A couple of weeks ago I stopped in to a local bar to chat with some of my “blue collar” friends. I enjoy the atmosphere and discussions concerning with these friends concerning more “down to earth” topics of life’s problems. This time my small group of friends were all wearing brand new MAGA hats! I already knew that they are pretty “conservative” folks, but was a bit surprised by a couple of them that were so proudly wearing these hats. They all know me well enough to expect some push-back from my rather liberal point of view. However, I was so surprised about this turn of events that I was speechless (an unusual condition) and just listened.
Things quickly settled down when they realized they were not going to get much of a response from me. The friend sitting closest to me said he had decided to vote for Trump. I just shock my head in disbelief, and mumbled something about being disappointed in his decision. He then surprised me by asking me to please convince him why that is a bad idea. Hum?? I was rather startled by this request – I think he was seriously asking me to help him form a position for not voting for Trump that makes sense to him, and perhaps one he can discuss with his friends when I am not there. It was an invitation. However, I was so taken by surprise by the request that I just said the reasons included just about everything Trump says and does, then I ordered another beer for the two of us and changed the subject.
Two weeks later I continue to ponder the invitation. I realize he wasn’t asking a high level big question, he was asking for detailed specific instances that he can understand. It wasn’t enough for me to point to Trump’s overall behavior, his habit of lying, his insulting and degrading comments, or the insanity of many of his proposals. My friend was asking for something much more nuanced and specific.
As I ponder his request I keep wondering what he thinks will get better with Trump in office. What might be my friend’s specific problems, issues, concerns that are so important that he is willing to overlook Trump’s rather obvious problems? I haven’t had a chance to go back to ask about this – I hope to in a few days. I think my best approach to responding might be to take a small number of examples of problems and compare likely outcomes and solutions offered by Trump’s Republican followers versus the Democrat’s approaches.
Perhaps I have an example that might help clarify the differences.
A few weeks ago I was notified by my insurance agent that the homeowner’s insurance for my “cabin” (actually just a house) in Northern California will be canceled in September because of the high risk of wildfires in that area. I have been searching for an insurance company that will sell me coverage – so far I have had no luck. It appears that I may end up with an uninsured summer house located on a large recreational lake. There are several thousand homeowners in a similar position around this lake, and millions more throughout California.
Losing fire insurance has severe economic impacts of these homeowners. Most homeowners in California have mortgages with banks, they don’t own their homes outright. The loans from banks require that insurance coverage be maintained to protect their assets. If insurance coverage lapses, then the banks want to be paid off, or they will foreclose on the property. That means that because insurance companies are refusing to write fire insurance millions of homeowners are at risk of losing their homes and the value represented by these homes. Even if a person owns their home outright, the sale value plummets without the ability to obtain a bank loan. That is a disaster for the individuals, and the economy of the State.
There is a new fire insurance plan in California that is available for a few of these homeowners for a mere 300% – to 400% increase in rates for vastly reduced coverage. It is called the California Fair Plan, but is nt a “State government” plan, it is a commercial plan available in the state. So far there are about 350,000 of these policies sold but the restrictions for obtaining coverage for things such as hours of occupancy per year that about a million homes are still uninsured. The demand for these high prices plans has overwhelmed the insurance company, resulting in limited availability to those who need to take this “last resort” approach to saving their home.
Where did this problem come from??? It started about 120 years ago when large timber companies began managing the forests for maximum profit. These companies cut the old growth forests, planted new monoculture forests of identical trees (Monoculture is the cultivation or growth of a single crop or organism, or a culture dominated by a single element.) spaced too close together to enhance the yield while decreasing the harvesting costs. At the same time, the timber companies demanded fire protection from the government to protect their investment. The fire protection was provided as requested, was successful – and resulted in the creation of highly flammable, unmanageable forests.
At the same time that the forests were being transformed into plantations, homeowners were being enticed into building new homes in the beautiful, but highly fire prone, forests. These homeowners depended upon bank loans, which depended upon the availability of low cost fire insurance. If there had been no fire insurance, there would have been very little building in these fire prone areas. The creation of the current fire problems in California came about by a combination of inexpensive fire insurance, mismanaging forests to maximize logging profits, and the current high temperatures associated with global warming. However, the current problem is NOT the outcome of global warming, it is the outcome of too much profit taking from our natural resources.
Now that the risks created by these practices are being experienced as loses, those insurance companies that profited for many years are leaving the homeowners to pay the price. Millions of citizens were enticed into purchasing homes in hazardous areas based upon their belief that the fire services could protect their property, and that if they failed to do so, their savings were protected by the insurance that they have been buying for decades. Now insurance rates have risen by as much as ten times in the last two years, and fire insurance is often unavailable. These homeowners are now at risk of losing their homes along with their entire investment.
What does this have to do with Trump and his “conservative” followers? They are set upon eliminating regulations with the expectation that business will “do the right thing.” Businesses are not capable of protecting or enhancing the common good, they are only capable of reducing their business risks while maximizing profits. It takes government policies, regulations and agencies to protect the common good, and it takes regulations to ensure the protection of individuals from excesses of business. My expectation is that the conservative approach to the insurance emergency is to let the chips fall where they might. If homes are foreclosed and bought up by the banks and investors for pennies on the dollar, that is just the way that money flows. My expectation is also that the “liberal” side of politics will work to find ways to project homeowners, while minimizing future high fire risk situations. The liberals aren’t likely to succeed completely these two goals because of the conservatives blocking their actions – but they will work toward making it better for the common good rather than just better for the super rich.
There are millions of analogous situations where decisions need to be made in favor of the common good versus the good of large businesses. The opposing parties are very clear about these differences. Conservatives claim that businesses make the right decisions about things like the environment and social needs while liberals observe that they don’t often make such generous decisions. For some odd reason, many of the supporters for Trump’s proposals are the very people that will be hurt the worst by the current proposals such as are outlined in “Project 2025” and during Trump rallies. I think much of the emphasis on social issues (such as abortion rights, undocumented immigrants, etc.) are intended to distract many people from Trump’s real goals of concentrating power and wealth into the hands of a few.