If the DNC reads this Max Sawicky post, they might be able to stave off their free-fall into irrelvance:
Dean’s comments about seeking the votes of people who put Confederate flag stickers on their trucks are not objectionable; they are praiseworthy. The other candidates are indulging in cheap moral posturing and race politics. As public policy, we can criticize hanging the Stars and Bars on the Courthouse without futile attempts to marginalize individuals for their own choices in this vein.
What’s at stake is whether we are going to have class politics in the U.S. Cultural conservatism, which in the South can include some type of sentimentality for the Lost Cause, or resentment of what is perceived as excess in the name of civil rights, should not be treated as an enemy ideology. I am not talking about adherence to segregation in public accommodations, denial of the right to vote, or other obvious breaches of democracy that nobody in good faith could endorse.
Coalitions are about reaching understandings through dialogue and/or compromise with people of different views. The Democratic Party needs to be a coalition of working people. It needs to ease up on cultural and social liberalism. I mean fetishes about gun control and tobacco. It needs to stop pretending that Southern whites are more racist than other people. It needs to welcome the “seamless web” Catholics who oppose both abortion and the death penalty. It needs to stop overselling rehabilitation and underselling punishment. It needs to find ways of establishing reasonable environmental regulation other than on the backs of workers. What it endorses as a party is ideally the outcome of a rational debate and compromise on these issues. For some, one or another such compromise could be a ‘deal-breaker.’ So be it. That’s the process we need. The constant and lodestar should be an unwavering commitment to the living standards of working people, and opposition to the corporativist, war-mongering ways of the Republican Party.
Granted, I do not necessarily agree with his final remarks about the Republican Party, but if Democrats ever intend to win again, they need to stop acting like the only people who live in the South are the Dixie Chicks and a few former slaves. To show you what Max’swing of the Democrat party is up against, a commenter to this very reasonable post from Max attempted to do just what Max had cautioned against- ‘cheap moral postuing and race politics’- when he said:
Max: you think you can win majority support for your “progressive” economic agenda returning the socially marginal–uppity blacks, feminist women, gays–to their proper places at the back of the Democratic Party bus. To which I can only say, not with my vote you won’t, pal. This is the same game the smart-ass White Boys at the DLC have been playing for years (albeit with a very different economic agenda from yours). Well, here’s a news flash for you *and* the Bubbas: that game’s over.
-and-
And I find his empathy, if not sympathy, for the neo-Confederates deeply repugnant. If they are not representatives of an “enemy ideology,” then I don’t know who is.
Max’s response:
*** wants to have his/her cake and eat it too. Also his/her pie, sorbet, and chocolate mousse. If the full plate of progressive positions was a going political concern, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. So demanding it embodies a desire for political irrelevance, or some kind of elaborate wishful thinking. Multiple organizing principles mean no principles at all.
The rest of your argument is just inflating my words until they look like something ugly. Sorry but opposition to affirmative action does not equal racism; opposition to gay marriage does not equal homophobia; etc. I don’t have those positions, but making any deviation from liberal orthodoxy on them into a moral indictment is obnoxious and, as we have all seen, spectacularly ineffective politics. If you want to bear moral witness, I suggest joining a monastery or a trotskyist sect.
It just sounds so much better when a limousine liberal is smacked down by a progressive than when they are smacked down by a conservative.
Kimmitt
“It needs to stop pretending that Southern whites are more racist than other people.”
Have you *been* to the South?
Andrew Lazarus
Mark Kleiman, who doesn’t even like Dean much, has the same point less eloquently. Let me join in too. What sort of dimwit candidate doesn’t want to show the guy with the flag he’d be better off changing parties? It’s not like Dean is propsoing to get his vote with a promise to restore segregation?!
I don’t think the Iraqi terrorists are desperate. But I think this kind of specious, superficial attack on Dean shows Kerry and Gephardt are desperate. I hope Dean hits them hard on this.
