should the Dems write off the South?

We're not gonna have the money/resources to fight Rove and co. on all fronts, so to speak. The South is solidly Republican, obviously. Should we just forgo the South and concentrate on states we can win, given our limited resources available in 2004? Or should we try to win southern voters and even snatch a state or two (beside FL, which is winnable either way)?

My 2 cents.

Bush isn't doing as well with them as the media is spinning. Alot of those states are in the South and a strong network has been built over the last year to reach out to them.

to my beliefs for one on just about every issue, race, religion, war, abortion....you name it....I don't see a way to bring them into the tent with those views.

HOWEVER...we should not SAY OUT LOUD that we are writing them off...

Spend the most money where races are close. Don't count any state a sure thing and ignore it completely. Don't count the south out completely just because they're largely reactionary there.

People are furious at Bush all over the country. Let's tell them they do have a choice.

Oh Ye of Little Faith.

you can't chance a Bush re-election (besides, I don't want to be written off). Clinton won because he won some southern states.

I'm intrested in the views of a Southerner (I live in Chicago, Democrat stronghold since WWII).

especially when he talked about the 21st century. Hope for a better future for every American. He also said that some of the things you might like about republicans such as tax credits, tax cuts for the middle class, he could give but also more with a progressive agenda.

We should focus mainly on states like Missouri(kind of a southern state), Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, and possibly(I do mean possibly) Virginia. To win these states you need to be pro-gun and somewhat moderate on environmental issues. If there's one thing these states hate, it's a hippie.

Personally, I like a western strategy to compliment this because these states hinge on similar issues. We can win states like Colorado, Arizona, and Nevada on similar issues. The same goes for Ohio and West Virginia.

the only reason we lost it in 2000 was Gore, Mr. Enviroment, was running. The WV coal miners hated that

but gun control cost him a lot of votes in WV as well.

Virginia, South Carolina, Louisiana, Arkansas, Florida, and Tennessee!

These are states that lean to the right or in the case of Louisiana, it is a swing state! If Clark is the nomminee, which I hope he is, then South Carolina will be in play too!

Forget Georgia and Mississippi, they've gone down the toilet!

Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, North Carolina, and South Carolina are all lost causes. Don't even bother with any of them.

But that's a maybe! We would do better campaigning in Kansas and North Dakota!

with military families and veteran's organizations that aren't too happy with Bush.

states.

>>>>>>>
The real business of the day was transacted afterward. Kerry mingled easily with the vets, who were mostly African-American; he cussed and joked and talked about places like Da Nang and Da Lat. A pink-faced overweight man approached. "I'm Jim Gunn," he said to Kerry. "Do you remember me?"

Kerry nodded warily. Gunn was the leader of the Coalition of Retired Military Veterans and had attacked Senator John McCain during the 2000 Republican Presidential primary in South Carolina. Kerry had written a letter protesting the charges that another veterans' group had made against McCain-essentially, that McCain was "anti-veteran"-and he had got the other Vietnam combat veterans in the Senate to sign it. Now Jim Gunn said to him, "I just want you to know, Senator, that you were right about McCain and I was wrong. Bush lied to my face, and I'll never support him again." Gunn proceeded to file a bill of particulars against the President on veterans' issues. Then he sighed and said, "I wish there was a machine that could really say when someone is telling the truth, but you sound sincere when you talk about our issues. I represent seventeen thousand vets in South Carolina-I'm like their union boss-and if you run for President next time we're with you."
........

my state, has a Dem Governor, Dem state senate and 1 seat minority in the state house. Sure the state went for Bush, Dole, Bush the last 3 elections, but that doesnt mean it is not winnable.

All that does is free up campaign resources for the other side to go trolling for votes in Minnesota, Pennslyvania or even California. All giving the South to Bush for free does is make us have to work all that much harder for states that we should be able to win comfortably.

On edit: I would play hard in Florida, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and Louisiana. I would make a 50% effort in Georgia and North Carolina and let Bush have Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and South Carolina.

1. The Congress. "Write off the South" and we can forget about ever having control of the Congress again. If the Clinton years taught us anything, it should be that there's more to political power than the White House.

2. There are states in the South that are winnable, and others that are trending our way. Why write them off?

3. The Southern and border states contain app. 60% of the electoral votes needed to win the election. Would you want to run a 100 yard dash in which your opponent gets to start at the 60 yard point? Sure, you can still win, but it's not likely.

4. Publicly "write off the South" and you will lose the legislatures here, most of which are Democratic. Have we all forgotten who does reapportionment? The state legislatures. If you want to see what was done in Texas done in twelve or fourteen other states, then "write off the South."

5. If we "write off the South" then Bush can spend his entire $200,000,000 in "our" states.

6. The South is home to a major share of the nation's minority voters. In fact, Mississippi and Alabama have more black elected officials than the rest of the country combined. "Writing off the South" means writing them off along with many millions of black voters.

Not only does the South have alot of electoral votes it's going to get more with each reapportionment as more people leave the Frost Belt for the Sun Belt...

Clinton managed to win some southern states. It can be done.

any VA people, please respond. Do you think we can win your state in 04?

Tough call here. East is very military. West is rural. North is Democrat.

based on disappointing voting (redistricting helped repub) in assembly and such yesterday.

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

Fairfax County just elected a Democrat to the office of County Executive. They gained two House seats. Fairfax County has trended toward the Democrats. In 1988 the Bush I campaign won with a 60% majority. In 1992 and 1996 the Republican margin shrank. By 2000, although Bush carried the county, the Nader and Gore totals outnumbered his.

If the trend continues then VA could very well be in play in future cycles. VA is home to a large Hispanic and Arab population. With time their numbers might be enough to swing VA in our direction.

