WV: Abortion-Hating, Gun-Toting, Immigrant-Trashing Kerry Voters

[AmyStrange]

West Virginia

From: William Saletan
Subject: Abortion-Hating, Gun-Toting, Immigrant-Trashing Kerry Voters
Friday, June 18, 2004, at 12:55 PM PT

FROM: http://slate.msn.com/id/2102496/entry/0/
Struck by the pro-Bush comments I've heard in Hinton and Morgantown, I head east toward the West Virginia exurbs of Washington, D.C. Maybe Kerry has a better shot here. Jefferson County, at the far end of the 2nd congressional district, forms the tip of the state's eastern panhandle. It voted for the statewide winner in every year but 1988, when it went for Bush's dad. It picked the national winner in the last five elections. In 2000, the county cast more than 14,000 ballots for president. Gore lost by 185.

Charles Town

The economy here is very different from Hinton's or Morgantown's. New houses are going up, but the buyers are coming out from Washington's Maryland and Virginia suburbs in search of cheaper real estate. Defino Resendiz, who runs Grandma's Diner in Charles Town, the county seat, says 40 percent of the people here are commuting to Washington or its inner suburbs. They're exhausting the town's resources—it has no high school—and driving up real estate prices, which sounded good to the locals until they realized that they couldn't sell one house because they couldn't afford another. Eric Olmstead and Derek Brandt, two regulars at the diner, fix cars at the dealership down the street. Zachary Morse, who's lunching a few seats down the counter, drives a UPS truck. They all complain that you can't make a decent enough wage here to keep up with the cost of living. People are being forced out and have nowhere to go.

It sounds tailor-made for Kerry's message, but the culture here turns out to be as conservative as that of Morgantown or Hinton. Heading south from Veterans Memorial Highway, you pass Coast Guard Drive, a Veterans Affairs medical center, billboards urging prayer for our troops, and a house covered with a sheet welcoming home a staff sergeant from Iraq. On Charles Town's main street, there's a ministry on every block. At Grandma's, I run into Billy Hearn, a pastor whose congregation meets up the street. Billy emphasizes the evil of abortion, which doesn't surprise me. But Eric, a 29-year-old Democrat from Vermont who leaves before I talk to Billy, volunteers the same opinion.

The Good Book—and a few others

Derek plans to vote for Bush, mostly because of the president's religious convictions. Eric prefers Kerry but calls him a bloodless flip-flopper. Bush's "views suck, but at least he has some passion behind them," Eric scoffs. Eric says he could make more money on welfare than he does at his job, which offends his work ethic. He excoriates the "politically correct" assault on masculinity. "The world would be a better place if everybody was packing some heat," he argues. If terrorists hijack a plane while he's on board, he warns, "There's gonna be some Muslim ass gettin' trashed." Zachary, the UPS driver, condemns ghetto culture and laments that self-reliance is vanishing with the family farm. He blames promiscuity on women and decries the prosecution of parents who use "the rod" to discipline their kids.

<SNIP>

[DeepModem Mom]

1. Yet Saletan thinks Kerry can win WV --

From the article:

"...You don't win this state as a Democrat by resisting its nationalism or its anti-welfare ethic. You win by channeling that nationalism and that ethic into economic issues. If you can't run against Bush for killing Iraqis, you run against him for spending our money on them—and for cutting deals with the Saudis to keep our gas prices high. If you can't run against Indians who buy American hotels, you run against companies that ship jobs to India.

You blame lost jobs and low wages on underhanded foreign competitors. You buy off the coal industry with subsidies. You promise more of the pork Sen. Byrd has brought home. You duck questions about abortion or gay rights. You flaunt your military service and paint the other guy as a draft dodger. You swear allegiance to the Second Amendment. If possible, you bring your hunting rifle, as Kerry has hinted he'll do. The good news for Washington liberals is that Kerry can win West Virginia. The bad news is that he'll have to run against everything they stand for...."

[spooky3]

2. WV's loss is Virginia's gain?

The farther one moves from DC and its immediate suburbs, the more Republican the neighborhood is. Rather than pay the high land prices nearby and live in smaller, older homes or condos, many of the nouveau riche, or at least upper middle class, who are decidedly conservative, move north and west into McMansions on cheaper land, and then spend a lot of their lives in cars, commuting. This is also happening for other Soccer Mom/Dads who are less well off financially but want "lots of space" for their kids. So it is no surprise at all that the "exurbs" are filled with Republicans, and that will affect the likelihood of WV's going Dem this year. But as more and more Republicans who would otherwise live in Virginia move to West Virginia, what is the effect on the remaining population in Virginia? There may be a higher proportion of Democrats, putting more electoral votes potentially in the Dem column.

[sandnsea]

6. They think it's city liberals

What happens in this situation is that the locals think they're being bombarded by city liberals so the locals become even more right wing. So then you end up with gated community Republican types and angry locals voting Republican and the whole state goes Republican. That's what happened in Montana and other western states. Probably the south too. They just don't understand the hypocrisy of a Republican. They say they don't want regulations, well except those regulations that keep the riff-raff out. The locals interpret that as liberal elitism. It's a real problem and one I think the Democratic Party as a whole is completely missing. Of course, there truly IS a problem with city Dems ignoring rural Dems in their own states, but that's another issue.

[fujiyama]

3. It's funny

but Kerry is leading in two polls in that state, and I myself had almost written it off.

[DeaconBlues]

4. I grew up in Charles Town, West Virginia and visit there

several times a year. It seems that this fellow picked the biggest knuckleheads in town he could find to interview. And down the road just a few miles is the local college town - a more liberal place you couldn't find.

I believe this guy cherry-picked his interviewees in order to support his "thesis" about rural swing states.

[DeaconBlues]

5. And by the way

why the Hell do these so-called journalists ALWAYS go to some local diner in order to find out what the mood is of the area they are covering? Don't they know what type of people hang out at these places?

[Radical Activist]

7. No, they don't know

they just go because the diner is quaint and fits their image of small town life.

Anyway, this does make a valid point about why economic populism/liberalism is key to winning in the south. I don't think having someone that is very liberal on social issues but moderate on economic ones like Kerry was our most electable choice, but hopefully he pulls it off anyway.

[carpetbagger]

8. As a former Charles Town resident, I had the same laugh.

I guess it sounds more "authentic" than the truly authentic places to get a gauge on the local mood (which are the much less romantic Walmart, Sheetz, and Burger King). Without commenting on the individuals involved, some of whom I knew, I'll just say it ain't typical.

I have no idea if Jefferson County will go Kerry's way. I doubt it. The influx of exurban families over the last four years I think has tipped the county to the GOP, but that process has been going on for some time anyway. Kerry could win the state and lose the county.

For those of you unfamiliar, Charles Town is only part of the county. Harpers Ferry/Bolivar and Shepherdstown have good numbers of hikers, civil servant and college types, as well as oddballs who moved out long ago to the countryside. Charles Town is historically pro-confederate, HF and Shepherdstown unionist. Also Unlike most of WV, Jefferson County is ethnically diverse, about 10-15% black and with a significant and growing Latino popoulation mostly involved in the orchard and gambling industries. And unlike most of WV, Jefferson County has no coal mines, therefore no UMW presence. The region of Eastern WV is historically republican.

My last trip there was in February, and my sources predict net votes of current residents going away from Bush. As I said, though, new residents probably break 2:1 Bush.

[jsw_81]

9. That was a very disturbing article

I don't think we're going to have much of a chance there this fall. Kerry should probably focus on more "winnable" states like NH, FL, and NV.