I have lived urban, suburban and rural. Most of my career has been spent working closely with rural clients. I have spent time in the countryside of every state in the country (ironically, except Alaska). I understand rural America. And I have just read one too many editorials, articles and even KOS dairies about how Palin's folksiness resonates with country-folk. It may be that John McCain's campaign is right about one thing: the media is full of elites. But then again, so is McCain's own campaign staff. In fact, anyone who is culturally-challenged enough to believe in all this "folksy" garbage probably actually is an elite.
I am guessing the urban simpletons who buy this likely base their judgements on re-runs of Green Acres and The Andy Griffith Show. The closest these people have ever been to "rural" was while safely strapped into an airline seat, but like Palin herself, seeing it in the distance from a window makes one an expert.
Were any of this true, then you'd see rural America polling as a block, but it clearly is not. And the difference has nothing to do with fraudulent folksiness. It has everything to do with racism, but how can that be understood by any who are ignorant enough to buy into the folksy myth.
Look people, out in the country, people don't say "Aw shucks!" They don't say, "You betcha!" They don't say, "Golly doggone it!" That is what HOLLYWOOD only imagines people there say. Those who buy all this are the root of the elitism label. And it happens on both sides. Peggy Noonan thinks Palin killed it in the debates because of her folksy charm. That judgment infuriates me because it stems from both arrogance and ignorance -- much like Palin herself. Palin is only disgorging tags and one-liners crafted by Schmidt and company, who think they are creating an authentic counrty voice. They are not, and the only ones buying it are pundits and elitists with no real rural exposure.
That type of "folksy" is entirely manufactured and does not exist as a function of rural life. These stereotypes are fictions created by writers. And this is exactly why people in rural America do not like Sarah Palin. Rural people recognize frauds and in this case it is not that difficult -- just look for the moron reciting lines from Old Yeller and Hee Haw.
Liberals and progressives do themselves the same harm that Sarah Palin self-inflicts when they continue to imagine and blather about country stereotypes. News flash people: rural America graduates its students at both the high school and college levels in greater percentages than its urban counterparts. News flash: farms and farming are one of the most science savy enterprises. News flash: country people have computers too and access to the Internet.
I suspect many liberals are confusing fundamentalist Christians with country people. I suspect the McCain campaign is making the same stupid mistake. What they don't realize is that real country people are deeply pragmatic and much more prone to Calvinist or stoic traditions than the vapid and idle luxury of modern monied evangelicals.
Real country people see bullshit walking and they know the difference between decency and deceit. They don't like pretenders. It is the hard right fundamentalists who are brain-washed and judgmental. Fundamentalists are the ones to sound faux folksy since the publicly avoid curse words, relacing them with "aw fudge" (gag me) type language riddled through-out Palin's speeches. And they are just as likely to be your next door neighbor in the exurbs or even down the hall in your condo as they are to be from the country.
Fortunately, both Barak Obama and Joe Biden innately "get" all this. I just wish some of his urban supporters did as well because until they do, rural folks will have a legitimate resentment of the "tisk tisk" class patronizing urbanites.