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This is later with Lee Matthews,
the Lee Matthews Podcast more what you Hear

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Weekday Afternoon's on the Drive. He's
the author of the Politry Prize winning and

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Their Children after them twelve other books
as well, among them Journey to Nowhere,

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the Saga of the New Underclass,
which by the way, inspired Bruce

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Bringsteen to write Youngstown. Dale Maharidge
is joining us because his newest creation is

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called American Doom Loop dispatches from a
troubled Nation nineteen eighties to the twenty twenties.

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And in it, Dale you pose
America of the twenty twenties is living

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with a cultural shape shifting rooted in
the nineteen eighties. How so well,

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I covered homeless starting in the nineteen
eighty but the word wasn't used back then.

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They were called winos. We wouldn't
use that today, of course.

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But and then I covered the first
schoolyard shoot in nineteen eighty nine. Patrick

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Purdy in Stockton, California, shot
up a school yard, killed some kids,

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and wounded a whole bunch of others. And most importantly, I covered

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a lot of the rising anger we
see in America today that you mentioned,

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Bruce Springsteen and Youngstown where they shut
down the steel mills and fifty thousand high

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paying jobs were lost. It was
very democratic place, it's not very republican,

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but both parties kind of failed the
workers, in my opinion. So

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a lot of the stuff we're seeing
today started in that decade, stuff like

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homelessness. I had a student last
year who didn't believe me when I said

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there had not always been homeless.
When I did the story in Sacramento in

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nineteen eighty, there were no no
people like we see today. It was

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the usual public inebriates. But housing
policies failed in places like California and New

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York. A lot of these rich
suburbs, mostly boomers like me, didn't

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want quote unquote affordable housing near them. Well, at Los Angeles, that

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means housing that costs eight hundred thousand
dollars a lot more, a lot more

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than an Oklahoma city, I hope. Yeah. Yeah, oh no,

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that that kind of money. You
could buy three houses and a big hunk

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of property. Yeah. Right.
So they basically the subreimonites, the boomers,

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one of the exclude their own children, and so places where there's affordable

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housing has a whole bunch fewer homeless. Jackson, Mississippi has won sixth to

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homeless for Capita as La. But
the rents in Jackson, Mississippi are eight

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hundred dollars a month versus twenty eight
hundred dollars a month in Los Angeles.

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So we need more housing. And
that's just one of the issues I write

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about. Dale Maharaj is with us
and the book is American Doom Loop Dispatches

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from a Troubled Nation nineteen eighties to
the twenty twenties. What's another example,

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because I ask I lived the nineteen
eighties. I was in high school and

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college in the nineteen eighties. I
remember living with the nuclear threat at the

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time. I was competing in high
school and college debate and one of the

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techniques we would use and debate was
what they call the ultimate negative. When

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you were in a debate and you
were trying to make your point, you

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tried to have an ultimate negative was
at that time was nuclear war. I

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contend it seems like nuclear war is
no longer a perceived threat, but that

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that's been shifted over to environmental threats. Am I right? Oh, the

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climate doom loop. Yeah, it's
something that's a backdrop to everything. We

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don't deal with that every other issue
doesn't matter. But that was not something

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I was reporting on in the nineteen
eighties, so it's not in my book.

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But I agree with you that climate
is affecting every nation. No one's

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going to escape what's happening. But
in terms of what your book deals with,

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that's seems to be part of the
doom loop. Right. Well,

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we don't like dealing with things as
society. We always push it off to

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the side or to a future generation. Well, the bills come and do

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American doom Loop dispatches from a troubled
nation nineteen eighties to the twenty twenties.

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You mentioned. I keep hearing about
how divided we are as a nation right

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now politically, but I mean I
remember there being division all through the nineteen

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eighties and beyond. Well, it's
just exacerbated. I go back to Youngstown

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where there's a lot of anger.
It gets funneled, sadly into some hate

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groups. The left isn't excluded from
heating either. Of course, we haven't

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seen armed action by the left at
this point, but we've seen the right

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wing take over that refuge in Oregon, for instance, or storm the capital

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and that anger is rooted in things
that happen in the eighties job displacement.

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I covered a white supremacy group in
Secondmento in nineteen eighty four. I told

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them I was a journalist. I
embedded with them and listened to them.

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My job description is listening. And
the funny thing is lee when you talk

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to people like this, I agree
with like eighty percent with them, and

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we disagree on the twenty percent,
but we're not listening to each other any

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far. That's one of the big
things that's changed now. That's the biggest

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one, I think, and I'm
wondering what role digital technology has to do

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with that, because we don't have
to listen to one another. All we

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have to do is read what is
typed out in that little device in the

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palm of our hands and respond to
it exactly. And it's easy to be

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hateful when you're sitting in a room
on a phone or a computer and you

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can say all kinds of nasty things. We actually have to communicate with somebody.

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You're real, they're a lot like
you. So we need more real

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face time, not fake face time. American doom Loop dispatches from a troubled

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Nation nineteen eighties to twenty twenties Pulitry
Prize winning author Dale Maharaj do you deal

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with the effects of digital technology on
the doom Loop? I don't. It

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was way beyond my capacity. And
also, as again, it was in

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the eighties. We didn't have the
cell phones, so you can't compare it

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to anything in the eighties. No, No, Well, what else in

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the eighties has has circled around and
is being re perpetuated? Now, well,

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I go back to that school yard
shooting I covered. I mean,

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I used to hunt. I grew
up in Ohio. I'm gonna post it.

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You know, I have some dym
in the ray for a shoting for

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hunting, and you know we don't
need hundred shot drums. That's not meant

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for deer, that's meant for humans. I think that should be illegal.

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But again, it doesn't mean I
think somebody should hunt. So it just

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seems that common sense to me that
we shouldn't have hunterd shot drums floating around

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in circulation. Dale Maharaj is with
us, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning

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and their children after them, his
newest creation, American Doom Loop Dispatches from

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a Troubled Nation nineteen eighties to the
twenty twenties. Thank you for joining us

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and we look forward to the read. Thanks Lee, Thanks for listening to

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Later with Lee Matthews, the Lee
Matthews Podcast, and remember to listen to

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The Drive Live weekday afternoons from five
to seven and iHeartMedia presentation