JD Vance in The Atlantic

On Drugs: Prescription "hillbilly heroin" was invited, not invaded

Folks back home speak of heroin like an apocalyptic invader, something that assailed the town mysteriously and without warning. Yet the truth is that heroin crept slowly into Middletown's families and communities--not by invasion but by invitation.

Very few Americans are strangers to addiction. Shortly before I graduated from law school, I learned that my own mother lay comatose in a hospital, the consequence of an apparent heroin overdose. Yet heroin was only her latest drug of choice. Prescription opioids--"hillbilly heroin" some call it, to highlight its special appeal among white working-class folks like us--had already landed Mom in the hospital. In our community, there has long been a large appetite to dull the pain; heroin is just the newest vehicle.

On Principles & Values: Trump is cultural heroin: you feel better for a little bit

A common thread among Trump's faithful, even among those whose individual circumstances remain unspoiled, is that they hail from broken communities. These are places where good jobs are impossible to come by. Where people have lost their faith and abandoned the churches. Where too many young people spend their days stoned instead of working and learning. [These are,] in the aggregate, a social crisis of historic proportions. There is no group of people hurtling more quickly to social decay. No group of people fears the future more, and exposes its children to such significant domestic chaos.

Trump's promises are the needle in America's collective vein. What Trump offers is an easy escape from the pain. Trump is cultural heroin. He makes some feel better for a bit. But he cannot fix what ails them, and one day they'll realize it.