No names here, but the initials are RFK. They want you to think that your neighbor with an accent isn't to be trusted, even though we have lived with neighbors with accents from all over the globe for 250 years. They don't understand international trade and claim we are being ripped off by wily foreigners, and that somehow, the answer is to raise prices for stuff we import?

And the reason they are being misled is the same as for my fictional preacher, or a real one like Swaggart. Money and power. And with the power comes more money. And, if not money specifically, more deals that make more money, or even big, expensive jets.

And all that's required is to find out what people are uneasy or resentful about, and feed it. If you have to lie about debt and deficits, that's just a necessary evil. Politics is a zero-sum game. I win, they lose. It has always been, but now, the stakes are higher.

And folks are angrier.