Question about voting and the south

[wtf]

My view of the south when it comes to politics is probably more stereotypical and general than it should be, so that's probably why I'm confused about this. But why is Alabama a LOCK for *, but Arkansas a toss up? What's so dramatically different about someone in Alabama vs someone in Arkansas?

[DaveFL99]

1. Roy Moore

[Warpy]

8. Yeah, pretty much

I drove across the country twice last year, drove the length of Alabama on the way home. It was the height of Roy Moore's 15 minutes of undeserved fame, and the radio in Alabama was the most toxic stuff I've ever heard, and I'm talking about the lunacy on SW, too. There was no opposition, just one foaming lunatic after another shrieking in outrage against Yankees, liberals, feminists, black folks, Arabs, and anybody else who isn't a right wing wack job. This was all across the dial, the only break being classical music on the PBS station.

I know a couple of lefties in the Birmingham area, and I applaud them greatly for sticking to the good fight faced with such insurmountable odds. I also fear for their continued safety.

Yes, Alabama is different. It's like another planet, even compared to the rest of the south.

[Jo March]

11. But put it into perspective

I hear the same crazy rants full of hatred and bile on my way home from work and I'm in Charlotte, NC. When I first moved to this state, I lived in Lexington, NC. I moved there in Feb. of '98. Within 4 months, there were TWO KKK rallies on the courthouse steps.

Growing up in Bama, I had never even seen a KKK rally!

So, Alabama isn't that different from other states in the South. It just has those pockets of ignorance that are in every state.

[Warpy]

12. I also drove through Teenessee, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, and part of

Louisiana. The bile in Alabama was relentless. The ONLY alternative was one PBS station.

THAT is the difference.

[DaveFL99]

13. I went looking for a new radio station the other day

and it was very scary. We have an NPR station, A smooth jazz station (only so much of that I can take) and one that plays a lot of 70s and 80s stuff. When I started scanning through the dial I was in shock. There were stations like Spirit 97 on FM. All over the FM dial. I can't believe people listen to so much of this crap around Tampa.

[Jo March]

19. I am sure that I won't convince you otherwise

I don't even live in the state because it's way too conservative for me.

My point is that it's no different than other Southern states that I've lived in - Kentucky, Tennessee, South Carolina, Georgia and now North Carolina. There are pockets of that crap in every state - every single one without exception.

I am sorry that your drive through Alabama wasn't a pleasant one. Just don't paint all of Alabama with the same brush.

[forgethell]

26. That seems to me to be

a pretty bigoted remark.

[TNDemo]

2. How different is someone in Ohio from some in Pennsylvania?

One is red and one is blue.

[wuushew]

4. Ohio touches more red states

Ohio is bordered by Indiania, Kentucky, West Virginia and Pennsylvannia. Where as Pennslyvannia is bordered by Ohio, Maryland, New York, New Jersey and Delware. Clearly one state is subject to more color bleed than the other.

[DaveFL99]

15. How is someone from San Francisco different from someone from Alabama ?

[Nevernose]

23. Colder beaches?

[DieboldMustDie]

27. Actually both are considered swing states.

Here in PA we currently have a Democratic governor but both houses of the legislature are under Republican control.   Tom Ridge was Gov. before taking over Homeland Security. :shrug:

[Jo March]

3. Sigh. As someone from Alabama, let me explain

Alabama is the "deep" South. Arkansas is closer to the Midwest and has a chance of letting in the light of truth and sanity.

IMHO, however, I don't believe that Kerry should write off Alabama. More and more people there are beginning to come around and would if Kerry and Edwards would concentrate more on the state.

[charlyvi]

5. Agreed

I was sitting on a rocker in front of Cracker Barrel in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, yesterday. A man walked by me and said hi; we started a conversation--just a friendly "really hot, isn't it" type of thing when he asked if I thought we'd have a new president come November. I thought, "oh, no, here it comes" when I said "hope so". And he actually agreed. A middle aged, NASCAR luvin', Southern white man agreed that bush* had to go. I was dumbstruck. Driving home, I actually allowed the word "landslide" to enter my political thought process.

[Jo March]

10. He was one of many, I'm guessing

More and more people who, by first glance, should be repubs are voting against * in this election. It has really blown my mind.

I haven't given up on my home state and I won't. I'd love to move back there one day.

When I die, I want my ashes spread out from the top of Monte Santo mountain overlooking Huntsville, where I was born.

[theboss]

6. Yellow Dogs versus Christian Right

One of my most frustrating experiences posting here is the fact that so many posters seem to only know history back to about 1989 or so.

The South - historically - was always rock-solid Democrat. The Solid South was the reason that the Democrats were able to control the White House pretty much non-stop from 1932 to 1968 (with a small gap where a moderate war hero who nearly ran as Democrat was in charge) and both Houses of Congress pretty much from 1932 to 1994 (with small gaps here and there in Senate).

Granted, the main reason for this dominance was the fact that the party openly courted segregationists, but let's ignore that unpleasantness for a bit. Things started to change in 1968 when Nixon basically through open the doors of the Republican Party to the Segregationist wing of the Democrats, who had just passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act. But that didn't totally alter the landscape since it mainly changed politics on a Presidential level. The Dem Incumbants in the South had figured out how to attract the black vote and still had enough historical ties to White Voters to keep them involved.

