Buying, owning, and ruling the rural West

The Netflix binge-worthy and Emmy award winning Schitt’s Creek brought to millions of households during the pandemic the tribulations of a wealthy family who, after purchasing a rural town as a joke, are forced to reside there following their fall from grace.

But purchasing small towns is not just the stuff of fiction. The lure of the rural has exploded during the COVID-19 pandemic, with “Zoom Towns” sprouting up across the country and rural real estate interest sky rocketing. Blog posts discussing the attraction to the rural during COVID-19 can be found here and here.

One such example of the rural boom is Gunnison, Colorado where wealthy, second home owners flocked in order to escape the pandemic, ultimately creating a local political battle for authority. This recent surge may simply be indicative of rural gentrification, but it may also expose a specific Western appeal that has existed for much longer.

When the West was made more accessible by the Homestead Act of 1862, primarily white settlers set out to claim their piece of “the wild,” in complete denial of the already existing ownership of land by tribal nations.

For many homesteaders, this was a chance to break from society, to achieve an independence no longer accessible in the East, to strike it rich, and to hide. Lisa Pruitt discusses the idea of going West to remain hidden in the vast rural-scape in her piece The Rural Lawscape: Space Tames Law Tames Space, in The Expanding Spaces of Law: A Timely Legal Geography.

Today, rural towns have an allure for city locked Americans who are looking for some elbow room. But maybe there are some other draws to the West as a destination for the ultimate escape and true ability to control one's environment, which is not new by any means.

Take the town of Scenic, South Dakota, with a population of approximately ten, that staggers a main street running through vast prairies. Most of the buildings in the town, some surviving since the 1800s, serve as reminders of frontier life, including racist signs and metal barracks. So when Scenic was purchased in 2011, much buzz surrounded the identity of the purchaser.

The buyer finally became publicly known four years after Scenic’s purchase: Iglesia ni Cristo, or, in English, the Church of Christ. The Philippines based church began setting up shop in the South Dakota ghost town, with the gold rush era buildings being covered in colorful religious banners, and flags placed to welcome all those who happened to make their way through the rarely visited place.

A photo of Scenic, South Dakota's main street, taken in January 2021.

Iglesia ni Cristo is a politically powerful church in the Philippines, and has made news for more than religious ministry, including corruption, kidnappings, and murders. Residents near Scenic expressed concern of a cult moving in, perhaps exposing a general distrust of outsiders that may be found in rural communities. However, church members clarified their purpose in purchasing Scenic was to spread their ministry, and Scenic remains a mostly sleepy ghost town today, with only the addition of weekly church services.

The town of Leith, North Dakota, with a population of approximately sixteen, paints an entirely different story of Western ownership. In 2013, prominent white supremacist Craig Cobb moved to Leith with motives to claim the town as a white supremacist haven. Blog posts on Cobb’s initial presence in Leith can be found here and here.

Cobb’s quest to fill Leith with fellow supporters and gain control of city council is documented in the film Welcome to Leith. Although the mayor of Leith and local residents successfully kicked Cobb out, the Neo-Nazi fight left a lasting impression and led Mayor Schock to spearhead a referendum in 2018 to dissolve the town.

Even more recently, a 140 acre compound “hidden” outside of Pringle, South Dakota and run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, an oppressive cult classified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as white supremacist and totalitarian, was finally ordered for sale by a judge after years of non-interference by the local and state governments. The compound remained an untouchable hideout in the rural expanse for years, with claims of human trafficking ignored throughout.

These rural towns and places, although different in substance and objective, illustrate a continuing idea that the rural West is available for the taking, whether through purchase or hostile action. The current move to the rural west by the wealthy may be for entirely different reasons, but perhaps with a similar desire to escape, hide, or embrace an entirely new life.

Overcoming the cult of individualism

In 1984, David Engel wrote that individualism, as a cultural phenomenon, takes on two distinct forms. One of the forms, which Engel called "rights-oriented," aligns with the legal notion that individuals possess certain rights for which the justice system offers redress upon those rights being violated. Engel explained that the other type, which I am calling "autonomy-oriented," holds the opposite view: 

[A]n individualism emphasizing self-sufficiency and personal responsibility rather than rights is consistent with the expectation that people should ordinarily provide their own protection against injuries and should personally absorb the consequences of harms they fail to ward off.

