June 13, 2025
Dear Interested Readers,
It Is Hard To Know What Comes Next And How It Will End
Since January 21st, there has been a new depressing surprise almost every day, or at least every week, and many of these surprises have a direct or indirect impact on the nation’s health. At the least, an era of immense uncertainty breeds widespread anxieties which can not be good for the mental health of a majority of Americans and the many who have allegedly come here illegally. A PEW research study last fall confirmed that a majority of Americans of both parties believe that these illeagal immigrants often take critical jobs that no one else seems to want to do. Immigrants are critically important members of our community who, despite what the president alleges, may commit fewer crimes than legal citizens.
By mid-week, the biggest surprises for me were the call-up of the National Guard and Marines in Los Angeles and Robert Kennedy’s firing of the entire 17-person CDC vaccine advisory committee. The firings by Kennedy contradict what he said he would do when he gave testimony before Senate committees during his confirmation hearings. Senator Bill Cassidy, the chairman of the Senate HELP (Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions) committee, voted to approve Kennedy’s nomination to lead HHS only after Kennedy assured him that he would not do anything like he just did. If you are working for a man who has told tens of thousands of lies as one of his primary operating principles, you probably quickly learn that a casual relationship with the truth and adherence to your word only when it is convenient are just tools in the “art of the deal.”
In the aftermath of the obliteration of the vaccine committee and the occupation of LA by the National Guard and the Marines, two other events made me shudder. First, I heard that ABC had cut ties with long-term (28 years) newsman, Terry Moran, for writing on “X” that Stephen Miller, the deputy White House chief of staff, and President Trump were “world-class haters.” It seems that we now live in an era where criticising the government makes you a liability to your employer, who may fear being sued or otherwise somehow penalized by the government. ABC has already settled one lawsuit with the president.
Have we seen the beginning of the end of free speech? Perhaps, Moran just couldn’t “take it” anymore like the character played by Peter Finch, who won an Oscar for best actor ( posthumously) in the 1976 movie “Network.” Finch’s character was about to be fired as a network news anchor when he yelled, “I am mad as hell, and I can’t take it anymore.” Each week has its surprises, and many of them, like Kennedy’s action, are likely to undermine the health of the nation.
The second event was even more startling. Senator Alex Padillo of California was wrestled to the ground and handcuffed when, during a news conference in Los Angeles, he tried to ask a challenging question of Kristi Noem, the Secretary of Homeland Security. One of my favorite commentators, former Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin, summed up the event succinctly on her new Substack outlet, The Contrarian. Late yesterday, she wrote:
…We witnessed something today only seen in dictatorial regimes. California Democratic Senator Alex Padilla exercised his First Amendment rights and fulfilled his constitutional obligations to ask a question of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem while in his home state. He was viciously manhandled, thrown to the ground, and handcuffed. This is fascism. If this is how they treat a U.S. Senator, you can imagine the unprovoked brutality being deployed against ordinary people in Los Angeles. Americans MUST turn out in overwhelming numbers on June 14 to peacefully protest the violent, unconstitutional, and tyrannical actions of the Trump regime. This is an all-hands-on-deck moment…
If you have not seen the video of the event, just click on either of the last two links. I hope that it is not a chilling preview of what is to come.
I can’t restrain myself from asking three questions that have no certain answers. What comes next? How long till it ends? Is there any way to stop it, cut our losses, and begin recovery? It occurs to me that I would frequently ask similar questions when I was caring for a patient with complex medical problems.
One hope that I have had is that as prices rise and access to government programs and services is denied, some of those blue-collar voters who will surely be harmed will realize that their loyalty has empowered a kleptocracy that only feigns loyalty to their interests and values. I have given up the hope that many of the president’s wealthier supporters or Republican officeholders will turn away from him because of his manifest crudeness, cruelty, criminality, and clumsy foreign policy. They seem not to be concerned by his ruinous policies for healthcare and the economy, or by his numerous attempts to undermine the constitutional and political norms required for our democracy to hold together in our pluralistic country.
My hope that his economically disadvantaged voters would turn against him was undermined this week as I read a “Guest Essay” written by Professor Arlie Russell Hochschild in the “Opinion” section of The New York Times. You may remember that I have written extensively about two of her books. In 2024, she published Stolen Pride: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right. Back in 2016, I was amazed by how she captured the feelings of conservative voters suffering from the environmental disasters in Louisiana in Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. Ironically, both books were published just before President Trump won a presidential election. I must not have understood the deeper meaning of either book because I have clung to the hope that eventually working-class MAGA voters would turn on the president as they realized that he really wasn’t interested in their practical troubles.
