I think the Hispanic voter issue is more complex than you're portraying it. First, Bush did pretty well with Hispanics, getting north of 40% in 2004. Second, one of the major things that pushed Hispanics more closely to the Democrats, was the Republicans -- in California, not the South -- floating a nasty bit of legislation titled Prop 187, which denied illegal immigrants a broad variety of social services. California Republicans didn't push that bill to please their southern brethren; they did it because it was politically popular within the state, and because it dovetailed with a nativist, xenophobic conservative ideology that had been in place long before Nixon (xenophobia was one of the contributing factors to old school conservative isolationism; now, paradoxically enough, it is at the heart of conservative interventionism, but I digress).

Anyway, I think it's an oversimplification to think of what the Republicans have done as a "Southern strategy." That was Nixon's nominal focus, but it's more complex than that, and it's going to be a lot harder for the Republicans to disentangle themselves from it, given their philosophy and history, than making some kind of statement.

BTW, Republicans continued to be competitive in northern states right up until recently. Bush's daddy, for example, carried NY and CT and Vermont -- yes, Vermont -- against Dukakis, and I think Reagan carried those states as well (can't be assed to look it up, but I know he carried NY and CT both times). Again, the issue is more complex, and should probably be dealt with more deeply, than you've done here.

Crooked cops, crooked lawyers, crooked judges, crooked politicians, crooked doctors, crooked scientists, crooked clergymen -- but no crooked journalists. An amazing record for an amazing class of people.

Bullshit alert

Hey, if you step back and reread Mg's post, it is funny!  That is why I gave it a "3."  I must admit, it is no funnier than most 7th grade jokes are; but it shows the thought process of an 8th grader with a "C" average!

Great job, Mg -- you are moving up!

elcampo?  Time for a "1" based on....?

Jan

Got your attention.

Let's look at the comment rating policy here:

"Readers trying to participate in discussions in good faith should never be given ratings of 1s or 0s. Those ratings are reserved for clearly inappropriate behavior or content -- obscene or offensive language, ethnic slurs, spam, disruptive behavior, extreme ad hominem attacks. This isn't an exhaustive list. But the key point is that you do not give a 1 or 0 to someone's comment just because you think their comment is stupid or because you strongly disagree."

I've been commenting here for over two years and have followed my own guidelines: I don't use foul language, I don't call people names, I always try to keep a respectful attitude, I don't make ad hominem attacks, I don't make things up and link to sources to support my arguments.

For the last many months you seem to have dropped "O" on just about every comment of mine you've come across with no attempt to explain, justify the rating or counterargue with any information. This is all completely in violation of the policy cited above. Up until this point I've never said anything about it. I've also noticed lately that I don't appear to be the only one here that you do this to.

I don't expect you to agree with me and wouldn't downrate you for disagreeing if it was done in a civil and rational manner.

Just thought you might like to see what it feels like for a change.

It took me about a year to get fed up - it's taken you less than a week to start squirming.

Think about your ratings. I'll certainly extend the presumption of good faith to all of your civil comments if you'll do the same for me and others.

Unfortunately, El C., the rating system here is routunely being used in exactly the way the rules say it should not be used, because there is no authority here willing to prevent it or even to step in and simply say that the rules are the rules.

Downrating commenters on the basis of agreement or disagreement with their arguments leads to a monolithic forum, free of new ideas and input.

Seems like a fair description to me.

Do you mean like ratings such as this?  Which you gave (And I predicted a "1?"

Does Thomas have a history of recusing himself when in such cases?  According to Toobin he does not, and there is no way to force recusal (for example Scalia, a Cheney hunting buddy deciding in the case that challenged Cheney's right to secret meetings to set energy policy).  It will be interesting to see what happens.

Obviousy  Elcampiono has an obsession with CVille Dem.  He is trying to impress me with his 1. 

Jan 

El  Campo, you speak for yourself.

 PS, Considering your vendetta of "1's" against me, you have a real nerve to even invoke the idea of the rules around here, as if you are  an injured party. 

Sorry, elcampu -- you lose

Jan

This Mgmax is doing a great job - sowing his assigned propaganda into the threads and also triggering off useless meta-wars. He is really earning his paycheck from the Counter-Blogging Project this week.

sPh

The whole locust has shifted, I think from race bigots (1954) to policy bigots (1968) to religious bigots (now).

I think the religion thing is the motherlode for the right. You don't have to be rational with religion. You can use the bible to justify any sort of behavior you want. And it allows you to control people - once people enter this they aren't likely to leave it any time soon.

Its where Nixon meets Strauss meets Uncle Miltie. This is the poison that is killing our society and our country. And it is a most toxic poison that may prove to be lethal. Ours will not be the first society to collapse under the weight of elitism tied to religiousity (or religious fanaticism).

This phenomena has given conservatives tremendous traction. Its remarkably cohesive and resiliant. It is very difficult to undo. I don't think we as a nation have ever been here before. But I am more concerned about how we get out of it.