Engel argued that the residents of rural Sander County, Illinois embodied that type of autonomy-oriented individualism, which contributed to a social climate that inhibited residents from ever bringing suit after experiencing personal injury. 

Thirty years later, Engel's theory appears in the modern context in the documentary, For the Love of Rutland. In the film, the town of Rutland, Vermont clashed over the Mayor's plan to host Syrian refugees. However, the film mainly focuses on the life of Stacie Griffin, a Rutland resident living in poverty and battling addiction. 

Within the first few moments of the film, Griffin invites the camera into her home and puts her life on full display. At one point, someone off-camera protests that they don't want the crew to see their room, but Griffin quickly rebuts them saying it's real. She does not care to hide any part of her life from the camera, because she wholly accepts the consequences of her past decisions. The audience quickly learns that she also feels that the incoming Syrian refugees should have been held to the same standard, too.

Initially, Griffin was opposed to the refugees coming to Rutland. She witnesses the communal effort to accommodate them and she resents them for it, because neither the community nor the state was helping her with her problems. At that time, Griffin was trying to keep her son in school, find her husband a job, keep her family from being evicted, and so forth. The heightened sense of autonomy-oriented individualism that Griffin held, she held to a fault. It became suffocating as she believed her problems were her own, but they had become insurmountable. Like the residents of Sander County, Griffin could not see herself getting help and seemed intent on making sure the refugees did not receive any, either.

Unlike in Engel's paper, however, Griffin's story offered a solution. Griffin's life began to improve as soon as she began to organize in her community. Although, the film is unclear as to why Griffin started reaching out to community groups--presumably, she might have hit rock-bottom or maybe the filmmakers encouraged her to talk to people actively organizing around the refugees--but she quickly found a new purpose in leading an effort to improve her neighborhood. 

Before linking up with the community groups, Griffin was sinking under the crushing weight of her bills and the other problems previously discussed. She had attended a meeting about the opioid crisis, but felt angry and invisible as politicians and police applauded themselves for their impressive statistical data. But once she began organizing in her community, specifically to help with a youth program, she clearly felt heard and included as part of something bigger than herself and her problems. She also learned how to reach out to other organizers to ask for help, instead of holding onto her problems as her burden alone. 

In the documentary, the Alderman who helps Griffin from not being evicted makes two interesting points in that regard. First, she did not understand why Griffin did not ask for help sooner, as her problem was relatively simple. An eviction might be new for a tenant, but it is not a new phenomenon. An experienced organizer has helped others similarly situated to Griffin, and the Alderman said that her organization could have prevented her eviction in a day.

Second, that it was tragic that people like Griffin have to reach the point of desperation before help is provided. Griffin could have never dug herself out of all the problems piling up in her life, but it was clear that she felt they were her problems, nonetheless. That was the true consequence of her holding onto the idea that personal problems were strictly personal, and that it was selfish to involve the community. For Griffin, relief only came when she abandoned that idea of autonomy-oriented individualism, and found help through helping others. 

 

A rural czar: will Biden connect with rural America through a new position?

A recent Politico article highlights pressure on the Biden Administration to address the problems facing rural America in light of the pandemic by appointing a rural czar. According to the article, Members of Congress and various political advocates feel that it is necessary for Biden to plan a federal response to boost his popularity in conservative areas of the country and help with rural economic recovery. The rural czar would “oversee a national strategy to uplift rural communities” by working “closely with the executive branch, especially with the Department of Agriculture.” From my understanding, the rural czar would not replace the Secretary of Agriculture, but rather work with the USDA and the Biden Administration to connect with rural communities.

A rural czar in the White House would align well with Biden’s plans to re-build rural America as set out in his platform. The President has recognized the impacts the pandemic has had on small businesses in rural areas, with nearly 1 in 5 of them closing. Among other goals, Biden has pledged to create new jobs, rescue small businesses, help farmers and ranchers, expand broadband, and partner with small communities to give them full access to various federal resources. 

 

There is no question that the economy in rural America has been hit hard by the pandemic. Still trying to pick themselves up after the Great Recession, small businesses in rural communities are struggling with access to funding and broadband connectivity. Here is a blog that highlights five ways the President can carry out his platform and assist rural America; it also discusses some of the most pertinent issues in rural communities. 