In her guest essay published this week in the New York Times entitled My Journey Deep In The Heart Of Trump Country, Professor Hochschild blows away my fantasy. She has returned to Pikeville, Kentucky, and its surrounding Appalachian communities that have been economically devastated by the loss of coal mining jobs and opioid addiction. The area has one of the highest percentages of the population that depends on government subsidies, like SNAP, Medicaid, disability income, and fuel assistance, in the country. All of these programs will be compromised by the programmatic cuts that are likely to be necessary if Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” is passed as is expected. In my mind, this should be a bridge too far on the MAGA journey. Professor Hochschild doesn’t buy it. She returns to several of the people she interviewed for Stolen Pride and confirms that their support for Trump lies not in his approaches to their economic woes, but rather is in response to his supposed war against the sources of their “shame.” These are the people that Hillary Clinton disrespected with her label “a basket of deplorables.” Professor Hochschild paints the picture:
In the 2024 election, 81 percent of Kentucky’s Fifth Congressional District — the whitest and third poorest in the nation — voted …for Donald Trump. Once full of New Deal Democrats, the region had suffered losses that its people felt modern Democrats didn’t care about or address. … the coal mines closed, and the drug crisis crept in.
In 2016, Mr. Trump’s answer to these losses took the form of policy promises and a story. Many of the policies he promised never panned out…
…But Mr. Trump’s story of stolen pride did take hold. With the fall of coal and American manufacturing, he told his followers, you lost your pride. That’s because others stole it from you, just as they stole the 2020 election, and they still want more — your guns, your families, your way of life. I’ll take revenge on them, he declared: on the pet-eating immigrants, uppity women, spying international students, idle government workers, and the institutions behind them — the universities, the mainstream press, the judiciary, the deep state…
In the first months of Mr. Trump’s second term, his story of loss, shame, blame and retribution has split the country…
What do things feel like, I wondered, to the people in Kentucky’s Fifth District? Are we approaching a tipping point when they might start to question Mr. Trump — either because of his threats to democracy, or because his economic policies will make their lives tougher? After all, experts predict Mr. Trump’s tariffs will raise prices, and his budget cuts will hit some of his strongest supporters the hardest…These are services people need. More than 40 percent of people in the Fifth District rely on Medicaid for their medical care, including addiction treatment. Now, Mr. Trump’s “big beautiful bill” is poised to cut benefits, which could lead to layoffs in the largest employer in eastern Kentucky, the Pikeville Medical Center. Meanwhile, many children in the district qualify for food stamps, and the administration’s chain saw is coming for those, too.
These cuts have led Colmon Elridge, the head of Kentucky’s beleaguered Democratic Party, who is Black, to wryly remark, “If somebody who looks like me is your enemy, then you don’t care if the guy in the White House is peeing on your leg and telling you it’s rain.”
What did she discover when she reinterviewed the people whose stories she had told with compassion and concern in Stolen Pride? Her response was enlightening, although it undermined my fantasy that the beleaguered would eventually realize that they were being used. She continues:
When I checked back in with many of the Trump supporters whose lives I describe in my most recent book, “Stolen Pride,” to see if this had changed any of their minds, the overall answer seemed to be no. Some seemed more committed to Mr. Trump than they had been before.
…the rise in prices and loss of benefits haven’t hit yet.
Mr. Trump’s angry tone didn’t seem to bother his supporters in the district. Calling his opponents scum? “Oh, that’s how Trump talks. People know how he talks, and they voted for him. I wouldn’t talk that way and don’t like it, but I’m glad I voted for him,” said Andrew Scott, a Trump supporter and mayor of Coal Run Village, a town of around 1,600 nestled next to Pikeville.
As for the likely cuts to Medicaid, SNAP and Meals on Wheels, Mr. Scott mused, “You know how proud and stoic Appalachians are — we know how to take a little pain. People,” he explained, “may have to suffer now to help make America great later. Trump’s tariffs could raise prices but that will force companies to gradually relocate to the U.S.”
These people seem to be willing to be martyrs:
Many of the people I spoke to recognized that this bill would create some pain for them or their neighbors, but that didn’t seem to bother them. One Trump supporter told me that if you like the guy who’s making you suffer, you don’t mind so much. As Mr. Trump himself has put it, America is akin to a sick patient, and the tariffs are the surgery — “The patient lived, and is healing.”
Perhaps there is a little hope. Some of the people interviewed did try to imagine the full impact of the “Big Beautiful Bill” and the tariffs.
[A drug counselor] had a different take on the Appalachian pain threshold: “A lot of people around here are living on the edge. If we start to see Trump policies lead to price hikes and benefit cuts — especially Medicaid and Social Security and food stamps — some people will begin to say, ‘Wait a minute. I didn’t vote for this.’”
[A woman] who since age 18 had always worked one job, sometimes two, still thinks back to her panic at losing her job a year ago. “We had to apply for food stamps. It took quite a while to process my SNAP application. My husband and I couldn’t turn to friends for a loan because they were having financial issues too,” she said. “In the end, I couldn’t pay my bills and also eat. However hard you work, you never know when you’ll need help.” …
…If there were anxieties about budget cuts among the people I talked with, they seem to be privately held. No one seemed worried about Mr. Trump’s deportations.
