Maggie's Farm

What's the Matter with Thomas Frank?

Honestly, this guy - the auteur of What's The Matter with Kansas - is so out to lunch I cannot believe it. This guy is trying to understand the "culture wars." Hello, Thomas. This has been going on for years. Where have you been? He's supposed to be a cultural commentator, but the guy needs an expedition to talk to normal folks. It's like a safari for him. Load all the Range Rovers with brie, chardonnay, Evian, and baguettes. Make sure the drivers are well-armed, but keep those scary guns away from me!

So now Frank has a big piece in the NYROB in which every "insight" is, like, duh! Who knows - maybe for regular readers of NYROB these are insights into the great unwashed. But I read it regularly, and I bathe (when I have time), and I am a fairly regular sort. The average redneck Yalie Yankee lawyer who prefers Dewars to chardonnay, which is a lady's drink.

Besides seeming only average-bright, Frank aspires to stylish writing and stylish views. But his style is obsolete. As in his book, he assumes that class and materialism are what life and politics are all about. It's his only lens - or is he just pretending it is? He doesn't use the Marxist term "false consciousness," but it's what he thinks he is talking about. That tells me a lot about him, but not much else.

An example:

"But in the election of 2004 all the class anger was on the other side. Now it was the Democrat whose aristocratic lifestyle was always coming into question, who couldn't seem to take a step without detonating some explosive reminder of his exalted position. And it was Republican operatives who were gleefully dropping the word "elitist" on the liberal at every turn for his affected, upper-class ways. For his supposed love of brie cheese. For his wealthy wife's supposed unfamiliarity with chili. For his mansion. His yacht. His windsurfing. His vacations with celebs on Nantucket Island. The secretary of commerce said he thought Kerry "looks French." The House majority leader made a habit of starting off speeches with the line, "Good afternoon, or, as John Kerry might say: 'Bonjour!'" The NRA came up with an image that brilliantly encapsulated the whole thing: an elaborately clipped French poodle in a pink bow and a Kerry-for-president sweater over the slogan "That dog don't hunt."^[10] 

Yeah, I forgot. He also uses footnotes! What is he - a scholar?  My point is that you can tell how out-of-it he is by his statements he presents as revealing, as if he were studying the sexual habits of the natives of New Guinea, while he's talking about you and me. Why doesn't he simply give Maggie's a call? I know you won't read it, but here it is anyway.