 

To start rebuilding rural communities across the country, Biden nominated Tom Vilsack, former Iowa Governor and Secretary of Agriculture under President Obama, to lead the USDA. However, rural America is already fearful of the nomination, even with the Administration’s deliberate focus on investing back in their communities. According to the New York Times, farmers worry about new and potentially burdensome regulations under the Biden Administration. Additionally, some Democrats feel that Vilsack’s lobbying for the dairy industry insinuates that he will favor larger industries over small farmers, potentially obscuring the Administration’s rural connection. Even agriculture groups have labeled Vilsack “as being too cozy with ‘Big Ag,’” and have pointed to mergers of massive companies that happened during his last term, like the $66 billion Monsanto and Bayer merger, as evidence of that. 

 

If confirmed, Vilsack, along with Biden, will certainly have a long way to go to win over the hearts of rural Americans. In rural counties across the country, President Biden was outvoted 2 to 1 by former President Trump; even if only 14% of Americans live in rural counties, the overall lack of support for Biden in these areas is significant enough to impact the Administration’s plans to connect with rural America. Here is a blog post highlighting some of the economics behind Democrats losing rural counties in the last election. If these voting statistics are any reflection of rural attitudes toward the new Administration, in order to change them, Biden and Vilsack will need a plan that tackles important issues facing these communities, such as access to funding, health care, and broadband.

 

An important question thus emerges: will a rural czar be enough for the Biden Administration to connect with rural America?

 

I think it would be smart for the President to appoint a rural czar. It has real potential to help bridge the gap between the Administration and rural Americans through a dedicated position. Though I am certain that not all of rural America will be open and welcoming to such a position, I think that a focus on their communities and problems is necessary and justified. The federal government’s recognition that rural Americans are struggling and its commitment to help through a specific position can potentially make these communities feel more appreciated, while also helping them through trying times. I look forward to seeing if President Biden creates this position and I will continue to blog about this as new information is released.

Coronavirus in rural America (Part CXXI): New vaccine hesitancy data shows depth of rural America’s distrust

President Biden has boasted a goal to vaccinate 100 million Americans against covid-19 in his first one hundred days. This will be challenging, and rural writers I have read this week emphasize the challenge for their communities. One of my classmates wrote more expansively about this here, but key challenges that persist across experts are storage, distribution, and misinformation.

Misinformation, specifically, was of interest to me. I knew rural communities felt some of the harshest impacts of the pandemic, and as I have studied rurality, I know changing minds of folks in rural places can be easier said than done. The depth of this distrust, or ‘vaccine hesitancy’, and ways to fight it and protect rural communities drove me to dig further.

Recently, Kaiser Family Foundation has released data collected about trust in the covid-19 vaccine.

…four in ten (38%) rural residents say they will “wait and see” before getting the vaccine, and one in ten say they will only get the vaccine if they are required to do so for work or other activities.

Rural communities are less enthusiastic overall about the vaccine when compared to suburban and urban responses.

Three in ten (31%) people in rural areas say they will “definitely get” the vaccine, compared to four in ten people in urban areas (42%) and suburban areas (43%). An additional one-third of people in rural areas say they will “probably get it” while 35% say they will either “probably not get it” (15%) or “definitely not get it” (20%).

These communities are disparately impacted by coronavirus and the most distrustful of the vaccine among other American locales.

My next questions as I explored this issue were: what causes rural folks to be hesitant of the vaccine and how do public health officials best curb the spread of related distrust and misinformation?

Rural folks could be distrustful and not enticed to get the vaccine because of a deeper distrust in the virus itself. The Kaiser Family Foundation’s polling further found:

In addition, half of all rural residents say the seriousness of coronavirus is “generally exaggerated” compared to 27% of urban residents and 37% of suburban residents.

They similarly found:

…for rural residents, getting a COVID-19 vaccine is seen more as a personal choice (62%) than as part “of everyone’s responsibility to protect the health of others” (36%).

This personal choice mentality should be considered heavily in campaigns to fight vaccine hesitancy. In an article for the Kaiser Foundation, Drew Altman suggested modeling pro-vaccine arguments after similar arguments used in favor of the second amendment. In this scenario, the vaccine is shown as a way for rural residents to protect themselves and their families from outsiders.