Mr. Krugman offers much hope that things could change, but still I don't yet see the kind of traction that will get this society moving to a more rational place fast enough before 'movement conservativism' drowns us all. But perhaps that's just fear mongering on my part.

He that hath a trade, hath an estate - from Poor Richards Almanac - Benjamin Franklin

Too true.  It really is beneath the level of discussion we hope to have here.  Thanks for the reminder (especially when every word I say gets an "elcampo 1" )  I appreciate your recognition of the legitimacy of my statements.

No, the Republicans freed the Iraqi people, and the troops, and many Iraqis, but not the Republicans, get consigned to 'hell'.

Thanks.  This has been going on for far too long.  I appreciate your support and civility.

Just another example of Elc's rating system -- he gave me a "1" for this:

Tom, As a Charlottesvillian, I welcome your words and thoughts.  I will be so glad to see Virgil Goode depart. 

Although I agree that part of the solution includes an acknowledgment that we were wrong to invade, I don't hold much hope of it ever happening; except, of course by historians.  Still, you provide a clear voice of reason -- I think Virginia is starting to wake up.

You have my support. 

Jan

Jan

Re: First, Bush did pretty well with Hispanics, getting north of 40% in 2004.

This much-ballyhooed stat is now known to be flagrantly inaccurate. Bush barely cracked 30% among Hispanics. Even most GOP partisans reject the earlier statistic now.

Re: Interesting that the Dems get to be against black people twice, enslaving them once, yet only the Republicans who freed them get consigned to hell....

Um, last I checked slavery ended 142 years ago. That means that no Democrat now alive had anything to do with slavery and no Republican now alive had anything to do with emancipation.

What I'm for, starting with A: African art, the Algonquin round table, Altman (Robert), anime, Annette O'Toole's swimming pool scene in Cat People, the Arian heresy, Aristotle, arthropods, artichokes...

Okay, seriously, that's an awfully large question. And I'm not sure it'd be hospitable to Prof. DeLong on his thread to hijack it at such length with the Mgmax potted version of economics and politics. I've called myself a Kennedy liberal. I suppose that's it, someone who believes in a muscular liberalism that isn't traumatized by post-60s notions of America as an original sin, and doesn't believe that if we simply ignore the middle east, it won't bother us, since in fact it's been trying fairly ineptly to kill us for 30 years. I lived through the 70s and so much as my circa-1983 self would have died to admit it, the dominance of conservative economic ideas since then has been a huge boon and made us a much richer (if more insecure and nervous) society. I have plenty of bleeding heart sympathies yet at the same time I've lived long enough and dealt with enough dysfunctional people to know that social programs often enable rather than help and reduce people to wards of the nanny state, and God knows living in Chicago I've seen how my taxes can go up and go up yet the problems get further and further from being solved. So my bleeding heart is tempered by my gimlet eye.

And I'm genuinely sad to see the Internet turn into a vehicle where, instead of discussing these things and learning from each other, it becomes one where partisanship is reinforced, deviation from the party line is punished, and the chance that the Democrats will find the center in 2008 (and win) may very well be vanishing.

How's that, without shifting the spotlight too much from Prof. DeLong to myself?

Just as it is ok for African Americans to use the 'N' word it is ok for a peckerwood to use that prajorative.

Wow, listen to you. I rated all you commented a 1, whether I agreed or not, with no comment, basically just as you have been doing, just so you'd know how it felt.

Now all you seem capable of is whining.
==========================================

PS, Considering your vendetta of "1's" against me, you have a real nerve to even invoke the idea of the rules around here, as if you are an injured party.
==========================================

So after a year or so of your downrating, one little pushback and all you can do is squeal, "I'm the victim! Wah, wah! It's all about me!"

How sad and little you are.

I'll just go back to ignoring you. It's all you deserve

"Democrats get to be against blacks twice" is not a "good faith" attempt to participate in a discussion.

"All governments lie, but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out." - I.F. Stone

Do you understand the meaning of "sarcasm"?

What does it say about you that of all my comments here, you only have something to say back to this one?

Where are your long essays on the horrible partizanship and irrationality of the conservative web sites and media figures? Where is your tut tutting of Red State, Michelle Malkin, Fox News, Town Hall, Power Line, The Corner, World Daily Net, Washington Times, WSJ editorial page, Investors Daily editorial Page, Glenn, Beck, Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, the Eagle Forum, Focus on the Family, etc...........

Never heard of it, seems pretty smart and media-savvy but not well-acquainted with her views, pretty sure I've never watched it once (that's usuallly CNN in airports), never heard of it, find them neither horrible nor irrational, but certainly well to the right of myself, and certainly admire their role in exposing Dan Rather's fraud; find it often amusing and interesting, though again, well to my right, never heard of it, don't live in Washington and don't read it, find they've gotten more sane since the late Mr. Bartley's retirement, never read it, not sure who Glenn is (Reynolds? Frey?), loved Odelay but the last few seemed repetitive, never heard him but what I've heard of him repulses me, not into talk radio but auctioning off that letter was a brilliant PR coup, wish she'd go away, debated the local representative of it while in high school and ran rings around her, James Dobson's a little thug but my kids really enjoyed the radio production of Narnia he paid for (but the BBC had creative control over).

