Though I come from Emporia stock, and spent days of my childhood in Peter Pan Park under the shadow of the White Memorial where the eulogy of Mary White, permanently fixed in bronze empresses her tragic story permanently in the minds of young Emporians, I know little of the broad scope of White’s editorial career.

I know only what made him famous, and reacted without thinking from the small sample I knew of his work.

As a son of Emporia, I should have known better.

I’ve been trying to make some of these points in my
blog, but you’ve put them more effectively and concisely
in one article than I could manage in 4 years of blogging.

Ben, W.A. White would later write:

“Ten years ago this great organ of reform wrote a piece entitled ‘What’s the Matter with Kansas?’ In it great sport was made of a perfectly honest gentleman of unusual legal ability who happened to be running for chief justice of the Supreme Court of this state, because he said in effect that ‘the rights of the user are paramount to the rights of the owner.’ Those were paleozoic times; how far the world has moved since then. This paper was wrong in those days and Judge Doster was right; but he was too early in the season and his views got frost bitten.”

Doster was a brilliant legal scholar who developed theories of private property very much in line with Weaver and Shiffman.

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The conditions which surround us best justify our co-operation; we meet in the midst of a nation brought to the verge of moral, political, and material ruin. Corruption dominates the ballot-box, the Legislatures, the Congress, and touches even the ermine of the bench. The people are demoralized; most of the States have been compelled to isolate the voters at the polling places to prevent universal intimidation and bribery. The newspapers are largely subsidized or muzzled, public opinion silenced, business prostrated, homes covered with mortgages, labor impoverished, and the land concentrating in the hands of capitalists. The urban workmen are denied the right to organize for self-protection, imported pauperized labor beats down their wages, a hireling standing army, unrecognized by our laws, is established to shoot them down, and they are rapidly degenerating into European conditions. The fruits of the toil of millions are boldly stolen to build up colossal fortunes for a few, unprecedented in the history of mankind; and the possessors of those, in turn, despise the republic and endanger liberty. From the same prolific womb of governmental injustice we breed the two great classes—tramps and millionaires………

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Dispite any personal affection that white might have had for Jerry Simpson, it seems odd to suggest that he would have in any wat been a supporter of populism. He was a blue blood republican (from way back before republicans were red), and is still remembered as such in Emporia.

Nixon criticized intellectuals with great effect, even though he was one. Bush campaigned against anyone smart in the news media by depicting them as a bunch of overly-critical America-haters, even though the media bent over backwards to adore Bush and criticize Gore.

McCain carried it a step further, and actively campaigned against anyone smart enough to understand the problem. Palin looks to carry the war to the next level, and simply makes fun of anyone too smart to be manipulated by sarcastic bumper stickers.

I would like to think this will end somewhere.

At some point, I would like to have politicians who are well-spoken and thoughtful. At some point, I would like to think that our elected officials have principles and ideas.

If public debate in the next ten years is going to be shaped by fake populists like Santelli and Limbaugh, then America will be the worse for it.

When you choose a doctor, it should not matter if he wears a silk suit and eats caviar. It should only matter if he understands medicine. When you choose a Congressman, it does not matter if he drinks latte, it only matters if he understands science, economics, and the law.

If your congressman is a beer-guzzling, foul-mouthed, mean-spirited, football-playing, man-of-the-people; then you aren’t being served well by your own intellect.