To reach these communities and successfully encourage them to get the vaccination, the polling found the best messenger to be local doctors who are familiar to the rural residents. This is unsurprising. Though I am not originally from a rural community, I have learned that they are weary of outsiders.

As I heard in class recently (I’m paraphrasing), “…you’re from here once your grandparents are buried here.” It makes sense then, that these same tight-knit communities would distrust a vaccine being pressed on them from an outsider.

Public health officials must then incorporate rural healthcare providers in the information campaigns for the impacted communities. The messenger is key. As the Kaiser Foundation also found:

…a large majority of rural Americans (86%) say they trust their own doctor or health care provider to provide reliable information about a COVID-19 vaccine. Smaller shares say they trust the FDA (68%), the CDC (66%), their local public health department (64%), Dr. Fauci (59%), or state government officials (55%).

This data is revealing. It suggests that to best motivate rural Americans to get vaccinated, messaging needs to come from within the communities themselves. 

As a new administration takes the presidency and stresses vaccinations for a large chunk of Americans, it is important to keep in mind the ongoing struggle of rural communities against COVID-19, and the complicated barrier of vaccine hesitancy.

Other writing about COVID-19 vaccines and the challenges they face in rural communities on this blog can be found here and here.

Joe Biden’s Plan to Build Back Better in Rural America

Before President Biden came into office, he planned to build a new economy both for our rural American families and the next generation of rural Americans. This included:

Creat[ing] millions of new jobs, including new opportunities in rural America; Advanc[ing] racial economic equity in rural America; Protect[ing] and build[ing] on the Affordable Care Act to expand access to health care in rural communities; [and] Expand[ing] broadband, or wireless broadband via 5G, to every American.

Now, one week into his presidency, Liz Compton notes in her Politico article that President Biden is facing growing pressure to appoint a rural envoy within the White House to oversee a national strategy to uplift rural communities that have been experiencing food insecurity and high unemployment, and are in need of affordable, reliable housing. 

To help better understand the challenges facing many rural communities, and the efforts made to support them, check out this podcast by NPR. 

Democratic lawmakers, in particular, are urging President Biden that embarking on a rural strategy is an immediate course of action he needs to pursue.

Former Democratic Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear noted:

I certainly think there has to be a big emphasis on developing rural America. It is past time that the rural areas of this country be targeted for not only economic development, but for health care, for broadband access, for all of the things that will lift this whole country up. 

Similarly, Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat said: 

After years of attempting to make these investments, what I know is this: the organization of government often makes it difficult to facilitate real on-the-ground success. A concept like a Rural Envoy at the White House who has real power to coordinate between agencies and make sure that each agency’s work supports another agency’s work in rural America would be an improvement.

While the proposed envoy would work closely with the executive branch, the Agriculture Department is expected to be the first response to many of these problems. The department has a sprawling mission statement that touches nearly every aspect of rural America, from funding affordable housing to building rural hospitals to deploying broadband access to combating climate change. 

Therefore, President Biden’s agriculture secretary nominee, Tom Vilsack, will likely be a key figure in his plan to build back a better rural America. Mr. Vilsack previously served as Agriculture Secretary for all eight years of the Obama administration before heading up the U.S. Dairy Export Council. In addition to having broad support from big agriculture, Mr. Vilsack’s allies say his record proves he’s ready to confront the numerous problems rural Americans face. 

Check out Mr. Vilsack’s interview with the Storm Lake Times, where he discussed rural economic development as a priority area. 

It is also worth noting that President Biden has selected Katharine Ferguson to serve as Vilsack's chief of staff. Ms. Ferguson served in the Obama Administration as Chief of Staff for the White House Domestic Policy Council and as Chief of Staff for Rural Development at the USDA, thereby demonstrating that rural development issues could get special attention in the overall agriculture discussion.

Although Mr. Vilsack is yet to be confirmed, President Biden’s plan to build back better in rural America is already underway with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and House Representative Antonio Delgado’s joint announcement of their newly introduced bill in Congress that would help to bring more federal funding and resources to rural communities across the country. The Rebuild Rural America Act is set to accomplish many goals, including setting aside $50 billion dollars in block grants for rural regions and establishing a Rural Future Corps in coordination with AmeriCorps to support childcare, health, and other services, among others. 

In her announcement, Senator Gillibrand noted: 

Too often rural communities can’t access the federal grants and other public resources that could help them solve these problems because they don't have the same economic development organizations. They don't have the grant writers and lobbyists that the larger communities can afford and have.

