Indiana, PA. – Turn the corner onto Philadelphia Street in this little west Pennsylvania, and you can be on the main street of Bedford Falls, a mythical city in the festive classic film Frank Capra, is a wonderful life.
“This is a city where you hear people tell each other” Merry Christmas “, never wondering if it is politically correct,” said Chris Carter of Dayton, Ohio, here for a day in business.
Earlier, Carter, 30 years elderly, posed for a photo with the statue of Jimmy Stewart, the hometown of Indiana Everman.
Carter believes that places such as Indiana or his hometown of Dayton are omitted by the White House and Congress, but “Everything is fine with me. Despite the lack of attention of the government, we are developing our fears and do not disappoint. ”
His sentiment was said without participating in a “tea event” or a handrail against a selected official in the town hall – a regular caricature of the media of people who answer against Washington.
Main Street America entered the era of populism, which does not cover any party. People are tired of saving the government, expenses and uncounted corruption, as well as the lack of curiosity or investigation perceived by the media in the case of all three.
They are really tired of saying that their values ​​and way of life are not politically correct.
“Now it has become a stereotype that the elite from Washington does not understand people who live outside their bubble, but clichés are not created in a vacuum,” says Michael Scott, who owns a photo studio near high school.
“Politicians were known as statesmen,” he explains. “They were the owners of companies in their hometown and earned more or less the same amount as the average voter, keeping them in contact with who they represented.”
“Today, well, not so much,” says Jamey Snyder, one of the owners of Coney Island, the legendary local bar. Snyder grew up in Elmir, ny; When he married his wife Dee Dee, he became part of the celebrated Mcquaide Bar family.
Just like on many main streets in a miniature town, Philadelphia Street is the title of Light Light-Bole-to Light with flickering Christmas lights and hanging snowflakes. Pedestrians are treated in the folk voice of Jimmy Stewart at pedestrian crossings, leading them through intersections.
“We’re an hour everywhere,” says 33 -year -old Scott Cramer, a loan officer who came here to attend studies and never left. “But we might as well be a million miles from Washington.”
“Elites such as President Obama perceive the government as a power to protect a small guy,” explains the political scientist of the University of Arkansas Robert Maranto. “But regular people at Main Street perceive the government as incomprehensible and unpredictable.”
Even with the best intentions, the government almost always causes more harm than good.
When President Obama orders corporate rescue, a stimulus plan, which costs a quarter of a million dollars of work or talks more about increasing the government than reducing unemployment, people are naturally skeptical, says Maranto.
Most Americans are Jeffersonians: they want a circumscribed government – completely contrary to Obama, who wants a government without borders.
A significant part of the nation can buy a nice house for USD 150,000, live in a secure area with good schools and have peace in general – and do it with one income.
For people in places such as Indiana, Pa., Chicago or both coasts economic uncertainty – where people can do two works to live in a secure area – is completely foreign. So the president gives his economic policies to people who can take care of money less and more.
While the registration of Indiana County voters shows that Democrats are still exceeding the number of Republicans, they are voters recently.
“These are people who may not participate in the Tea Party, but they consider them to be consistent with their fears,” says interviewer G. Terry Madonna. “They are becoming less and less satisfied with the government … So they end up dissatisfied.”
This week, the president begins his first “Listening Tour” at the next Main Street Pennsylvania.
It can be an effort to augment its popularity-but it can be more effective if he accepted certain policies preferred by Jeffersonian Middle, and then organized another brilliant speech to selected supporters with pre-described questions.