The rugged hills of southeastern Ohio are rich in tradition and folklore. It is, for the most part, the only wealth in the area.
Thick, lush forests cover the hills and creep right up to the road. It is a constant battle between the trees and the people who are paid to keep the roads open.
It hangs in the small towns and villages. We drive through, and sometimes we stop and walk through the lonely business districts, wandering through the little stores. We run into some of the nicest people. And we run into some people who would be just as happy if we just kept on driving, and some who would have been even happier if we hadn’t even driven through.
This is small town America. Deeply conservative, committed Christian, and xenophobic. They don’t care much for strangers, particularly strangers with long hair, driving a Toyota, and dressing differently. I’ve heard all about small town hospitality and even encountered a few rare occurrences, but it is a hot house flower indeed.
We stopped at a giant flea market; it is a weekend event all summer. Booths are set around the parking lot at a small, rural strip mall. We wandered through the tables, some filled with the plastic detritus that was a byproduct of the late 20th century. It isn’t collectable or antique, but for those of us a certain age it is faded memories of an oddly disposable past. There were tables filled with used guns, some so full and heavy you felt sure the table would collapse under the weight of the lethal metal. Placards sprouted up randomly “we sell ammo,” “Hand Made Knives.”
There are booths stacked with NRA hats, right beside shirts that have almost graphic implications of violence and revenge. “Don’t tread on me,” “You can have my gun when you pull it from my cold, dead hands,” a personal favorite, a pistol with the caption, “If I catch you here tonight, they won’t find you tomorrow.” Shirts get more aggressive and hostile every year. Soon, it will just be “I’ll shoot you.”
At one booth, featuring tools so rusted and dirty it would have taken a real expert to tell how old they were, an older man in faded, frayed denim overalls sat under an umbrella. It shielded him from the glowering, hazy sunlight. He looked bored, and slightly irritated, the weight of the day, the humidity, the mostly silent, milling crowd was clearly starting to chafe and scrape his patience. A younger man, wearing heavy, lace up boots, a long sleeve Mossy Oak shirt and camouflage pants rushed in behind the table, animated, excited.
“Some guy just sold me a 38 revolver for a $100.00!” He said, the joy in his voice obvious. He pulled the gun out his waist band and displayed it with pride.
The man took off his hat and pushed his sweaty hair back. A sharp line defined the brown, tanned skin below the rim of the hat and the pale white above it. He took the gun and appraised it with a keen gaze and agreed it had been a good deal. He went back to looking at the crowds with a shaded, slightly indifferent hostility.
Sounds of twangy, new country radical nationalism poured from cars, pickups, and Harleys. It was everywhere and changed with the passage of each vehicle. A call and response, bouncing from the walls, washing over the crowd, and sweeping across the busy highway. It was almost maddening. One snippet of one song, quickly replaced by the next.
Poverty is a curse visited on Southeastern Ohio by years of unkind circumstances, the industry that bought wages and community to the area have moved to more hospitable environs. Iron, coal, clay bricks, all found new homes, new people. While the old people were left to scramble for what was left. Trump, who did nothing to help them, told them he would help them, and implied he was the only who could help him. This is Trump country, thick with MAGA signs, a few hearty souls with Ultra Maga signs. Mostly they are on houses whose better days have come and gone.
Hope has been in short supply for so long nobody remembers what it felt like. Trump gives them hope, they can keep their guns and their faith, and their place as majority. Prosperity will return if you just give Trump another chance.
When you ask them what has Trump has done for them, they cast about for some concrete benefit provided by Trump’s administration. It always comes down to travel bans, border walls, tariffs, things that have taken money from their pocket, left them with less, reduced their purchasing power and moved the needle even farther toward the wealthy, coastal elites they despise. They believe, though.
Trump says things that no other candidate would say. Blatantly untrue, and patently ridiculous, and they get more fantastic all the time. A geometric progression of incredible distortions. Yet his administration was as rambling and disjointed as his campaign speeches, and almost as pointless.
His former chief of staff retired 4-star Marine Corps General John Kelly, called him a moron. A sentiment echoed by Rex Tillerson, an Exxon Executive who accepted his offer to become Secretary of State, and John Bolton, his National Security Advisor.
Still, in rural America, Trump has a loyal following.
I knew an older lady, a long time ago, she lived with her son, who had to be one of the few living survivors of the ravages of polio. He had trouble walking, one leg was twisted and stiff, his right arm was atrophied and almost useless. They watched professional wrestling every Saturday evening. They loved the clear lines drawn between good and bad. There was an obvious pattern, stark, and vivid. It gave them something to believe in. It was black and white, none of the shades of grey and difficult intricacies that confuse daily life.
I don’t think they believed any of it. I never asked. It gave them some comfort, like the good old days, when good guys were good guys and bad guys were doomed to lose, eventually. Trump gives people that same sense of artificial well-being, he’s the lonely sentinel standing in the way of a shadowy, global machine inexorably swallowing entire cultures in a wild frenzy of intense insatiable hunger. I don’t know if they believe any of it. I’ve asked, and they say they do. I hope they’re lying.
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Adam Jones on Flickr under CC License