For more information on Senator Gillibrand, check out a few older posts here, here, here, and here.

By the looks of it, it would appear the President Biden's plan to build back better in rural America is blowing full steam ahead, arguably providing at the very least, some relief to rural communities that something is being done. 

Check out this earlier post focusing on President Biden’s efforts to help rural America. 

Coronavirus in rural America (Part CXX): A vaccination party in a snow storm

The New York Times reports today from Josephine County, Oregon, in the southern part of the state, where a team of  health care professionals got stuck in a snow storm while traveling between tiny Cave Junction, population 1,883, and the county seat, Grants Pass, population 34,533, some 30 miles away.  A jack-knifed truck was blocking the road, so they got out and started offering the vaccine to folks similarly stranded by the accident.  They administered all six doses they had, knowing the vaccine was likely to expire by the time they got back to Grants Pass.  Here's a quote form Michael Weber, the public health director for Josephine County.  

"We had one individual who was so happy, he took his shirt off and jumped out of the car."

Another recipient, he said, was a Josephine County Sheriff’s Office employee who had arrived too late for the clinic in Cave Junction but ended up stuck with the others on her way back to Grants Pass.

Most drivers laughed at the offer of a roadside coronavirus vaccine and politely declined, even though Mr. Weber said he had a doctor and an ambulance crew on hand to help oversee the operation. He acknowledged it was not the typical setting for a vaccination.

“It was a strange conversation,” Mr. Weber said. “Imagine yourself stranded on the side of the road in a snowstorm and having someone walk up and say: ‘Hey. Would you like a shot in the arm?’”

I can't help wonder if those who declined the vaccine did so because they plan never to get the vaccine, a phenomenon that may be more common in rural areas, as discussed here.   

By the way, it's worth clicking over to the story just to see the photos of jubilant people getting and giving the vaccine, with a gorgeous snowstorm in a forest as the backdrop.  .   

I've written previously about Cave Junction here and here and wider Josephine County here and here.  The County's population is about 80,000.

Oceano dunes reopen to vehicles amid continued controversy

A beach in Oceano, a small unincorporated town, in San Luis Obispo County, allows visitors to drive onto it and is the subject of an ongoing debate implicating public access, conservation, air quality, and local tourism economies. Oceano Dunes State Vehicular Recreation Area is one of a few off-highway vehicle areas, and the last on a state beach, administered by the California Department of Parks and Recreation. This means people can drive on the beach in both street-legal vehicles such as Jeeps and trucks, as well as non-street-legal vehicles such as ATVs and dirt bikes. 

People bring dune buggies, trucks, and a whole manner of vehicles to race and recreate at the park, as well as holding bonfires and camping. Because it is the only beach that allows off roading in the state, it attracts visitors from all over. The park is the source of long-standing tension, which have previously been written about on the blog here and here, explaining the basics of much of the fraught issue.

In addition to being the site of popular vehicle recreation, the sand dunes and beach are also habitat for two federally protected shorebirds: the Western snowy plover and the California least tern. During the winter months these birds nest in the sand and can be hard to spot, as well as easily disturbed by people, dogs, and vehicles. The dune environment would normally provide an ideal habitat for these birds, offering both access to forage for food as well as protection from predators.

The tension between the endangered species present on the dunes and the vehicle access goes back at least 40 years, and has recently been complicated and compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic. This past spring of 2020 when the state shut down for the pandemic, the park closed to off-roaders for seven months. The birds took the opportunity to expand their nesting area, and expanded past their protected, fenced-in zone. According to Cal Matters, 

In response, park biologists in early June scuffed over and erased plover “scrapes”— excavations by male birds to attract females and establish nests. Park personnel also herded and moved some chicks from the new areas, and installed mylar flags to haze the birds away from the riding zones…

These actions violated the Endangered Species Act, and the Coastal Commission filed a cease and desist letter against the park in June.

Proponents of vehicle use of the dunes held a “Freedom Flag Rally” to demonstrate their support for reopening the dunes. Local business owners spoke up about the impact the pandemic closure was having on their business, and their reliance on the park and its visitors. Pictures of the rally show many American flags as well as Trump banners— showing an intersection and melding together of the politicization of the pandemic as well as the existing land use, conservation, and access issues. It seems that for many, use of the park carries additional symbolic meaning about where they stand politically. 

