Tim Russert and Blue Collar America

Whilst I am sure many of you have heard a great deal about the passing of Tim Russert this past Friday, I felt the need to write a bit on Tim Russert’s passing. Russert was more than a popular news bureau chief or a great interviewer for NBC News, relative to things political. From my perspective, Tim Russert did something few others continue these days. By that, I mean, in a great many of ways Tim Russert represented the Blue Collar Ideal of our country. Russert did so the way Bruce Springsteen does for music or the way the Tom Clancy character “Jack Ryan” does for fiction. It’s this universal ideal, this archetype about which our culture fantasizes, but no longer follows through in keeping alive.

I say that, in that I come from an area not dissimilar from Tim Russert’s Buffalo, NY. The Quad Cities—Moline, Rock Island, Illinois and Bettendorf, Davenport, Iowa—are a rust belt stronghold, right along with Peoria, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Detroit and more southern parts of Chicago (e.g. Gary, IN, Beverley, Homewood, etc…). Moving to Boise, I’ve often claimed a love for the city's socio-economic diversity, and loving that there is a dimension of “blue collar” work in this city. I continue to believe that; however, seeing the tributes to Russert, and thinking of the way I live, along with my upbringing, I cannot help but think I’ve avoided some dimension of that blue collar lifestyle that I so admire in Russert.

Is it just me, or are our generations losing their attachment to the post-Industrial Revolution remnants of the blue-collar labor ideal? I think our culture, while idolizing it in a nostalgic way, does not embrace it. Don’t get me wrong, I think we still value hard work; however, I think we are looking for components that are not as easily accessible. In other words, I think “elegance” has replaced pure function, and we prefer more synthesized and easily palatable deliveries both with our media and our ideals of ourselves. Of course, with those two things, one could go off the “deep thoughts’ end,” and claim that our social construction has taken us away from the “blue collar,” and for right now, our nostalgia keeps us thinking that mode of delivery is “to the point,” and is “honest.”

Because people like Tim Russert are doing what they do, that nostalgia remains. This is a Chris Matthews meets a voting-for-Hillary Clinton Pennsylvanian Male meets a Reagan Democrat. From a step back, it’s something interesting with which to contend. In short, it makes me wonder where the blue collar daughters and sons are, and what it is they aspire to do. Did the idea of being blue collar dissolve with the Baby Boomer generation? I don’t know. It’s something that fascinates me, indeed.