Even though I know it doesn't matter who I vote for next November because Bush will win Mississippi, I don't want us to be given up on.

Rather than throw in the towel, Dems have to get creative and find a new way to appeal to Southern voters.

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

and the deep south in the long term. I do want Georgia though. It is always a toss up and I want to get Zig Zag Zell.

But it isn't. It voted for Barry Goldwater of all people and voted for Bush by 13 points. We need to carry the nation by 8 in order to win Georgia.

Its the state that thought Max Cleland wasn't patriotic, never mind the fact he left three limbs in vietnam.

But many of their votes will be counted as Republican
and many will be turned away at the polls.

We can't "give up on" the South
but we need to focus our very limited resources where the votes will count.

my state's last two governors have been democrats (NOT dixiecrats). They run on progressive issues as well such as more money for education and early childhood programs. So to write North Carolina off is a mistake. It just takes work.

n/t

I'm hoping Bowles but it will be a fight with Burr.

we haven't even started to fight. Why give up before we begin to fight. This needs to be a huge wake-up call that this will boil down to the conservatives and the south.

While it is "technically" possible to "win" without the South it requires a zero margin for error. It means winning EVERY blue state, plus taking WV, NH, and OH. It means probably wininng one of these three: NV, CO, AZ. It means that EVERYTHING--and I do mean everything--has to go our way. We cannot lose one blue state.

The southern states that are the most winnable are:

FL
LA
AR
TN
MO
KY
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The southern states that might be competetive next year or in the future are:

VA
NC
GA
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The southern states that are not winnable at all unless Bush loses in a landslide are (even then it would take a miracle to win):

SC
AL
MS
TX
OK

The VOTING South is- and there is a huge difference between the two.

I'm sorry to keep beating a dead horse since I post this every time a southern thread rears its ugly head, but what we need to do in the South is work on increasing turnout. We have some of the lowest voter turnout rates in the country, and our number of residents registered isn't so great either. (for example, Texas ranks 48 and 49 in those categories) Even more unfortunate, minorities *tend* to vote in lower numbers than whites. (I said tend- I am not trying to stereotype anyone)

I know turnout is an issue in every part of the country, but no where is it more of a Dem killer than in the South, where on average more than 60% of registered voters fail to vote. Note that that figure only goes to registered voters- it doesn't even speak to the number of residents who don't vote because they aren't even registered.

Four things we must do in the South to win future elections:
1- register voters
2- get people to the polls
3- speak to EVERY Southerner and ask for EVERY Southerner's vote
4- get our message out so that the repub spin on Dems isn't the basis of opinion down here

Sorry that this is such a pet peeve of mine, but the South is really no more repub than the rust belt states in a good turnout year. We shouldn't pander to Southerners (or anyone based on region), but we shouldn't write the South off as repub either.

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

Look at the way they tried to tar and feather Howard Dean when he tried to reach out to poorer white southern laborers.

We can definitely win in Florida and possibly Arkansas with Clark on the ticket. The other southern states are, however, lost causes when it comes to presidential elections. The Democratic nominee has zero chance of winning in MS, AL, GA etc.

to get their crap together and someone needs to drop out of this large field of candidates so that we come up with a coherent message and fast. McAuliffe's push to start campaigning more than a year before primaries and caucuses was stupid. At this point, most people could probably recite from memory the stump speeches and stock phrases of every one of those candidates.

If we believe we're right about our values, then we need to stand up and shout it from the rooftops. We don't take one step backwards, but we DO make a massive effort. The one thing Dean has done is mobilize people. The DNC needs to mobilize people. If we would all just get behind what the Democratic Party has accomplished in the last 100 years and put up a cohesive fight for those principles and what it will mean for the next 100 years, we can win the whole damn country. We're RIGHT, they're WRONG. They being Republicans, not southerners.

And the reason I'm against Dean is because he keeps backing away from those Democratic principles. I don't want it and I don't believe we can win that way.

I can't see why any time or money should be expended down here...

FLORIDA - get graham on the ticket as VP, he may be boring but he'll give you the best shot of getting florida and the 27 electoral votes.

If Gore picked Graham as VP in '00, he would be president of the United States right now. There isn't any doubt in my mind about that.

If you get florida, you CAN write off the rest of the south. It's a gamble though, if you lose florida, basically you are screwed.

race will go a long way in determining how many resources should be expended in the South. A Democratic win will show that what has been happening is basically a "throw the incumbent out" mood, it just happens to be that mainly Democratic incumbents have been affected so far. If the rethug "wins" however, it won't be a good sign. Florida, Arkansas, Tennesee, and Louisiana should still be contested, but the electronic "voting" issue NEEDS to be resolved. I still have a hard time buying what supposedly happened in Georgia.

they ever want to win the senate back.

You can't let Bush win S Carolina by 20 % and then expect the Democratic senate candidate to win there, That's too much tide to fight against.

on SO many levels. It's typical DNC-thinking and it's a losing strategy. God, this smacks of elitim which has become, tragically, acceptable by too many on DU. No, we should NOT abandon the South. Nor should we abandon rural voters, nor should we continue to abandon the base nor the 50% of Americans who have given up or have never been involved in the first place.

There are some states in the South that we might be able to get. There are other states in the south that are a waste of our time, money, and effort. We need to considere every state in the union in a case by case manner.

You folks have strange ways of looking at things... So, if Alabama is 52% Bush and 48% Gore....we just write off that 48% of those folks that voted with us? Write them off?

Hmmmmmmmmm.

Consider this. If you had a state that went for Bush in 2000 with 58% against 42%, does it help to work hard to make it 55% against 45% in Bush's favor?

sounds like a plan to me :eyes:

why would the DLC push such a policy?