Professor Hochschild identified that the deportations Trump were making most of those interviewed very happy, even if they knew and at times employed a deportee. In describing her conversation with one who favored the deportations, she writes:
With every deportation, it seemed as if Mr. Trump was returning his stolen pride.
By the time I got to the end of the article, I had lost most of the hope I had generated as I tried to imagine that those who voted against their own economic interests would someday finally figure out that they had been conned. She seemed to anticipate my disappointment and tried to answer the logical follow-up question. She wrote:
So what can be done? Democrats are deeply unpopular. According to a March poll, only 27 percent of registered voters have a positive view of the Democratic Party…it will be [difficult] for the party to break through when Mr. Trump has so powerfully captured the bitterness and pain that has taken root in the hills of Appalachia…
One interviewee added more context:
…“Around here, Democrats come off as against this and against that — and not for anything. They need a big positive alternative vision. And they need to understand that in rural areas like this, the deeper problem is that we’re socially hollowed out. That happy buzz of community life? That’s not here… A lot of kids are alone in their rooms online with Dungeons and Dragons. I think MAGA plays to a social desert.”
Hochschild’s quick take:
In many local minds, the word “Democrat” is no longer associated with openness, daring, imagination and care. During the last administration, Democratic attempts to build a green America, which many Kentuckians support, fell on deaf ears because the people providing these ideas were Democrats…
…For now, Mr. Trump’s support isn’t fading. So Democrats face a double task. America needs a firm hand on the wheel of democracy — defending the free press, universities, the judiciary. At the same time, Democrats need to begin taking steps to regain the basic trust of voters who once supported them.
That starts with confronting, up close and personal, the circumstances that have led red America into the angry fires of a stolen pride narrative: visit, listen, campaign everywhere, propose policies that could elevate local politicians whose stories resonate nationally and begin to restore the civic fabric of life in towns like Coal Run Village and Pikeville…
…Whomever Democrats choose as their standard-bearer, we cannot leave it up to them; to choose wise leaders and strengthen a challenged democracy, we need all hands on deck.
The final comment was a hopeful warning. I bolded part of the message.
…the addiction counselor, offered this important warning. “If people in Pike County or elsewhere get socked with higher prices, there might come a tipping point. But what happens then would hinge on how Democrats handle it, what better ideas they have to offer, their tone of voice. If the left starts scolding, ‘You Trump supporters brought this on yourselves,’ or ‘We told you so,’ people around here will get more pissed at the snarky left than they are at the hurtful right — and Trump will march on.”
The advice should ring true for any experienced clinician. It is the rare patient who responds positively to a scolding. Hillary Clinton discovered that you don’t win elections by making scornful remarks about a significant percentage of the voters. Empathy and sympathy, coupled with good, understandable policies, could eventually win the day, but “we told you so” comments are unlikely to do the trick.
Democrats once were the voice of the working class. It is not impossible to be both the voice of the working class and introduce progressive ideas, but I fear it will not be possible by continuing to make fun of Trump and those who see him as a source of hope. When or if the time comes when Trump’s erratic nature, the failures of his entourage of sycophants, or the self-serving actions of the Republican politicians who should know better lead to the implosion of the MAGA world, the challenge will be to avoid long “we told you so” rants. It seems that Hochschild is suggesting that care and an attempt to understand how the tragedy occurred will be required before true repair can occur. I fear that finding the road back for better healthcare delivery, medical science research, and the reestablishment of an effective public health infrastructure will be delayed until a process of healing and understanding finally occurs.
Arlie Russell Hochschild, at age 85, is one half of an octogenarian West Coast intellectual “power couple.” Her husband, Adam Hochschild, aged 82, is an acclaimed journalist and author of prize-winning books of history. They both teach at UC Berkley. Adam Hochschild recently published a piece in the Washington Post that offers both a historical perspective and a little hope for the durability of our democracy, and the reassurance that in time, “this too will pass.” The article was published in early April and is entitled “America was at its Trumpiest 100 years ago. Here’s how to prevent the worst.”
The article reviews the issues that surrounded our entrance to World War I and the unconstitutional use of imprisonment of dissidents, suppression of the press, and our flirtation with autocracy in the teens and twenties of a hundred years ago. The male Hochschild writes early in his piece:
It is easy to imagine that constitutional rights are under greater threat today than ever in the past. But history suggests otherwise. Although much of what happened during and after World War I is now long forgotten, Americans in those years saw the federal government act in ways that — so far — Trump can only dream of.
It shut down some 75 newspapers and magazines it found too critical and censored several hundred specific issues of others.