The big big big change took place in 1980 when Reagan figured out the sleeping giant of American politics were social conservatives, largely located in the South. He openly courted them and helped slowly convert them all to rock-ribbed Republicans by convincing them that Democrats were all heathens. The high point of this was 1994 when the Republicans simply buried us across the South. Since then, they have used redistricting along with unbelievably cynical racial-gerrymandering to solidify their hold. (It's fascinating to consider that the Black Caucus in Congress exists primarily Repulicans were willing to create one minority district in exchage for three "white" districts).

Now what does that have to do with Arkansas and Alabama. Two things, Alabam was also much more strongly segregationist than Alabama so a large part of it went to Nixon under his Southern Strategy. Secondly, it has a much higher percentage of affluent members of the Christian Right. Two pillars of Republican strength reside there. Arkansas remaind much more attached to its "Yellow Dog" past in producing politicians like - I don't know - Bill Freakin' Clinton, who would not have been elected to city council in Alabama. It still has some historical ties to us and is under much less influence of the Christian Right.

So, that's it: history, race and religion in a nutshell.

[bobbieinok]

20. great post........history is very important

1 minor disagreement......Nixon started his 'Southern Strategy' in 1960

MLK was in jail for taking part in a sit-in and his wife was pregnant.

JFK was not apparently too interested, but there were people on his staff who understood the opportunity.

So JFK called Coretta Scott King (close to the election) and Nixon did not.

The news of the phone call flew through the black community; the 60 election was the one in which blacks ceased to vote republican (the party of Lincoln) and started voting democratic.

(There's a lot of info on this in the first volume of Taylor Branch's series The King Years.)

Nixon, like everyone else, knew many whites in the south were furious about attempts to desegregate schools and other aspects of society. Also he realized many in the so-called 'Bible Belt' were very upset that the democratic party had nominated a Roman Catholic for president. He thought he had a great chance to shatter the 'solid south.'

It took a while, but the republican 'southern strategy' finally succeeded.

[theboss]

21. True to a degree

But blacks began voting for FDR (when they could actually vote) in the 1930s. Before 1960, the "black vote" didn't even really exist. In the South, forget about it and in the North, they were controlled by the machines in the cities.

[nosmokes]

7. also bama born n bred

but i don't see the K/E ticket having a chance. i'm not gonna say that great strides have not been made in the deep south, but there's still some giant leaps left. the religous right has a strangle hold, literally, on alabama. you'll drive the highways and f'ways and pass billboards that say stuff like go to the church or the devil will get you, and there's no sponsorship motive behind it. no ad for a specific church, just someone that put the billboard up. and i'll give ya 5 to 1 that whoever paid for that billboard is casting his lot with the dumbass that claims god speaks through him.

[Jo March]

9. We have those billboards here in NC

They are a bit creepy, aren't they? I don't like them and I'm a Christian.

Still, though, there are quietly more and more Democrats in Alabama. I don't think that Kerry will win the state but I don't think that it will be a * blowout either.

[EstimatedProphet]

14. Good news from Georgia at least

I got an article emailed to me today that says Bush only leads by 4% in GA. Georgia is (especially rural Georgia) every bit as fundy as Alabama, so who would have figured such a slim lead?

[DaveFL99]

16. and that's probably the 4% in the northeastern part of the state

who want a theocracy

[MISSDem]

17. Lyndon Johnson said when the Civil Rights Act was signed that

the Democrats had lost the south for at least a generation. And it was true. That was 1964 and a generation is considered to be about thirty years.

[DaveFL99]

18. the way things are trending

I wish Bush could delay the election for a month or 2. By next December I don't think he'll be able to carry Crawford.

[drthais]

22. actually

every single state in the South
(and I mean the Deep SOuth)
is a land unto its own

no two are anything alike

[trof]

24. Guess I'll weigh in as the Senior Member from Alabama.

I must say I like the tone of this thread. Nothing even approaching a flame war. Y'all do me proud.

JFK and Johnson really lost a lot of the south, especially the goobers and blue collars, with civil rights. We DO tend to nurse a grudge. Granny was STILL pissed at the Yankees when I was a little kid back in the 40s and 50s.

We go back and forth between D and R for governor. Our state legislature is predominantly D, but not necessarily the kind they'd recognize in Massachusetts.

Since JFK (I think, might have been IKE) we've gone R for prez, except for Carter (again, 'I think'. too lazy to look it up.)

I talk to more and more what I call Real Republicans who are not happy with Bush. Some still can't bring themselves to vote for Kerry, but say they may just take a pass on this one. I'll take what I can get. I do think Alabama will be a lot closer than many people thinks this time.

[69KV]

25. I'm wondering about that myself

I think it goes all the way back to the divisions leftover from the Civil War.

Alabama was pure Confederate. Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, West Virginia had large pockets of pro-union sentiment. West Virginia was so pro-union that they seceded from Virginia. The Repuke southern strategy after 1968 used code words to appeal to segregationists. It worked in Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, but not so well in the border states.

There are still some people who still can't get over the Civil War. That's my guess.