Small Town Iowa - Know Your Enemy

Just a day or two removed from our trip to Iowa for the holidays. A good trip, cold, but family was nice. And I didn't get in any awkward conversations about religion or politics with the in-laws. I played nice. Wanted to get over to Chi-town to see some of gang, but unfortunately it was not to be. Weather, health and time conspired to prevent it.

I got quite a bit of reading done, Hitch 22 by Christoper Hitchens (review soon to come) and Zero History by William Gibson.

 I went walking around town just about every day. Osceola is not so different from where I grew up (Red Oak) or any other small Midwestern town. The small town checklist? Less than 5,000 people, little industry, a ridiculously large Wal-Mart, Indian gaming, decaying but interesting old buildings:

Largely white populations (Osceola 95.73%), a sinking economy with little hope for the future. Deprived of a longtime enemy,

they are forced to look for new ones. But, instead of looking at that Wal-Mart or casino on the edge of town ... those things that emasculate the community and render it generic and dependent ... they look elsewhere. Iowa, at once encouraging because of the law to allow gay marriages, at the next moment discouraging because of the drive to repeal the judges that made it happen.

And small town Iowan looks at immigrants. You don't have to go far to hear the phrase "damn Mexicans". (I didn't have to leave the house). It's too bad, but perhaps destined to happen. Osceola is named for the Seminole of the same name,

. Osceola was captured under a truce flag and died soon after,

To quote BSG, "All this has happened before, and all of it will happen again."

"From a certain point of view our real enemy, the true troublemaker, is inside." -- Tenzin Gyatso, The 14th Dalai Lama quotes (Dalai Lama, b.1935)

"The Little White Town"

Heathen -- these are for you:



Heathen said, " ... Stanton's nickname is "The Little White Town." Supposedly the nickname refers to the fact that all the houses are painted white, but I think there are some other reasons for this nickname as well (My mom was born in 1941 and remembers that there was a big stink when she was a kid and a Catholic family moved into town and one of their kids started dating a kid from the town)."

Yep, you pretty much have it pegged. They might as well be the "little white bread town".