The park reopened to vehicle access in late October 2020 in a phased reopening plan, which postponed the reintroduction of non street-legal vehicles and overnight camping. As of this writing the start dates of the second and third phases of reopening have yet to be set.

In addition to the habitat concerns on the beach, the dust from the dunes drifts throughout the area and into the predominantly Latinx community of Oceano-- implicating environmental and health concerns that ought to be taken into account about who is most impacted by the park’s presence. A recent letter to the editor in the Santa Maria Sun from an Oceano community member calls for prioritizing safe beachfront access for the Oceano community rather than use for beach drivers. The author compares the way access to nature is treated in other parts of the county, with popular developed parks such as the Pismo Preserve, Nipomo Regional Park, and Bob Jones Bike Trail, to the way Oceano’s natural resources are treated— pointing out a clear difference and inequity. 

Oceano is an unincorporated community situated within a mixed rural and non-rural, agricultural county with a huge range of socio-economic advantage and disadvantage. The voices of people who live in this community and who are impacted by the environmental consequences ought to be listened to in planning for the future of this park. A more thorough accounting of the needs of the community would also look to historic and present day Indigenous perspectives. This thread has potentially been lost, both by those who advocate for the total reopening of the dunes, or by outside environmentalists.

The Oceano dunes are a site where differing priorities regarding conservation, the environment, pandemic safety, and how our public lands ought to be used and managed, as well as who they are for, all converge on the beach of a small unincorporated community. Resolving this clash will likely continue to be a key, and complicated, issue.

Coronavirus in rural America (Part CXIX): The complicated effect of COVID-19 on the nation's farmworkers

Amid a world pandemic in which roughly 23% of Americans have faced food insecurity, America has begun paying especially close attention to those who feed us. From the farmers who plant and manage the crops, to the grocery store employees who keep the produce section stocked, America has realized that these workers are not just important but essential for our food supply and security. However, a category of these essential workers, farmworkers, have been especially hard-hit by the pandemic.

A recent study focused on farmworkers in the Salinas Valley, known to much of the country as "The Salad Bowl of the World," found that 13% of the study's participants, all farmworkers, tested positive for COVID-19 between mid-July and November 2020. This was almost triple California's general population positivity rate, which stood at 5% during the same period. 

However, the high rate of COVID-19 among farmworkers is not just a problem in California. In Tennessee, "nearly 200 farm employees [100% of the employees] on a farm in Rhea County, Tennessee tested positive for COVID-19." In early July, Maine also reported 100 COVID-19 cases among farmworkers in that state. In Oregon, a single farm, had two separate outbreaks infecting almost 100 farmworkers in April and May 2020.

As experts have discussed, contact tracing is critical for containing the spread of COVID-19. However, farmworkers do not always have the ability to get tested. Sometimes, this is related to the fact that rural areas, where many farmworkers are located, may not have free and/or accessible testing sites, if they have one at all. Furthermore, those who do have the ability to get tested, may refuse to do so out of fear that "a positive test may mean a permanent job loss."

A positive COVID-19 test is only the beginning of a difficult process for farmworkers who may lack access to crucial resources. 

When asked why they continued to work even after testing positive for COVID-19, or after experiencing symptoms, a quarter of the Salinas' study participants responded that they were concerned about losing pay, while another 13% expressed fear for losing their job if they stopped working. An additional 4% of the farmworkers in the study noted that they continued to work because their employer told them to. The fear regarding job loss is not unfounded, given that the agriculture industry has suffered deep economic loss during the pandemic. As discussed in this previous blog entry, small agricultural towns have been forced to improvise as the markets for their products continue to change during these unprecedented times. 

The Salinas study also showed that farmworkers with a higher positivity rate were more likely to speak Indigenous languages as opposed to English or Spanish. This presents a problem as they may be unable to find necessary guidelines and/or resources regarding COVID-19, isolation, contact tracing, etc., in their native language.