Now the question is, why am I compelled to take your side and argue things no one here would disagree with, to show my supposed good faith? When's the last time YOU posted something that broke with liberal-left orthodoxy and showed you had carefully shaped views not bound by party?

The REPUBLICANS freed the Iraqi people?  You're kidding, right?

By republicans, do you mean the college republicans who didn't flock in great numbers to enlist, or their parents who started this disasterous war, but evaded the draft when it was their turn a generation ago?

By Iraqi people, do you mean the millions who have run for their lives and are living in other countries, or the ones still there who are afraid to go to the market every day, or those who have to move out of their homes because they live in a Shia (or Sunni) neighborhood?  Maybe we could ask the Iraqis how they feel about it.

I think that many would agree with you that they are currently consigned to hell.  

Jan

Brad, you've got a point generally except that I don't think it is true that the congress was to the left of the nation from 33-94. If anything, I think the nation was to the left of the Congress, but there was increasingly less representation of where the population was on the political spectrum for a number of reasons. The voting nation and the nation as a whole are two different things of course. As we are all aware the voting segment of the population eligible to vote is heavily skewed toward higher income people and the participation and thus representation of the poor and their viewpoint has also declined. If the entire population of eligible voters actually cast ballots we would have a far more liberal government.

First of all, even in the heyday of liberalism the left was always compromised and it's position diluted to keep the peace with southern conservative Democrats and business interests otherwise we would have had, for example, national health insurance back when Truman first proposed it and our system of support for the poor in times of need would be far more generous than it ever was. Also, there was more to the typical white southern voter's allegiance to the Democratic Party than racism alone though we all agree that was the key and in the majority of cases decisive component of the "solid south" for eons and for the success of Nixon's southern strategy. The Democratic Party in the south and border states was also for many years even predating the 30's the party of the little guy and that's why the New Deal, etc... was something those voters could get behind.

The decision of the Republicans to pick up the fallen flag of racism presented these white voters with a choice. The majority of them eventually chose to go with the party of racism and segregation (the Republicans) but some (and not an insubstantial number of them) remained with the Democratic Party of Roosevelt, Truman and Kennedy. This outcome didn't have to be the case, but at the same time the Democrats were completely outmaneuvered on every imaginable front by the Republicans and lost more southern voters than they needed to through their sickeningly wimpy campaigns and hat in hand apoligies for every successful program that ever came down the pike.

The bottom line is your response to Vampa originally was flamethrowing trollery.
Then you waste all this time with sophistry. Up yours.

</reallyawfulpunmode> Is the right ever really justified? </reallyawfulpunmode>

Immediately below the text box is a line which either reads enable rich text or disable rich text.  Click it so it reaads "disble rich-text" and you should then see a formatting area below the typing area..that's where the right justification thingy is.  :-)

aMike

Yes, all political prisoners around the world long for the day when they can be released from prison into the middle of a civil war between and within different sectarian groups in the country.

Will Hispanics see the Repuglicans as a whole as the party of Texas Governor Bush, not unfriendly to Hispanics in principle (if not in policy) and socially conservative in line with some "traditional" (stronger in first generation) values... or will they see the Repguglicans as the party of California Governor Wilson (Proposition no services, get out & stay out).

So far Bush's success in 2000 seems to be the transient phenomenon as Repugs go nativist.

Re: "As we are all aware the voting segment of the population eligible to vote is heavily skewed toward higher income people "

Eligible to vote? I am not sure that is correct. But if you mean "Likely to vote" then it's true: they higher your income the more likely you are to vote.

What terrorist plot was stopped? Who knows?

All we know is this: al-Qaeda attacked us about every two years until 9/11. They haven't attacked us since.

I know no one here will give Bush credit for that, but it's the very fact that we're secure that allows you to dismiss security as a concern.

Great topic! Lee Atwater was a master at the game and his lieutenant Karl Rove has kept it going. It appears likely that Rove was behind the bogus DOJ campaign on voter fraud, another way of intimidating Blacks and minorities to keep them away from the polls.

At the same time the Rove types are attempting to pull conservative Blacks to the Republican fold by trying to join forces in opposition to gay marriage. The Republicans' veiled message is that gay marriage is an attack on Black manhood and womanhood and they quote the usual Bible verses to justify it. They use the same anti-gay techniques with Hispanics and other minorities.

And then there is the "law and order" card that they play with Koreans and other Asian groups. Law and Order is another code word for "We'll take care of those Blacks who are responsible for crime in your communities." Divide and conquer, that was the Atwater way.