It threw into prison roughly 1,000 Americans for a year or more — and a far larger number for shorter periods — solely for things they wrote or said.
And the Justice Department — now the center of so much perversion — chartered a nationwide vigilante group, the American Protective League. Its 250,000 members seized, roughed up and detained suspected draft evaders, violently broke up peace demonstrations, and joined government agents in raiding left-wing and labor organizations.
Just over a century ago, a major war, fear of foreign subversion and an administration with little respect for civil liberties unleashed several years of the worst repression in the United States since the immediate aftermath of slavery. What is unfolding in the country today is different in many ways, but this earlier period holds lessons for us about how swiftly the government can take away basic freedoms — and about our need to be vigilant to be sure it doesn’t happen again.
The story he tells is one that has been glossed over or not taught in our schools, nor is it likely to be taught, as our curricula are sanitized to hide many of our most regrettable but instructive historical events. I urge you to read it. I will jump to his conclusions and suggestions:
The crisis Americans are in today is at least as severe as the one back then, but in different ways. Although ominous conflicts exist abroad, the United States is not itself at war, and we are spared the hysteria that can come with that. And we do have a vocal, outspoken opposition, armed with means of instant communication unimaginable during World War I. But we also have a president who has let convicted vigilantes out of jail, who shutters agencies lawfully established by Congress, who defies judges’ rulings and who sounds fiercely determined to humiliate, jail or deport his enemies. What are the lessons for us today of that sorry time a hundred years ago?
A summary of his suggestions follows. I will leave the reading of the expanded explanations to you.
- First, speak out in every way possible…
- Second, celebrate that we’re a nation of states, and make use of it. States have considerable power and can often outflank Washington’s madness…
- Third, despite the fire hose of distortions from right-wing TV and radio, despite Facebook abandoning fact-checking, we still have independent news media. We need more of it. Facts matter. Much of our mass media is far bolder, more investigative, less willing to take for granted what the government says, than the media of a century ago…
- Finally, look for every possible way to fight back against the destruction of institutions that have served us well…New nonviolent resistance efforts will emerge in the weeks ahead. Watch for them. Join them.
I don’t know if there will be a “No Kings” gathering near you this weekend that will be occurring during the military parade in Washington. There will be one, rain or shine, most likely rain, in my little town. I plan to attend as a way of complying with Adam Hochschild’s last suggestion. I urge you to also look for one near you. Showing up once won’t fix things, but it is a worthy activity if you are concerned about the future of healthcare, improving the Social Determinants of Health, and preserving and restoring our democracy. I feel like going to a demonstration will be a beginning in the search for the answer to my third question.
Remember my earlier questions?
What comes next?
How long till it ends?
Is there any way to stop it, cut our losses, and begin recovery?
Summer Comes and Goes, But Is Mostly a Mid-Week Phenomenon
The prediction for the weekend weather for my neck of the woods is that we will get rain for the thirteenth weekend in a row. When it is not raining, it will still be cloudy and the temperature will be stuck in the low 60s, but it will feel even chillier with the rain and a little breeze. We haven’t had a clear, dry weekend since mid-March. We have had some very nice mid-week days like the one pictured in the header of this letter.
I shouldn’t really care which days a bright and clear and which days are rainy, because when you are retired, every day is theoretically like Saturday, but I do care since most family and social events are scheduled for weekends.
The picture in today’s header was taken by my good friend and neighbor, Steve Wolf. His house is across the road and up a rise from my house. As you can see, the Wolfs have a great view of our lake from their deck. Steve moors his very fast, powerful, and quite comfortable “Supra” wakeboat a few yards off our dock. He generously provides us with lovely evening cruises around the lake when the weather makes that a great idea. He is also an experienced teacher of wake surfing. He has taught my children and grandchildren the sport, and recently, when my granddaughter had a multiday party with nine of her college friends from Bowdoin here after their graduation, he and his wife, Anita, pulled all of them around the lake each day! What a gift!
What I like best about the picture is the rhododendrons in the foreground. This time of year, New London is one big rhododendron garden. The two positive things about all of our rain are that any worries about a drought are over, and everything is green and growing. Everywhere I look, I see flowers. They are in gardens, but also along the roadways and in open fields. I am hopeful that by July, we will be having good weather on the weekends because on the first weekend of July, we are having about fifty friends and family members over to help me celebrate my 80th birthday! I am joining the Hochschilds as an octogenarian. They are great role models as I try to figure out how to be an active octogenarian.
I hope that, whether it rains or shines on you this weekend, you will join me in trying to think about something other than the military parade in Washington that ostensibly will celebrate the 250th anniversary of our military or Flag Day. The president is likely to have a joyous day as he celebrates his 79th birthday, but my joy will come at the “No Kings” protest. Will you join me and show up at a No King demonstration near you?
Be well,
Gene
