Midwest Sensibilities
I’m spending a bit of time in the heart of the American heartland — Ames, Iowa, the home of Iowa State University, where I taught journalism decades ago.
For years now, I’ve returned to Ames in the fall — always the best time of year in the Midwest. I visit friends, eat a lot of great Midwestern beef, root for the hometown ISU football team and enjoy life in one of America’s best college towns.
And this visit, I’m also taking the political pulse of the state. Iowa is one of those crucial bell-weather swing states that will help determine whether it’s Trump or Clinton who occupy the White House. And they both know of Iowa’s importance.
Trump made a campaign appearance in Iowa this week and has traveled here several times over the past few months. Clinton has not been here as often as Trump, but she’s saturating TV airwaves with anti-Trump commercials during all the local-station newscasts in Des Moines. They are vicious ads, made more so by the liberal use of video clips of Trump speeches in which he looks — well, out of control.
But what I’ve been most struck by during my time in Ames is something I have not seen — candidate signs in the front yards of homes here. This is a smart, politically active community. The education level is, as you might expect in a university town, very high.
When I was here last year — just before the Republican and Democratic primaries were set to begin — I saw plenty of front-yard signs for Clinton, for Bernie Sanders, for Trump and for other GOP candidates. This year, I have not seen one — not one — front-yard sign for either Clinton or Trump.
(Well, actually, I did see ONE sign for Clinton, But it was for Wayne Clinton, who is running for Story County supervisor.)
What this tells me is that here in Iowa — as is the case in much of the rest of the nation — there is absolutely no enthusiasm for the candidates whom Democrats and Republicans have nominated for the highest office in the land. Of course, national polls show Trump and Clinton are two of the most distrusted, detested presidential candidates in modern history.
Can anyone explain how any of this is good for the future of our country? I didn’t think so.