Dean's New Southern Strategy

[ProudToBeLiberal]

Blacks and Whites Together--Focused on Education and Healthcare
by Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr.

Historically, the Confederate flag is a symbol of the Democratic Party. Today, however, Republicans can fly and wave it, but Democrats can't talk about it--and current Democrats don't know how to handle it.

As a result, the symbol Howard Dean used got in the way of his substance, but his substance was on point--and the point was that Southern whites and blacks together must focus on their common economic needs: jobs, good schools, affordable healthcare.

/snip/

Every Democrat has known since the civil rights movement that the party was becoming less competitive in the South because of race. Republicans have successfully exploited race (in proportion to black voting strength) since Richard Nixon's "Southern strategy" of 1968, by, among other things, using racial code words: Nixon's "law and order," Reagan's "states' rights" and "welfare queen," and the first George Bush's "Willie Horton."

/snip/

If Howard Dean wins the nomination around an economic agenda, and can effectively combat the certain Republican tactic of diversion--using social issues openly, and race more subtly, to sublimate economic concerns--then Democrats may once again be able to win in the South and pursue a progressive economic agenda for the benefit of all Americans.

...

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20031201&s=jackson

[sasquatch]

1. He just said what needed to be said

The DLC hates it because it's fucking them out of their corporate southern buddy's. This could win back the south and unite them with the rest of the country. Let them know that there apart of something special and they shouldn't hate the fact that they're americans. Because it's something to be proud of:)