Much of the nation's agricultural work occurs in the rural areas of the country. Unlike urban areas which may have a larger number of health care services, rural areas tend to have fewer healthcare services available, in the sense that a rural town might not have a medical care facility, thereby requiring access to transportation for those seeking to receive medical attention. Further, those health care centers that are available, may be less well-equipped to handle a large number of COVID-19 positive patients. Most concerning in rural areas, are the lack of physicians and available hospital beds. In addition, "many farmworkers have limited access to health care and live below the poverty line" making it even more difficult to receive medical treatment or receive COVID-19 testing. Thus, a farmworker in a rural area may have a difficult time seeking medical help following the onset of COVID-19 symptoms or testing positive for COVID-19.

As if this was not grim enough, research by UCSF shows that while California's "working-age-adults had about a 22% increased risk of dying from March on," as a result of "living during a pandemic," people in agricultural work "saw their chances of death double to 40%." That number is even higher for Latino farmworkers whose chance of death is about 60%. 

In sum, the rapid spread of COVID-19 among farmworkers cannot be solved by simply enforcing social distancing guidelines and requiring masks because the issue is much more complicated than simply the higher infection rate. A lack of resources, a lack of access to health care, and language barriers are just some of the many factors playing into COVID-19's devastating impact on farmworkers. This is yet another challenge, much like California's wildfires this year, that farmworkers have been asked to endure for the sake of our nation's food supply. However, the question remains: if farmworkers are essential to our food supply, why are we not making more of an effort to ensure their health and well-being?

Why don't rural Americans support Democrats on health care reform?

Improving access to health care is perhaps the defining policy goal of the contemporary American left. President Biden's campaign website displays the President's plans for addressing a multitude of issues, but the President highlights three of his plans in particular: beating COVID-19, economic recovery, and health care reform. President Biden wasn't alone on the left in making greater health care access a key campaign promise, and was actually one of the few Democratic Party presidential primary candidates that didn't support universal healthcare.

Rural Americans would be one of the largest beneficiaries of the health care reform plans being put forth by progressive politicians. Rural Americans are more likely to be uninsured than their urban counterparts, and must pay higher premiums on average than their urban counterparts. Rural Americans are also less likely to be screened for cancers and other potential hazards due to the lack of available primary care physicians in their area. In addition, rural counties are more likely to have only a single insurance issuer than urban counties.

Despite these health care problems rural Americans face, they don't support progressives on health care reform. In 2017, a survey found that 54% of rural Americans favored repealing Obamacare. While most of the rural disdain for the Affordable Care Act comes from rural Republicans, the polling reveals skepticism from all rural Americans. Rural Democrats were twice as likely to support repealing Obamacare than urban Democrats, and rural Independents were 14% more likely than urban Independents to support repealing Obamacare. So rural Americans, regardless of their political identity, are more likely to oppose attempts to increase access to health care despite having more to gain from these reforms.

Why isn't health care an issue that gives Democrats some modicum of rural support? It starts with rural Americans not caring about access to health care.

When rural Americans were asked by Kaiser Permanente what the biggest problem facing their community was, only 2% of the respondents cited the cost or availability of health care. Democrats can't win rural voters over with their health care stance if rural voters don't care about health care. Democrats  need to first explain to rural voters how their health care plans will benefit them. Democratic politicians need to describe to rural Americans how their plans can create competition for insurance issuers who have monopolies over isolated rural counties. Democratic politicians should hammer how unfair it is for rural Americans to have to pay higher premiums than urbanites when rural Americans already have higher transportation costs for medical care.

If affordable access to health care is going to remain one of the Democratic Party's primary policy goals, then Democrats should look to wring as many voters as possible out of this stance. Rural voters, despite favoring the repeal of Obamacare, overwhelmingly support Medicaid. Two-thirds of rural Americans believe Medicaid is "very important" to their community, and an additional 27% of rural Americans believe Medicaid is "somewhat important" to their community. I believe rural voters can show similar levels of support for future health care reform bills, but rural Americans need to be convinced that these bills are for them.

Law and order in the Ozarks (Part CXXVII): A local branch of "Save the Children"? QAnon or the real deal

I've been intrigued--or maybe puzzled is a better word--for some time by the strange association that seems to exist between "Save the Children" and QAnon.  Here's a report on the topic from the New York Times' Kevin Roose back in September, under the headline, "How ‘Save the Children’ Is Keeping QAnon Alive."  I've always known Save the Children as an international charity aimed at helping underprivileged children around the world, and I see it is one with a good ranking.  I've therefore been puzzled at how it has come to be associated with QAnon.  Turns out, the "Save the Children" associated with Q Anon is not the charity, whose name is protected by trademark, I see.  