Ricky
***”Have you *been* to the South?”***
Going on 37 years and (anecdotal moment) by FAR the biggest racists I’ve come across during that time have been the many transplanted yanks. Especially (for reasons unknown to me) NYers. And it goes across party lines (which only an idiot would object to, anyway, since political preferences have nothing to do with racial animosity).
Joe Schmoe
There is still a whole lot of racism in the South. I do think that there is more racism in the South than in the north. In addition, I think that the Confederate flag is a symbol of treason and evil every bit as loathsome as the Nazi swatstika. The people of the South need to stop lionizing people like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. he rebel soldiers were courageous, but so was the Waffen SS. They may have been virtuous men (Lee certainly was), but they fought for an evil cause. Statues of those men should be taken down. I am appalled that they are still standing in public squares. The flag is even worse.
That being said, the South has changed — a lot. The whole country has changed.
The vast majority of Southerners are not racists, and it is time that everyone acknowledged that. The people of the South, black and white alike, have worked harder than anyone to change. It is grossly unfair to keep waving the bloody shirt of racism when such great strides have been made. The South, like the rest of our country, has come a long, long way. It is terribly unfair to keep dredging up the past.
But race isn’t the only issue. There is more than a little social and cultural elitism in Democrats’ treatment of Southerners, and this is DISGUSTING.
There is nothing wrong with driving a pickup truck and watching NASCAR. People who own guns are decent, hardworking Americans who own them becuase they (a) like guns, and/or (b) want to protect themselves from crime. Protecting oneself from crime is a a *good* thing. So is religious faith. But you’d never know that listening to Democrats. No, to them Southerners are all superstitious, ignorant, inbred hicks.
Personally, I think that the Southerners who are always condemned as stupid, racist rubes by elitist Democrats are a lot more level-headed — and virtuous — than their efette Upper West Side and San Francisco critics. They put their lives on the line and FIGHT the wars that keep us all safe, while leftist Democrats shout “No Blood for Oil!” They keep our schools from descending into multicultural and postmodern hell. They work hard for an honest dollar.
Sawicky is absolutely right — Southerners should be natural Democratic constituents. The Democrats need to stop crying racism, sneering at religious faith, and looking down their noses at blue-collar Americans. If they can do that, then they may be able to attract the Southern vote.
scott h.
In some ways the South already is (or was) Democratic. Although Presidential races in the South have tended to go to the Republicans, everything else has been pretty solidly Democratic for a long time. For example: Mississippi didn’t have a Republican governor until the late 80’s, early 90’s (IIRC). Lott became a Senator in ’89, Cochran in ’78. Before that is a long string of D’s. All the way back to 1881.
In nearly 100 years there were no Republican senators from Mississippi. Again, IIRC, this was typical for most southern states on both the federal and state level. And yet they wouldn’t vote for a Dem for President.
John Cole
Scott H.- One reason for this is because southern Democrats at the local level would be called republicans anywhere north of the Mason/Dixon Line.
IN WV, half of our Democrats are so conservative they would be Republicans anywhere else.
Kimmitt
Absolutely true — the same principle applies to Republicans farther north.
the talking dog
Its probably all a moot point; if the Democrats want to seriously compete in the South, they’ll (we’ll) probably have to run a Southerner; anything else hasn’t worked since JFK (and even he won by a squeaker). And Vermont governor (and raised on Park Ave. in New York) Howard Dean trading in whatever his campaign bus for the General Lee from the Dukes of Hazard probably won’t change things for him in that department.
The Mighty Reason Man
Cole-
I cannot find a single thing in this post I disagree with.
I just thought that that fact in and of itself was noteworthy.
We’re practically brothers now!
John Cole
I will work hard to upset you tonight and tomorrow. Blogging is no fun when everyone agrees.
Dodd
“In nearly 100 years there were no Republican senators from Mississippi. Again, IIRC, this was typical for most southern states on both the federal and state level. And yet they wouldn’t vote for a Dem for President.”
The main reason for that was that the Republicans pushed Reconstruction on the South after the War Between The States. By the time a couple of generations had gone by and that had passed from living memory, the Dixiecrats had created political machines of amazing competence. It was the officials elected by these machines that enforced and later resisted segregation, too, one might recall.
