Last modified on October 11, 2020, at 07:57

Talk:Southern strategy

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If I'm not mistaken, Democrats would usually take all Southern states until the sixties, where they took a stance against segregation. That's when Republicans started winning them.--CamilleT 20:56, 6 March 2012 (EST)

See Engel v. Vitale, which banned classroom prayer, and other liberal rulings by the Warren Court. Liberal newspapers just cannot accept that the South votes based on religious values.--Andy Schlafly 21:04, 6 March 2012 (EST)


Propaganda

I would call this strategy a liberal myth. Both parties entice demographics and race as evident with widespread gerrymandering. While Nixon had designs, so did those before and after. Aschlafy is absolutely correct that as Democrats moved further and further left, they abandoned the Bible belt. The '64 Civil Rights Act wasn't a turning point. This was a gradual movement. Liberals constantly cite this as evidence of a grand scheme to build white supremecy and to label the entire region racist.Southern Strategy is a leftist myth.--Jpatt 17:29, 22 July 2015 (EDT)

Atwater

Just wanted to add a note about the point that Atwater was making. The goal of "coded language" is that there is a huge audience you wish to reach, but can't reach them by normal means. Atwater says there was no audience. Use of the N-word now hurts you. Race died as a force in electoral politics with Wallace's run in 68 as it was then constituted. Everything that Atwater was saying was a point about the past, particularly the late 50s/early 60's on the democrat side.

In the end, without an audience, there are no coded words. For example, "states rights" actually = "states rights", it is not that "states rights" = "slavery".

The interviewer's questions are also telling. Had Atwater given different answers, we would likely have a myth that the parties switched in the 1980s. But since they couldn't make that one stick, we receive the narrative that the parties switched in 1964. And again, I contend that everybody should listen to the full 42 minute interview on the tape. It's on the Nation.com reference. Progressingamerica (talk) 11:06, 18 September 2020 (EDT)

I did listen to whole interview some time ago. It is nothing whatsoever as reported in the Nation. Two big elements are missing: (1) the context in which it was spoken at the time the interview as given, and (2) the inability of a dead man to refute lies about himself which is most glaring from the Nation article. RobSFree Kyle! 13:33, 18 September 2020 (EDT)

Technical stuff

  • In the 1972 November General Election, for the first time in 40 years Democrats did not have a Southerner on the ticket,

this is a twisting of facts of almost Democrat proportions; in 1940 Henry Wallace of Iowa was on the ticket. This of course, would necessitate writing much about how the New Deal discriminated against blacks, blacks had been put into their place, domestic issues were on the back burner, World War II and foreign policy dominated FDR's controversial decision to run for a third term. FDR had already bought off white Southern Democrats with the Nanny state and opposition to the federal Anti-Lynching bill. But to include this would take up too much space and derail the focus of the article as it now. RobSFree Kyle! 03:55, 11 October 2020 (EDT)