Roose, the Times tech journalist who made the amazing Rabbithole podcast last summer, explains that QAnon is associated with the slogan "Save the Children," but that's different from the charity:  

Adopting “Save the Children” as a mantra helped save QAnon in several other ways. It created a kind of “QAnon Lite” on-ramp — an issue QAnon believers could talk about openly without scaring off potential recruits with bizarre claims about Hillary Clinton eating babies, and one that could pass nearly unnoticed in groups devoted to parenting, natural health and other nonpolitical topics.

Typical of the new, understated QAnon style are Facebook videos in which parents sound the alarm about pedophiles brainwashing and preying on children. These videos, wrote Annie Kelly, a researcher who wrote a Times op-ed about QAnon’s appeal to women this month, make for “compelling and dramatic content” that is “easily shared in other parenting groups with little indication of their far-right origins.”

Since stopping child exploitation is an issue that has broad and bipartisan sympathy, QAnon’s anti-trafficking rebranding has also allowed politicians to appeal to QAnon supporters without explicitly mentioning the theory. And seeding misinformation about child sex trafficking on platforms like Instagram and TikTok has allowed QAnon to tap into a younger and less explicitly pro-Trump demographic.

Roose quotes Marc-André Argentino, a doctoral student at Concordia University who studies QAnon:

It’s bringing down the average age of a QAnon follower.  In 2019, this was mainly a boomer movement. Now we’re seeing millennials and Gen Z getting on board.

And that brings me to a story I saw in my hometown newspaper last fall.  The headline is "Jasper school literacy event touts 'Early Steps' program," and it reports on the "first annual Parables in the Park held on Sept. 29 at Bradley Park in Jasper.  It is described as a "drive thru literacy event" that served 80 individuals from 60 families and included 8 vendors providing resources, and 20 event volunteers.  "The story chosen for this year's Parables in the Park was 'Harold and the Purple Crayon' by Crockett Johnson."  So far, it sounds innocent enough, but then it mentions that the one of the items distributed was "hand soap from Save the Children's first Gift in Kind donation to the community."  I looked up "gift in kind" on the Save the Children charity website and found no results.  Also, there is a caption that reads "Save the Children Program Coordinator Kelsey Engle and Jasper Elementary student Henry Martin distribute resources to families driving through the Parables in the Park event." 

All of this has me wondering:  Is the "Save the Children" reference one that locals in my home community have taken on, probably because they are QAnon followers?  or did the well established and reputable charity actually provide swag (soap!) to this event in Jasper?  I'm guessing it's the former, which is pretty depressing because it means even more people will be hoodwinked by the dodgy conspiracy theory's association with an otherwise reputable community event.

In addition, I'm thinking the Save the Children charity must be going nuts at having its trademarked name appropriated by a conspiracy theory--especially since QAnon is anonymous and there's no one the charity can easily sue for trademark infringement--or defamation.  

Biden's Executive Order on Racial Equity recognizes rural disadvantage

President Biden signed an "Executive Order On Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government" on January 20, 2021, his first day in office, and I was intrigued to see that it concerned a lot more than race.  Indeed, it includes "persons who live in rural areas" as well as "persons otherwise adversely affected by persistent poverty or inequality."  "Persistent poverty" is a federal government term of art for counties that have experienced high poverty (20% or more) for the last four decennial censuses, and the vast majority of those counties are nonmetro.  Thus, that last category seems also to be a nod toward rural disadvantage.  

Here's the full text of the definition section, with the salient portion highlighted.  

Sec. 2. Definitions. For purposes of this order: (a) The term “equity” means the consistent and systematic fair, just, and impartial treatment of all individuals, including individuals who belong to underserved communities that have been denied such treatment, such as Black, Latino, and Indigenous and Native American persons, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and other persons of color; members of religious minorities; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) persons; persons with disabilities; persons who live in rural areas; and persons otherwise adversely affected by persistent poverty or inequality.

It'll be interesting to see how this is actualized.  Right now, as an executive order, this appears mostly symbolic.  

Nevertheless, it reminds me that of Guinier and Torres' suggestion in The Miner's Canary that rural whites are "political Blacks" for purposes of the Texas 10% plan.  Personally, I think it's good to try to build coalitions among disadvantaged populations.