The Fiscal Times: Liz Peek: ‘Why The Elite Attack Mainstream America’

Source:The Fiscal Times– I guess this is supposed to be Middle America.

“The United States is at war. No, I don’t mean in Afghanistan or Syria; I mean right here in River City. Right here where our opinion-makers and political leaders are doing their level best to demean and discredit historical American values. A new film, Nebraska, that parodies our heartland, provides exhibit A.

Nebraska played at the Lincoln Center Film Festival in New York recently to an enthusiastic audience. Directed by Alexander Payne, whose body of work includes The Descendants, Nebraska speaks volumes about the country we live in. While one reviewer lauded the picture as a “nuanced portrait of small-town life” that “contemplates the loss of the stout Midwest that once formed America’s backbone,” I found it mean-spirited and insulting.

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Only people who actually believe that Midwesterners are mute and moronic could think this movie portrays accurately or with sympathy the folks who live in between our coasts. Rather, the film paints small-town America as culturally deprived, small-minded and venal – inhabited by folks “clinging to guns or religion,” as Barack Obama so famously put it. It’s hard to picture Johnny Carson or Warren Buffet emerging from such a bleak landscape.

This is the great divide in the U.S. today. It is not between blacks and whites – or rich and poor; it is between the elites in California or New York and ordinary people who wouldn’t know a Wagyu beefburger from an heirloom tomato. The pundits who cannot imagine how anyone can live in Nebraska’s farm country also can’t imagine why anyone ever voted for George W. Bush; they do not and cannot understand the Tea Party. And, they are scornful of what they do not understand.

The elites do not celebrate the rich history of our plains states, the struggle to tame the frontier and to create the world’s most productive agricultural society. In their hearts, they also deride the assembly line workers who built our industrial base, the hard hats who kick back with Bud at the end of their shift, instead of cozying up to the New Yorker.”

From The Fiscal Times

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Mike Gardner: CBS News Campaign 1970- ‘Alabama Governor’s Race’

Source:Mike Gardner– CBS News covering the 1970 Alabama Governor’s race.

Source:The Daily Times

“George Wallace, Albert Brewer, and Charles Woods mix it up.”

From Mike Gardner

The 1970 political campaign for George Wallace running once again to be Governor of Alabama so he would have a podium to stay in the news and continue to run for President of the United States. George Wallace’s 1970 political campaign was about staying in the news and remaining a viable candidate for the 1972 presidential election.

The new South (as its called) was not there yet, but emerging even in Alabama perhaps the reddest state in the union, was moving past racism in the sense that Anglo-Southerners were moving past the point where they wanted a racist Governor, whether it was because they were moving past racism themselves or because they no longer wanted a Governor who was so flamboyant who brought so much attention to it a lot of it negative.

Plus, African-Americans were becoming a bigger force in this state and voting more. And as a voting block needed to be taken seriously by more Progressive candidates.

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TNT Films: George Wallace (1997) Gary Sinise as Governor George C. Wallace

Source:TNT Films– Gary Sinise, as Governor George C. Wallace.

Source:The Daily Times  

“Teaser for George Wallace (1997) captured from the Contact (1997) VHS tape.”

From TNT Films

Source:IMDB– Gary Sinise as George C. Wallace

From what I’ve heard and seen, read about George Wallace the former long time Governor of Alabama, as well as multiple time presidential candidate as a Democrat, as well as an Independent, the 1997 TNT movie about him naturally called George Wallace, is a pretty accurate movie about him. George Wallace started off as a Progressive on economic policy. Things like infrastructure investment, public education, as well as higher education, housing. And was a moderate on social issues. Including civil rights, until he lost the 1958 election for Governor of Alabama.

And then George Wallace calculated politically that in order to become Governor of Alabama and have a future in national politics, especially as a Southerner, he could get by with being for economic progressivism, even tax hikes. As long as that money was doing some good for the State. With schools, roads and so forth. But that he had to run to the Right or Far-Right even on Civil Rights. That he couldn’t support integration, in order to get elected Governor of Alabama.

Even as someone who up to that point was basically a Progressive Democrat and had to been favor of states rights especially on civil rights. In order to get elected Governor of Alabama and reelected and have a future in national politics, or with another party. Which is what he did in 1968 running for President in the Independence Party and there was such a thing back then. The movie George Wallace I believe does a very good job of portraying the man George Wallace. Who was very different in public than in private.

Which is how Gary Sinise plays Governor Wallace in the movie. Someone who didn’t believe in integration in public. Even though in private got along very well with African-Americans and even managed to win some of their votes. Because he was a Progressive on economic policy. And built schools, roads, hospitals and other public infrastructure in their communities. Something that Alabama Governor’s apparently didn’t do much of in the past. And these African-American voters voted with their wallets when it came to Governor Wallace.

And thats what you see in this movie as well. Someone whose public persona was different from his private persona. And without the assassination attempt in 1972 in Laurel, Maryland, when Governor Wallace was campaigning for president in the Maryland Democratic primary, getting shot I believe in the back, maybe we have an Independence Party today. A clear third choice for Independent voters. And a party of their own that George Wallace could’ve continued to build. Along with John Anderson in 1980 and Ross Perot in the 1990s.

The TNT George Wallace movie I believe was very good. As well as the PBS documentary film about him. Setting the Woods on Fire from 2003. Because both films did their research on him and interviewed people who knew him and worked for Governor Wallace. And didn’t try to portray George Wallace as a devil or as a saint. But someone who was a lot more complicated than that, as he was.

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