Politico contributing editor Adam Wren, who is based in Indiana, was given an interesting assignment; to penetrate the liberal bubble along the Acela Corridor from Washington D.C. to Boston to gauge their attitudes. Well, the fact that almost all of them continue to have an unhinged red hot hatred of President Donald Trump is no big surprise. What is interesting in a most hilarious way are the lives many of them lead. If you had an idea of what a the typical liberal lifestyle is like, you are probably wildly underestimating just how bizarre many liberal lives are.
Wren describes his assignment in My 72-Hour Safari in Clinton Country:
My editors had given me this assignment as something of a lark. The idea: Just as reporters from New York and D.C. trek into Trump Country to visit greasy spoons and other corners of Real America™ to measure support for the candidate, I’d venture from Trump Country to the most stereotypical bastions of coastal liberal elitism, and ask the people I met whether they still support Hillary Clinton. An innocent abroad, I would leave Hamilton County, Indiana, a deep-red suburb north of Indianapolis that Trump won by nearly 20 points, the kind of place where the Koch brothers are presently carpet-bombing Democrat Senator Joe Donnelly with $2 million in television and digital ads for his vote against the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Once on the decadent East Coast, I would luxuriate in its undiluted upscale liberal consensus at bookstores, wine bars, cafes and other Blue State institutions peopled by NPR tote-bagging sophisticates. Perhaps I’d drop in on something activist-y, a meeting of Resistance types. It was a trip that would take me across three states, from a food co-op in Brooklyn to an unabashedly liberal bookstore in Bethesda, all in counties Clinton won by at least 60 percent or more of the vote.
So what did you find Adam? Can we all get together and sing kumbaya despite our differences? Well...no.
But as much as I thought I knew what to expect, I was wrong. The deeper I plunged into the Blue Abyss, the more I realized how broad the political chasm between Clinton Country and Trump Country really is.
And the first place he visited was the Park Slope Food Coop where he encountered a suspicious liberal:
At the door, a young blond woman told me I wasn’t welcome to roam a single organic-mango punctuated aisle unless under the supervision of a co-op member. She instructed me to take an elevator upstairs, where I would find a customer service desk. There, I met several members. I told them I had traveled here to take the political temperature of Clinton Country. This place, I explained, seemed to be the epicenter of liberal consensus.
Fine but don't you dare wander our organic-mango punctuated aisles without strict supervision!
The suspicious liberal attitude wasn't just confined to the food coop as Wren discovered:
I also found there was something more to the Trump hatred—a kind of closed-off complacency that also translated into how they treated me. The more I persisted, and closer I got to the beating heart of D.C., the more reluctant people were to talk to me on the record. The whole trip would leave a sour taste in my mouth over how difficult it is to perforate the Blue Bubble. It wasn’t just the clichéd dispatches from Trump Country that Clinton Country voters had come to loathe—it was Trump Country itself.
A good example of this was the attitude of Meghan Early, a liberal Wren met at the SoulCycle class on International Women's Day in "NoHo, the tony Manhattan neighborhood." Their conversation revealing her extreme insularity went like this:
I asked Early, the SoulCyclist, what she made of the parts of the country that, as her candidate suggested, were “looking backwards.” Had she ever visited? No, Early told me.
“But I’ve flown over it,” she said.
Hearing herself, she paused, and offered a disclaimer.
“I am in a bubble,” she told me. “But now, I don’t want to get out of it.”
I'm stuck in the Liberal Bubble and I NEVER want to get out!
And now time for Wren to celebrate International Women's Day in the holy liberal sanctuary of the SoulCycle:
I entered the candlelit sanctum, which smelled of lavender and liberal angst. Once on my bike and pedaling, Beyoncé’s “Run the World” was already blaring over the speakers. The instructor Marvin, a perfectly sculpted gentleman who appeared to be in his mid-30s, barked out a welcome.
“Hey everybody, happy International Women’s Day!”
“Wooo!” The riders around me yelled back.
Girls we run this motha, yeah.
“Girls, be flirty,” Marvin instructed.
Girls we run this motha, girls.
“Guys, man up,” Marvin added.
Uncertain what it meant to “man up” in this specific scenario, I pedaled faster until I pulled a calf muscle.
Who run the world? Girls.
Yes, liberals can be joyous especially when SoulCycling on International Women's Day. Perhaps they need to keep a positive attitude considering the heavy problems pressing down upon their shoulders such as deciding what to feed their vegan cats:
Next, I chatted with Rod Morrison, 66, a British expat who became a U.S. citizen in 1994. Morrison also still supports Clinton, despite the buzzing business at his marketing company, where the majority of his clients are Republicans. He had come to the co-op to return some vegan cat kibble for Daisy, his aging tabby. Recently, his wife had switched Daisy to raw rabbit, which she seemed to enjoy. “Pascal won’t touch it, but Daisy and Mr. Rat gobble it up!”
What about Mr. Sylvester? Does he prefer vegan cat kibble or raw Tweety Bird?
On a positive note, Wren did find at least one liberal named Brian Gurr who was making an attempt to understand conservatives:
Instead of just reading The New York Times or NPR, he now was also making a point of watching “PBS NewsHour.“ “Not a huge leap,” he admitted, “but they’re a little more moderate.”