As recently as 12 or so years ago a friend of mine was *required*, as a condition of employment at the Louisville, KY *courthouse* to change his voter registration to Democrat. Well, it’s taken a couple more generations after Brown v Board of Education for all that to shake out, but the machines are pretty close to moribund. I live in KY, 2-1 Democrat voter registration but the state Senate, 5 of 6 Congressmen, both Senators and now, for only the second time in my lifetime, the Governor’s office belong to the GOP. It’s conceivable we could take the state House in a few more years – the Dems have had that since 1895!
And no, I am not arguing that GOP dedication to civil rights made the difference, BTW (I will argue, vociferously, however, with any bigot who claims the GOP’s surge in the South is about racist Southern attitudes). Rather, I am saying that the South was always more “Republican” than “Democrat” in their beliefs and mores, even back when the Democrats were farther right than most Republicans are now (Truman was easily to Bush’s right). That’s why our Democrats do things, like they did here in KY, like passing CCW laws and, as in Zell Miller’s case, endorsing Bush.
Nowadays, both parties are to the left of where they were 40 years ago. As that’s happened, the Democrats have gone from the party of JFK (center-right by our current standards) to the party of Nancy Pelosi (fringe left by 1960 standards). So, with the death of the machines they were able to build and entrench during Reconstruction and Jim Crow, there’s just no reason for most Southerners to vote Democrat anymore and no way for the party to game the system to ensure their continued dominance.
Kimmitt
“Truman was easily to Bush’s right”
Okay, hang on. Truman integrated the military and proposed national socialized health insurance. He’s pretty solidly in the “liberal” camp, especially accounting for the times.
JFK was not center-right by any stretch of the imagination. His pursuit of the Civil Rights Act; acceptance of progressive taxation (along with, of course, a nod to sensible levels); and overall belief in the power of the State to address the ills of society puts him firmly on the center-left.
Stop bogarting our successful liberal Presdents.
“I will argue, vociferously, however, with any bigot who claims the GOP’s surge in the South is about racist Southern attitudes.”
I’m not a bigot, but I think the GOP’s surge in the South is about, among other things, racist Southern attitudes — though they now are complemented by the tremendous power of antigay and pro-fundamentalist Southern attitudes.
Dodd
Kimmit, you misread my comment (as I, frankly, expected you would). In their era Truman and JFK were indeed liberals. But I explicitly stated that I was comparing them to *current* standards which, as I said, are more liberal than they were 40 years ago. No conservative wants to resegregate the military or eliminate the civil rights act, Kimmit, fever-induced DNC fundrasing letters notwithstanding. IOW, the “liberals” *won* on those issues.
Paint a realistic picture of the two – include dropping atomic weapons and *fierce*, unremitting anti-communism into it, just for starters – and it’s quite clear that I’m correct. Name me one living Democrat who would invade Cuba to try and stop the spread of Communism and then bring us country to the brink of war rather than let them install missiles off of our shores? You can’t – because they’d all be running off to the UN bleating for sanctions and pissing their pants.
“I’m not a bigot, but I think the GOP’s surge in the South is about, among other things, racist Southern attitudes — though they now are complemented by the tremendous power of antigay and pro-fundamentalist Southern attitudes.”
If that’s what you think, Kimmit, then you are a bigot. Among other things.
Ricky
“acceptance of progressive taxation”
That’s how you describe the huge across-the-board tax cuts from JFK? Bigotry, ignorance AND dishonesty within the same
comment. Quite the combination.
Your credibility is shot to hell.
Kimmitt
Again, the CCC and the Klan turn out for the Republicans, while the HRC and the ACLU turn out for the Dems. The former is for racism and homophobia, while the later is for acceptance and religious freedom. People vote for the folks who they think will give them what they want.
Dodd
Let’s assume for the sake of argument, bigot, that you are 100% correct. How many votes do you think CCC and Klan support is worth? Enough to turn the entire South GOP by significant margins? Of course it isn’t. But you certainly seem to think so, proving you are a small-minded bigot who would rather believe that millions of your fellow citizens are racists than accept the simple and obvious explanation: Your party’s gradual shift further and further to the Left alienated those voters. One need never mention racism to explain it yet y’all pretty much always do.
