CURTIS, Nebraska - The only health clinic here is shutting down, and the hospital CEO has blamed Medicaid cuts in President Donald Trump’s signature legislation. But residents of Curtis - a one-stoplight town in deep-red farm country - aren’t buying that explanation.
“Anyone who’s saying that Medicaid cuts is why they’re closing is a liar,” April Roberts said, as she oversaw lunch at the Curtis Area Senior Center.
But Kemp, a lifelong Republican and Trump supporter, doesn’t hold that against Trump and suggested he might change course. “I really think he’s gonna do something,” she said.
It’s this kind of thinking I find staggering. Trump has done something - it’s his bill that caused the problem he’s not going to change course. I don’t understand why Trump voters want to judge Trump on his words rather than his actions. They’re amongst those who are going to suffer to preserve tax cuts that won’t benefit them.
It’s not thinking at all, really. It’s feeling. They don’t know the difference. They feel like Trump should, or will, do something. So that makes it true for them.
The “participation trophies are bad” crowd have embraced the idea that all opinions are equally valid rather than judged on merit. So they get to live in a world where they can shape reality on vibes. They have no use for critical thought.
When they say “I think…” what we should hear is “I wish.”
As the saying goes, you can’t logic someone out of something they didn’t logic themselves into.
The “participation trophies are bad” crowd have embraced the idea that all opinions are equally valid rather than judged on merit.
This is an interesting sentence. It is accurate, but seems contradictory. People who are bad at sportsball don’t deserve recognition, but people who are bad at thinking should be treated with the same respect as scholars and people with real world experience.
people who are bad at thinking should be treated with the same respect as scholars and people with real world experience.
This reminds me of a quote from Isaac Asimov:
Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that ‘my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.’
Of the people I know, this goes well with the self-centered worldview (e.g., things finally click once they’re personally affected).
Participation trophies in sports are bad, because they’re good at sports which makes them feel superior. Thinking shouldn’t be competitive though, because they suck at it.
Yes. They have complained for decades that trophies shouldn’t go to losers, because it breeds weakness and complacency. But they only apply that to others. It’s classic projection. It goes hand in hand with the devaluation of education and expertise.
As if people are proudly displaying participation trophies rather than tossing it out in shame and getting back to training
It goes hand in hand with the devaluation of education and expertise.
Another excellent point of hypocrisy, in my experience. There’s a massive (complete?) overlap between people I know who think “no child left behind” is a good thing (despite making high school diplomas, effectively, participation trophies) and people who think a high school diploma should be sufficient education qualifications for any job.
I don’t understand why Trump voters want to judge Trump on his words rather than his actions.
Because it’s simpler. Actions are many and have complex chains of reactions leading to various outcomes.
Meanwhile, after the election he literally said “I’m going to fix everything now.” Simple, easy, and something objectively positive. Like the other comment pointed out, this isn’t a decision arrived at by thinking about things.
I think if they had good judgement, they wouldn’t be trump voters.
Additionally many of them have a “take it on faith” behavior, because that’s been drilled into them by their churches and communities for decades. Thinking critically would have been punished. It’s hard behavior to unlearn. People were denying covid with their death rattles from covid.
Simple, get rid of organised religion.
They’re taught to blindly put their faith into a higher power, and good things will come to them if they do.
lol
I think at this point it has to be considered that it is an actual mental issue!
I think the point that keeps getting forgotten is that these people don’t even hear about the bad things that Trump does most of the time and, when they do, it comes with spin to make it sound like a good thing. Mostly, they just hear about how much they are winning, how perfect the administration is… how great this administration has been for the economy, how much they have helped minorities but not in a way that will displace white people… how perfectly they are winning on the international stage, how perfectly the most recent special military action went, how much the rest of the world respects the US, how quickly other countries are giving in to our terriffs.
They don’t hear truth and, at this point, they are so brainwashed that they wouldn’t know what to do with the truth if they encountered it.
They don’t hear truth and, at this point, they are so brainwashed that they wouldn’t know what to do with the truth if they encountered it.
Well, we can see what they do with it right here: throw it right the fuck out. This is literally the scroll of truth meme irl.
Why would Biden do this to us?!
Thanks Obama
I realize you’re being sarcastic, but I’m going to answer you anyway. Biden didn’t do anything meaningful to change things because he and his family were profiting handsomely off the status quo.
Needs more middle fingers and dicks hidden in the embroidered border.
People say this knife i stuck in my neck is the cause of my bleeding.
Horse feathers!
I’m over here in a corner wondering just how hard our ruling parties have to fail before the cultish devotion goes away.
Cults go down with their leaders… Not their devotion.
Republicans could round up Republican voters and gun them down on the street while waving Trump flags and their voters would assume it was Biden’s fault.
Million dead from covid last time and they were still calling it fake while dying on a respirator I dont think were getting anyone to think their way out of this
that will never happen. even as they are starving and dehydrated from lack of food and clean water they will mutter with their dying breath “thanks Biden”.
