The 1st Congressional District in Arkansas should be called "Fortress Democrat". Its one of the most fiercely loyal Democratic Party strongholds in the United States. I can't figure out why.
The 1st District encompasses northeast Arkansas and much of the Delta region. It has high unemployment rates, high poverty, low development, and a high minority population. It has been a development backwater for at least a century or more, if not always.
So I must admit that I am stumped. After 150 years of one party dominance, are these people satisfied with the improvements that their voting patterns have produced? Are they satisfied with their position relative to other districts within their state and their position within the nation? They must be, because they continue to vote for the status quo. One definition of insanity is "continuing to do the same thing and expecting different results". By this definition, the 1st Congressional District is insane.
Democratic control is maintained by a combination of promises. Free prescription drugs, farm subsidies, and Social Security. In other words, the promise that the smooth flow of government checks will continue, and perhaps increase.
The fastest growing and most dynamic region of Arkansas is the Northwest. The only part of the state where the Republican Party has had input. That region was also a poverty stricken area. It was geographically isolated with notoriously poor transportation links to anyplace important. Yet it has seen a burst of economic activity and wealth generation.
The 1st District has a lot more going for it. It has easy access to the aorta of the nation, the Mississippi River. It has some of the best farmland in the United States. It is situated right next to a decent-sized urban area that has established itself as a major American transportation hub. Yet with these geographical advantages it has fallen farther and farther behind Central and Northwest Arkansas.
The people there are not that different from the people in Central and Northwest Arkansas. The tax rates are the same. They share the same set of laws and regulations. Yet they are vastly different. The obvious explanation is the lack of a two-party system and a desire to remain dependent on the industry of poverty.
I have no solution. All I can do is ask, how many more centuries will the people of the 1st Congressional District give one party the steering wheel? If after another 150 years the region is still mired in poverty will you try something else? Maybe the 1st District should draw a line in the sand and tell the Democratic Party that they have only 100 more years to get us from 49th the 48th. All we ask is a little progress every century or so in exchange for our votes. It might be worth a try.
Sunday, January 08, 2006
Monday, January 02, 2006
Southern Dumplings
We have an argument going on in my house. It's over dumplings. As in Chicken and Dumplings. When my wife and I got married I was surprised to find that her dumplings were thick and round and bread-like in the center. The dumplings I had known were as flat as a nickel, cut into squares, and sort of slippery.
I lived with this with only moderate complaining. But I missed the dumplings I was used to. So recently my wife relented and made a batch and I made a shocking discovery. She has ruined my children.
My children thought that the flat-style of dumpling was disgusting and refused to eat them. I tried an appeal to family heritage. It did not work. I tried equating the flat dumpling with the doughy strips on a cobbler, knowing that they like the gooey-ness of those. The chicken/peach comparison did not meet with success either. I appealed to Southern patriotism. My wife objected to this.
My irritated wife insisted that the thick bready dumplings were the true Southern dumplings and that my flat ones were a yankee concoction. I retorted that the flat dumpling was the true Southern dumpling and that hers were some sort of mutated German dumpling. This did not sit well since she has no Germanic limbs on her family tree and I do. She attempted to turn the argument using my German heritage as a weapon.
This was a specious argument however since the flat dumpling was descended through my mother's side of the family. A family that dwelled farther back in the Southern woods than any other. My mother's side of the family had only been out of the woods twice in the last 200 years. Once to send sons to fight for General Marmaduke when the yankees invaded and once to avenge Pearl Harbor.
A quick look at Google also showed that its top results for "Southern dumplings" were also of the flat variety. But I admittedly did not look very closely and questionable results. Unfortunately, neither my wife, or my children, were impressed with my high-tech evidence either.
I'm afraid that it's too late to save the flat dumpling for posterity in my family. Hundreds of years of flat dumpling history will end with my generation. A chain, hundreds of years long, leading deep into the backwoods of history, has been broken. A pretender will take the place of the true Southern dumpling in the heart of the generations to come.
Maybe the grandchildren can still be saved.
I lived with this with only moderate complaining. But I missed the dumplings I was used to. So recently my wife relented and made a batch and I made a shocking discovery. She has ruined my children.
My children thought that the flat-style of dumpling was disgusting and refused to eat them. I tried an appeal to family heritage. It did not work. I tried equating the flat dumpling with the doughy strips on a cobbler, knowing that they like the gooey-ness of those. The chicken/peach comparison did not meet with success either. I appealed to Southern patriotism. My wife objected to this.
My irritated wife insisted that the thick bready dumplings were the true Southern dumplings and that my flat ones were a yankee concoction. I retorted that the flat dumpling was the true Southern dumpling and that hers were some sort of mutated German dumpling. This did not sit well since she has no Germanic limbs on her family tree and I do. She attempted to turn the argument using my German heritage as a weapon.
This was a specious argument however since the flat dumpling was descended through my mother's side of the family. A family that dwelled farther back in the Southern woods than any other. My mother's side of the family had only been out of the woods twice in the last 200 years. Once to send sons to fight for General Marmaduke when the yankees invaded and once to avenge Pearl Harbor.
A quick look at Google also showed that its top results for "Southern dumplings" were also of the flat variety. But I admittedly did not look very closely and questionable results. Unfortunately, neither my wife, or my children, were impressed with my high-tech evidence either.
I'm afraid that it's too late to save the flat dumpling for posterity in my family. Hundreds of years of flat dumpling history will end with my generation. A chain, hundreds of years long, leading deep into the backwoods of history, has been broken. A pretender will take the place of the true Southern dumpling in the heart of the generations to come.
Maybe the grandchildren can still be saved.
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