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Reader question: Please explain this headline, “Rust Belt” in particular: Hillary Clinton faces challenge: Black voters in Rust Belt (Associated Press, March 19, 2016). My comments: This story examines the problem Hillary Clinton faces with black voters in Midwestern America, voters who, like their white counterparts, want the old manufacturing jobs back. Those jobs were high-paying and therefore the real jobs to seek. This AP story has proved to be prescient. As we now know, Clinton lost her election to Donald Trump even though Clinton had been viewed by many as a clear favorite. Also, as this story presciently foretells, Clinton lost due, among other reasons, mostly to lack of votes along the rust belt, a vast swath of areas in middle and western America, areas known for its traditional manufacturing industries (Think of Pittsburg for its steel and Detroit for its cars). Due to globalization and free trade (think of NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Area between America, Canada and Mexico), these old industrial centers have seen its manufacturing jobs go to Mexico and elsewhere including, “China”, as Trump was wont to say and repeat saying. Anyways, the rust belt refers to an old industrial base where the conveyor belt and assembly lines (Think of Modern Times, the movie by Charlie Chaplin) have been abandoned and laid to waste. They have been abandoned for so long that the conveyor belts have begun to gather rust – or become rusty. | 
