Jonathan Metzl on what's driving polarization in a post-Trump America — and how to fix it

Capehart

The Washington Post

News Commentary, Politics, News

4.6 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 9 February 2021

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The "Dying of Whiteness" author talks about what he’s learning from new focus groups and why the 2019 Democratic victories in the Kentucky and Louisiana governor’s races "in the middle of Trumpism" provide a roadmap for bridging the divide.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm Jonathan K. Parton, and this is K-Pop.
0:05.4	The one stat that's vexed to me since election day is this, 12 million.
0:10.2	12 million more Americans voted for Donald Trump's re-election than did in 2016.
0:15.6	They did so in spite of Charlottesville, kids and cages, and is bungling up the response
0:20.5	to the pandemic.
0:22.1	How can the 81 million who voted for President Biden talk to or deal with the 74 million
0:28.5	who voted for Trump?
0:30.1	Is that even possible?
0:31.8	Dr. Jonathan Metzel is the author of Dying of Whiteness, how the politics of racial
0:36.2	resentment is killing America's heartland.
0:39.1	He and I have been talking about these questions for weeks, and today we're bringing our conversation
0:44.6	to you.
0:46.0	Metzel talks about what he's learned from the new focus groups he's been doing, what
0:50.2	he thinks is driving polarization in America today, and why the 2019 victories by Democrats
0:56.6	in the Kentucky and Louisiana governors races provide a road map for bridging the divide.
1:03.4	Hear it all, right now.
1:13.7	Jonathan Metzel, welcome back to the podcast, your third time.
1:17.7	I'm a regular, I'm honored to be back.
1:21.2	So the second time you were on, it was to put the response to COVID into context and why
1:30.4	people were not taking the pleas of wearing masks seriously.
1:37.0	Now we're after the election when 81 million people voted for Joe Biden and 74 million
1:45.4	people voted for Donald Trump, 10 million more than voted for him in 2016.
	...

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