But you know how it is, there’s nowhere that Trump won 100% of the vote. Even in the reddest of red places, there’s people that are going to want to come see Bernie. Thereâs all kinds of people everywhere.
At this point, Doug, 55 years into living in America, how would you describe your political views?
Well, I have a couple older siblings, they’re quite a bit older than me, and then my mom got a divorce, moved to Twin Falls, and started a whole new life. Where she grew up, Rupert, [Idaho], everyone around there is really conservative and stuff, and her family was. But when she moved to Twin Fallsâwhich is also super Republican and stuffâshe got a job at [the Idaho Department of] Health and Welfare.
So, when I was growing up, she was working in Health and Welfare and really just got turned on toâshe became a Democrat, a liberal, just a really compassionate person. She wasn’t an activist, and she was never in your face about it or anything, but she was always just compassionate. When the news was on or whatever, she would get pissed off at the Republican senators. I think I just always picked up on her vibe. To me, that’s the thing, it’s just about compassion, and having that sort of an attitude in your brain about people. I don’t know. That’s what it sort of boils down to in my mind.
So, yeah, I sort of always had that. Then I gravitated toward punk rock when I was a teenager, people in that community, learned more about leftist politics, and then I got older and got into some Noam Chomsky and things like that. I’ve always had a little bit of an interest, and it got more and more as I got older, and there’s been times where I didn’t pay much attention. Since the whole first Trump administration, I just followed a lot. That’s kind of basically my feelings. My band members are also very liberal ladies. I don’t know why they are, but they are.
I was curious to know how discovering Chomsky impacted your political ideologies. I assume that’s overlapping a little bit with the transition from Clinton into Bush, is my math there correct?
Yeah, definitely. I feel like it was around that time. It was when the movie Manufacturing Consent came out. I can’t remember exactly when I discovered that. His stuff is way more deep into foreign policy on a level that you don’t even think about anymore, because things are so extreme. We’re just talking about keeping a democracy. It seems like the concerns of Noam ChomskyâI don’t know, those things almost seem likeâwe can’t even touch those things anymore. We just have to deal with this horrible stuff that’s going on.
Right now, we’re part of the axis of evil. We’re on Russia’s side about everything! I think those guys are so far gone from the foreign policy world that Noam Chomsky was criticizing. It seems like a really benevolent, great system compared to what is going on right now.