As a primary factor, running a clinic with a population of 806 with the current payout structure of Medicare, Medicaid, and insurance companies is frankly unsustainable. It’s not wrong to say the Medicaid cuts are not the primary factor, just the last straw in an already broken model. Giving service to a community that small and spread out takes state subsidies or the regional health care system eating the losses. It sounds likely this crew would be hostile to the former and are mad that the nonprofit can’t continue to afford the latter as the Medicaid cuts squeeze them more.
Much of these services are offered primarily to avoid 30 day readmission penalties that CMS hits hospitals with after discharging people to areas with no follow up care. It essentially externalizes the cost of providing this care into regional health systems. But eventually they’ll find other avenues, like very targeted home visits and increasing nursing home admissions, as the costs get unsustainable. And then the costs of this lack of access are externalized right back onto the community.
Horse feathers!
That’s some down-home terminology right there. :)
I read that in a Foghorn Leghorn voice.
Hoss fethuhs!
I said… I said
They are sooooo close. Yes, our system of health care, which requires private partnerships that need to profit is the problem. And, the current party in power is exacerbating that issue. Theses people can be brought into the fold if you don’t spend your time doing victory laps for being right. End of the day they are still humans that deserve health care, regardless of if they voted “wrong”.
My experience is that a lot of people are completely closed to factual argument. It’s like their brains shut down as soon as you introduce a number. They’re not necessarily stupid people, just intimidated or untrained in information, and I find it very difficult to communicate with someone who puts equal weight in some pundit saying, “US healthcare is the best in the world” and an OECD chart that shows US life expectancy is 5 years shorter than “peer” nations.
Theses people can be brought into the fold if you don’t spend your time doing victory laps for being right.
I actually agree with you, but I don’t think these people in particular are the ones coming into the fold. It’s the ones who are realizing they’ve been lied to and changing their minds, and yes, people really, really need to stop throwing it back in those people’s faces.
To me, we’ve hit 1941, and folks need to understand that you’re going to have to ally with a few Russians with whom you have a mutual disdain if you want to take down the fascists.
Maybe. Maybe some are too deep, but you don’t need all of them. The margins are tight enough converting a few percentage to agree with a public option is enough to make it happen.
It’s the ones who are realizing they’ve been lied to and changing their minds, and yes, people really, really need to stop throwing it back in those people’s faces.
If they can’t handle being mocked for making stupid decisions in the past then they will just go right back to voting for the leopards as soon as things improve ir pressure from the fascists increases. They should feel shame and actually learn from it.
They should feel shame and actually learn from it.
This point-of-view is shortsighted and silly. Those votes are needed, and you just saw it nine short months ago. At some point you are going to have to grow up a little.
That is the kind of attitude that leads to Harris courting Republicans like Cheney without addressing all of the terrible shit Cheney does support.
Worked out great!
The problem wasn’t that Harris courted Cheney.
It was that she stared down a whole population of Americans who got poorer under Biden and said publicly: “I wouldn’t do anything differently.” It also didn’t help that she told all of these increasingly impoverished people to just be joyful for three months of her campaign before even addressing anything policy-wise.
But, at the end of the day, if you want people’s votes, you’re going to have to figure out how to display some level of empathy, because openly hating everyone who votes differently hasn’t worked to win them over to your side.
I’m not convinced that “showing empathy” is the way to court Republicans. It’s just seen as weakness, and weakness is a joke to them.
I’m thinking back to my grandmother’s funeral in Appalachia. She had a small terrier as her companion in her final years. They were inseparable. Multiple of her male relatives made the joke “I thought we were just going to toss the dog in the grave and bury him with her”. Hardy-har har. The dog was small and therefore weak and therefore a joke.
There were similar scenes between my mom and her coworkers when my dad was in hospital dieing of COVID-19. I’m not going into them because I already done triggered myself.
Anyways, that’s how I ended up with a surprise dog to take back home to a blue state. He’s still a good boy, even though he’s now a grumpy teenager.
I’m not convinced that “showing empathy” is the way to court Republicans.
I feel like I’m being very clear here, but let me clarify.
I’m not referring to the sadistic people that you’re referencing. There is, I think, a distinct difference between the cultists and the voters that Democrats can scrape off with a little effort.
I’m referring to the ones who are showing regret for their vote, because most Democrats seem content to push away all those votes without any regard for the fact that you absolutely need to flip the people you can in order to change the party alignment of the Federal Government.
But, at the end of the day, if you want people’s votes, you’re going to have to figure out how to display some level of empathy, because openly hating everyone who votes differently hasn’t worked to win them over to your side.
First of all, I hate them for who and what they voted for and not becsuse it happened to be different. This isn’t some pick a team and hate everyone else thing, they chose evil.
I also don’t want their votes, and chasing those votes is a fool’s errand. Spending the time motivating disengaged people to show up like Obama and other candidates with positive messaging is the path to success.
But Facebook told me to blame anyone who looks different than me.
