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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsIs the Republican "Southern Strategy" going down in flames?
It might be, during this election cycle. But I believe that's due to Trump's hatred of everything on planet Earth other than himself, and his ability to turn off any halfway sentient human being.
So what happens if/when he loses big?
I don't believe the Republicans are about to throw away their "Southern Strategy." It's worked very well for them over the past four plus decades. And the voters that it attracts, (the ignorant, the bigots, the haters, the "Southern Pride" people, and so many others), will still buy the snake oil.
The Republicans haven't much to offer America other than "tax cuts for the rich," and "hatred for the poor and the 'Other'." i don't know if they are capable of coming up with anything positive or noble.
But that's just my opinion. What do you think? Is the "Southern Strategy" on the way out?
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)and voter suppression, mislabeled as voter ID concerns, but the common element is based on racial animosity that now includes a greater emphasis on demonizing Hispanics and Muslims.
And someone is voting for these racists.
longship
(40,416 posts)And consider the true red states. Who's voting there?
Warpy
(111,383 posts)since the backwards early 60s. He's got to hope every single rural person in the south votes for him and that's not going to happen. Many of them have been voting to piss off New Yorkers for so long that they'll never vote for one, no matter what. A few are Democrats. Most will stay home. The southern strategy is largely going to be a flop this year, I think.
That doesn't mean it's completely dead. Should the GOP start running southern candidates, they might be able to revive it--if they can hang together as a party.
What's destroying them now isn't the southern bigots, they could have absorbed them just fine. It's the religious nutters who have infected the whole party with the deadly spirit of "no compromise, not ever" on every single issue. Goldwater warned them about that and in their greed for voting blocs, they refused to listen.
Now that party is seriously in jeopardy. If Drumpf is humiliated, they're done.
Cyrano
(15,071 posts)For sure, they're not going away anytime soon. I don't know if there are enough of them, combined with the others I mentioned, to keep the "Southern Strategy" alive.
After all, that "Strategy" doesn't really apply to just the South. Haters, bigots, ignorant people, etc., live everywhere. And the GOP has spent decades courting them.
What I've never been able to understand is how people can vote against their own well being, election after election, and never grasp that they're screwing themselves.
Warpy
(111,383 posts)Their eyes are raised to the clouds, where the preachers tell them heaven is.
They have no clue how insubstantial those clouds really are.
gwheezie
(3,580 posts)My county is about 30% non white. My district voted for Obama twice. There is an ever dwindling core of white racists holding on and they aren't going quietly but the country is turning brown even outside cities.
Cyrano
(15,071 posts)inevitable as climate change.
Any person who regards himself/herself as "superior" in some way because of their race needs to adapt, or drown in their own misery.
What's so sad is that it's so unnecessary. Yet it won't go away as long as politicians keep beating the drums of bigotry and hatred in order to cling to their diminshing power.
GOLGO 13
(1,681 posts)If they can still cling to the house & or Senate they are wedded to this strategy until the old racists die off. The young are increasingly becoming more & more liberal every generation. We are witnessing the twilight of the Republican party.
Adrahil
(13,340 posts)Is also a drawing a more educated citizenry from all over. The GOP strongholds ar slowly crumbling.