Republicans Living in Another World?

Great article on the state of the Republican base:

Democracy Corps: Republican Base Voters Living In Another World

It makes claims that the anti-Obama people in their focus groups aren’t racists, but ideologically different:

One thing that the firm makes clear, though, is that this is not about racism, but about ideology: “Instead of focusing on these intense ideological divisions, the press and elites continue to look for a racial element that drives these voters’ beliefs — but they need to get over it. Conducted on the heels of Joe Wilson’s incendiary comments at the president’s joint session address, we gave these groups of older, white Republican base voters in Georgia full opportunity to bring race into their discussion — but it did not ever become a central element, and indeed, was almost beside the point.”

I guess. Most racists in a focus group aren’t going to cop to it. I still think that race is just under the surface, particularly from southern state politicians.

However, the following definitely underscores recent posts I’ve made on blurbomat:

Conservatives see themselves as an oppressed minority, holding on to knowledge that isn’t represented in the wider media and culture: “Conservative Republicans passionately believe that they represent a group of people who have been targeted by a popular culture and set of liberal elites — embodied in the liberal mainstream media — that mock their values and are actively working to advance the downfall of the things that matter most to them in their lives — their faith, their families, their country, and their freedom.”

The funny part of those feelings isn’t that “elites” want to destroy anything. If anything, it appears that progressives are trying to rebuild; rebuild the U.S. foreign relations, the economy, healthcare, faith in the government to do good and the notion that disagreements are expected and worth talking about in graduated, infinite terms as opposed to binary terms. The funny part of the paranoid feelings from fringe conservatives is how pervasively wrong headed they are.

  • blueheron

    Attempted to leave response last evening. this is a test to see whether the technical side of the blog will let me leave a response, before I bother to type it all again. I am tired of seeing that, “whoops, you didn’t mean to get here” page.

  • blueheron

    Having lived in the South for over 50 years, and most of those in Georgia, I would agree with you that racism is just under the surface of most all white males over the age of 45 in the South, not just politicians.
    No one talks about it, because these people are totally unaware of it. There are plenty of great studies out there that reveal the subtle presence of racism. These people have it so ingrained, that it is deep in the subconscious and can not be articulated, so they rationalize their opposition with some very logical construct. BUT the impetus is clearly a presumption that a black man has certain characteristics, and more importantly that black people in general have certain undesirable characteristics.
    The prejudice leaks out, but it is never truly expresses. The rationales about Obama’s minister during the campaign were very enlightening–don’t say Obama has you worried, say if he listened to that preacher, then he probably is not who we want as President. Mostly the racism leaks in jokes told in lowered voices, in the knowing look when a certain area of town is mentioned, and the what do you expect? look when a black man gets a job instead of a white man.

  • natetharp

    That victim mentality was very well displayed by Rush Limbaugh’s reaction to being denied the “right” to own part of an NFL team. He blamed Obama, the liberal elite, and the main stream media. But apparently he never stopped to think that his actions have consequences and if he hadn’t said those things about black NFL players that he might have had a shot at it.

    In reading The State of Jones, it struck me how little has changed in our country since the 1800’s. In that time you had Union loyalists campaigning against secession urging that “a house divided against itself cannot stand.” While members of the South resorted to calling them “cowards” and “submissionists”, claiming the North was attempting to institute tyrannic rule. And claiming that the end of slavery would equate to the end of the nation’s prosperity as commerce in the South would come to a halt without slavery.

    Substitute some words with ones like “terrorist”, “un-American” and “socialism” and we’re having the same debate. It’s almost as if some people haven’t realized that we’ve been a fairly prosperous nation over the last 100–150 years.