Kimmitt
“Enough to turn the entire South GOP by significant margins?”
Of course not. The CCC and the Klan are (in order) extremely and very small organizations.
But there is no question that the GOP gives them something they want.
You are absolutely correct that my Party’s shift to the Left alienated Southern voters. Two of the most relevant parts of this (now) are my Party’s commitment to the separation of Church and State and my Party’s commitment to civil rights for gays, in my opinion. (For the record, guns are quite relevant, but the Dems are capable of putting forward candidates who can find common ground on gun laws, so they aren’t the reason why the Dems will never take the South.) Southern voters like to send antigay (and to a much lesser extent, anti-minority) fundamentalist Protestants to represent them Federally. The Democratic Party is structurally incapable of putting forth a large number of these candidates, so the only districts where Dems have good odds to win are majority-African-American districts, where the forces at play are different.
Thirty years ago, it was a lot more about race. Things are still getting slowly better in that area, thank goodness.
Ricky
Kimmitt,
Your party is a sinking ship full of losers all across the nation (except for the districts with the worst schools), especially in the south.
Try as you may, your attempts at smearing the people who don’t want them leading the masses is nothing but crying over spilt milk.
Put up decent candidates & run on acceptable issues & you may win. Raising taxes & acting like scared children when it comes to defense will keep the losing streak going.
laura
from kimmit’s post “I’m not a bigot, but I think the GOP’s surge in the South is about, among other things, racist Southern attitudes — though they now are complemented by the tremendous power of antigay and pro-fundamentalist Southern attitudes.”
I was born and raised in the south. I am not a racist. I havn’t even been to church since I was seven so I am hardly a fundamentalist. I don’t know anyone who has a confederate flag on their auto. I drove throu 4 parking garages and 2 mega malls yesterday looking for confederate bumper stickers and could only find one. I support gay marriage, right to choice, and stem cell research. I don’t know anyone who has ever belongerd to the klan, whichg started in indianna. I don’t think the klan exists anymore,
I certainly have never heard of any
Klan functions going on in SC. I never hear southerners talk about that damned flag, it always some national politician bringing it up for discussion. I get the distinct impression that you think we are all racist waving our flag on the way to some ignorant gathering. Your image of the south is about 50 years old. Politics in the south is a lot more about class than race. I don’t know anybody who glorifies robert e. lee or stonewall jackson. Condaleeza Rice is my personal idol, she rocks. Howard Dean is the guy waving the flag, not me, and I resent his insinuation that there are enough flag waving racist here to justify targeting. I don’t think there are that many of them. Our neighborhoods are integrated and our schools are integrated. It has been decades since we had a race riot, on the flip side, you could note that with 40% of charleston identified as “black” and a metro area population of 500,000, a race riot is a problem. Forget the national gaurd, we would need the first army division for that problem. There have been no lynchings in my life time. Mixed marriage is very common here as are mixed families. The long time police chief of charleston, my home, is black and jewish and arguably the most popular man in charleston. The first reform synagouge was founded here and there is an unusually large jewish population here. I’m pretty sure that you did not know that. I can’t fathom why you so dislike southerners, I don’t think you know any. I can see that the democrats sure do hate us, They seem to think we come from the evil side of the clampett family. I don’t know these southerners you are ranting about and I hope to never meet them.
Kimmitt
1) One of the great pleasures of this sort of discussion is meeting interesting and thoughtful people.
2) I hate to assume, but given this set of beliefs, it seems likely that you’d be voting Democratic more often than Republican. South Carolina has six Representatives — four are Republican and two are Democratic. When Ernest Hollings retires, it is essentially expected that your new Senator will be a conservative Republican. I guess what I’m getting at is, while you and I share a lot of thoughts and beliefs, a lot of your neighbors do not seem to.
