November 7, 2004
NO CONCEPT:
Talk to someone in Cincinnati? Are you crazy?': . . . and so the Democrats blew it
(Tom Wolfe, 11/07/04, Times of London)
The liberal elite showed it was way out of touch even before the election. I was at a dinner party in New York and when everyone was wondering what to do about Bush I suggested they might do like me and vote for him. There was silence around the table, as if I’d said “by the way, I haven’t mentioned this before but I’m a child molester”.Posted by Orrin Judd at November 7, 2004 12:54 PMNow, like Chicken Licken after an acorn fell on his head, they think the sky is falling. I have to laugh. It reminds me of Pauline Kael, the film critic, who said, “I don’t know how Reagan won — I don’t know a soul who voted for him.” That was a classic and reflects the reaction of New York intellectuals now. Note my definition of “intellectual” here is what you often find in this city: not people of intellectual attainment but more like car salesmen, who take in shipments of ideas and sell them on.
I think the results in Ohio, the key state this time, tell us everything we need to know. Overall, the picture of Republican red and Democratic blue across the country remained almost unchanged since last time. The millions of dollars spent and miles travelled on the Bush and Kerry campaigns made no difference at all.
But look at Ohio and the different voting patterns in Cleveland and Cincinnati. Cleveland, in the north of the state, is cosmopolitan, what we would think of as an “eastern” city, and Kerry won by two votes to one. Cincinnati, in the southeast corner of Ohio, is a long way away both geographically and culturally. It’s Midwestern and that automatically means “hicksville” to New York intellectuals. There Bush won by a margin of 150,000 votes and it was southern Ohio as a whole that sent him back to the White House.
The truth is that my pals, my fellow journos and literary types, would feel more comfortable going to Baghdad than to Cincinnati. Most couldn’t tell you what state Cincinnati is in and going there would be like being assigned to a tumbleweed county in Mexico.
They can talk to sheikhs in Lebanon and esoteric radical groups in Uzbekistan, but talk to someone in Cincinnati . . . are you crazy? They have no concept of what America is made of and even now they won’t see that.
There's more Sumerian gold in the Cincinnati museum than in Iraq.
I don't know why Cincinnati was more red than Cleveland, but it wasn't because Cincinnati is Hicksville, as even Wolfe seems to think.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at November 7, 2004 2:11 PMHe also makes a mistake about Ms. Kael's mistake -- it was the Nixon election in 1972, not Reagan in 1980 that left her with the shock of not knowing anyone who voted for the Republican (though I'm sure the same thing held true eight years later). Nevertheless, Wolfe does a good job explaining to the Brits why those they most come in contact with from the colonies were so out of touch with the rest of America last Tuesday.
Posted by: John at November 7, 2004 2:29 PMMr. Wolfe (or his editor) is coasting: not only the Nixon/Reagan thing but Cincinnati is 'in the southeast corner of Ohio'.
No wonder the Kerry people had trouble getting out the vote there.
Posted by: old maltese at November 7, 2004 6:09 PMOnce again, my suspicion is confirmed: that there are more Americans who know about the Caucasus (and other such places) than there are Europeans who know about regions and sub-regions in the USA.
On the whole, it appears that the 'blue' staters (especially in NYC and LA) are more provincial than 'red' staters. Strange, given that most of the blue New Yorkers probably came from somewhere else.
Posted by: jim hamlen at November 7, 2004 7:15 PMI thought Hicksville is in Nassau County, NY.
Posted by: Joseph Hertzlinger at November 7, 2004 9:07 PMThe tragedy is that the best ice cream in the known physical universe is made in Cincinnati by Greaters. Although they have stores in Columbus and a few other cities in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana.
If you decide to mail order, you must buy at least one of the Choclate Chip flavors.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at November 7, 2004 9:40 PMAside from getting his Kael wrong, it seems to me Wolfe's also mistaken about his chickens.
Must be due to post-election elation.
(Just imagine being a Bush supporter living in NYC and rubbing shoulders with the cocktail party 'n dinner circuit. A mid-autumn schadenfreudian's dream!)
Posted by: Barry Meislin at November 8, 2004 4:35 AMActually, Cincinnati has one of the great French restaurants in America, La Maisonette, better than anything in NYC since Soltner sold Lutece and La Cote Basque closed.
Wolfe is right about the non-intellectual nature of NYC 'intellectuals.' They are like fans rather than creators of intellectual life. One can easily see them buying a velvet portrait of Noam Chomsky or Kurt Vonnegut for the living room.
Posted by: Bart at November 8, 2004 7:04 AMBart, one would hope the velvet portrait of Noam isn't a nude like Orrin's "Maggie".
Posted by: Randall Voth at November 8, 2004 10:15 AMWolfe is right about the non-intellectual nature of NYC 'intellectuals.' They are like fans rather than creators of intellectual life.
Not "fans". FANBOYS.
Posted by: Ken at November 8, 2004 12:40 PMGreaters is fine ice cream but its nowhere near a good as Braum's in Oklahoma.
Posted by: jefferson park at November 8, 2004 4:18 PMSomehow, I doubt the crack about not knowing what state Cincinnati is in. But anybody who doesn't . . . well, that's one of those things any baseball or football fan learns in the early years; how can you not know from whence come the Reds and the Bengals?
Posted by: Crank at November 8, 2004 8:50 PM