(There is something to be said for discussing the rural/urban split; urban areas tend to be significantly more liberal than rural areas, so that may account for the disparity between your day-to-day existence and the overall statistics.)
Dodd
I don’t know why I’m arguing with this bigot. He clearly has already decided that Southerners are a bunch of slack-jawed morons who vote purely on the basis of the word given down from the pulpit at the local snake church. The possibility that the left-liberal project of big government, more top-down, comand and control intrusive regulation, lowest common denominator public mores for everyone, higher taxes, teachers’ union fellating and various and sundry other legislative and cultrual agendae might be the reason for their decline in the South isn’t even worth considering.
And why? Because *some* conservatives are very religious (which, BTW, has nothing to do with separation of church and state – the “conservative dream” of a theocracy only exists in your stram men) and *some* don’t think that gay marriages should receive the sanction of the state (neither of these things is true of me, BTW, so I think I, as a Southern Republican, can judge their extent more objectively, bigot, than you can).
Laura
My vote is flexible. I have voted for democrats and republicans in national and local elections. Holling’s seat is the most interesting thing happening arouind here. There is a good democratic candidate namned Inez Tenenbaum. She is in her second term as state superintendeant of schools and she has done a very good job. Inez won with 58% of the vote the first time and 62% in 2002 against seasoned republicans.
The republican competition is not strong and she has a real chance of winning the seat. In the polls she is beating the two republican front runners one of whom just is not electable and the other unknown outside of the upstate. As I understand it her husband is jewsih ans she has retained her affiliation with the methodist church. It won’t matter here, only the very religous care and they don’t care how she or her husband prays. The just care that she does pray. Muslims and Jews are very well tolerated in the south, even the babtist know it is all the same god. She would be a good balance to Lindsey Graham who took strom thurmond’s seat. The shizophrenic south does exist but it is not a rural/urban split it is a region split. To best explain, SC has three large metro areas. These three areas are represented by charleston (lowcountry), columbia (midlands),
greenville (upstate). The three regions have distinct personalities. Charleston is the most liberal coming in on the middle of the road on some issues and a little to the left on some issues. Columbia is a little to the right and grennville is conservative.Charleston and greenville often find themselves at odds. Charleston has been a port for 300 years and there have been many waves of immigration. There has also been a continous exposure to people from everywhere.This has always been seen as a party town, a place where illegal gambling casinos ran with impunity until the 1980’s. Remember the flappers, the charleston, the roaring twenties; this was ground zero of southern decadence from the very early 1700’s until anywhere in florida took the title in the 1970’s.greenville is all about Bob Jones University and the bible. I don’t know if they are racist but they will vote with their bibles.
Don’t make the mistake of underestimating their intelligence, greenville is a well educated high technology area. Columbia is just sort of there, it’s the capital and has little personality. The vote will split nearly down the middle every time. It isn’t that southern states vote one way or another, it’s that regions inside those states vote one way or another, biggest area wins. Atlanta always dominates Georgia’s vote. In SC, Greenville and Charleston are fighting it ou at each election. Charleston is a little smaller but our political influence extends up and down the coast from Beaufort to Myrtle Beach and we are growing faster than Greenville. If we turn out the vote we can out vote Greenville. It is more about the dominate region of the state than a rural/urban thing. Coastal areas are more liberal, inland areas not so much.
Kimmitt
‘”conservative dream” of a theocracy only exists in your stram men’
It wasn’t Connecticut that had a State Supreme Court Chief Justice openly defy a Federal court order to remove a religious icon from a place of prominence in a court building. His reasoning was theocratic: “May this day mark the beginning of the restoration of the moral foundation of law to our people and a return to the knowledge of God in our land.”
You may not want a theocracy, and I’m delighted to hear it — because plenty of people do, enough to put Roy Moore into power and to support him in his assault on our secular foundations.
David Perron
And, magically, one judge in Alabama suddenly is indicative of a trend sweeping the country. I think you’d have a great deal to teach aerodynamicists in the area of extrapolation, Kimmitt.
Legend has it aeros are willing and able to extrapolate from a single point. It appears they’re in the presence of greatness.