Results of a Missouri focus group - Northeasterner problem

Any ideas on how to combat this?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59729-2004May1.html

These Missourians suggested that Kerry's New England roots would not translate well in the Midwest. "I've worked with people primarily from Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, and they just have an air of arrogance about them," said Dunsford, who was perhaps Bush's toughest critic in either group.

Chris Behnen, 25, a college student, said he had recently seen a videotape of Kerry from his days as an antiwar protester. "He had this accent from when he was speaking that I don't necessarily hear in his voice now," he said, "and there was just something about it that just came off as very arrogant."

Comes off as arrogant? Bush is the most arrogant SOB we have ever had in the Whitehouse, and yet he has failed at every task he has ever attempted in his life. This Brice character is seriously deluded:

Brice Evans, 44, a letter carrier, said, "I think Missouri would go Democratic, but I don't think they like Kerry that much. . . . I think he'll get eaten alive when it comes to a one-on-one debate with Bush." :eyes:

since it is obvious that the only thing that reaches these clowns is paid political advertising. They clearly are not paying attention to what is going on by following the news with a critical eye.

... there is no way that Kerry will ever, EVER shake the label. He's a MA liberal, and a blueblood as well, complete with the prep-school accent. Changing the meaning and/or stigma of the label might be an option, because denying it sure as hell isn't.

I don't know how well this article reflects the reality, or how big a deal this is, but I resent the fact that my home region is seen as a liability in national politics. There is a certain stern attitude in the area, I concede, that could come off as arrogance. Kerry will have to work on that.

...unless your initials are JFK.

just south of Branson MO. I have NO problem with northeasterners. I've never met one who was arrogant. I hope I can visit New England some day, because the folks I know who live there are very cool.

People who have problems with Yankees have the problem, not the Yankees.

I am a North-easterner and proud of it.

We have a proud heritage of hard work, education, assimilation, dignity and integrity. We are children and grandchildren of survivors of countless struggles for Independence and equality, from Plymouth Rock, Philadelphia and the steel mills and coal mines of Pennsylvania. We developed this nation by heading to Missouri when you were all just a field.

If you want to call that arrogant, so be it.


grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

It would be overstating it to say that it is a bastion of liberalism,
but it is perhaps the closest thing to it that we have. Most of the
region is reliably Democratic, and has led the Democratic party
nationally in the path of progressivism in the past.

Even some of the Republicans in New England have seen through Bush*.
The formerly-Republican Senator from Vermont, Sen. Jeffords, being
the prime example, but while Sen. Chafee and Sen. Snowe have remained
in the Republican party, they are its least conservative Senators,
opposing some of the regime's most outrageous proposals.

?

and I plan to work on the election in Florida. This state needs all the Democratic help it can get!

collective judgment into serious question!

Ashcroft is from the southwest of the state where all the neocons live and play.

Missouri is an interesing state politically. In order for a Republican to win statewide, they have to mobilize outstate. They heve been effective at doing so in the past few elections.

Missouri's biggest cities, KC and St.L carry the water for the Dems. If Bush doesn't ignite the outstate voters, or there is nothing compelling to bring outstaters to the polls, the Dems carry the day.

judgement IS suspect.

both were elected when GOP voters were motivated. Additionally Jean Carnahan was worthless as a replacement for her dead hubby.

On Edit: We kicked out Ashcroft in favor of a dead man.

there are people in the south or even the border south states such as Missouri which feel fine about a ticket with two southerners on it but if you have a northeasterner who may have had a bit of an accent he is arrogant. Good thing that the people of the northeast who gave the Clinton-Gore ticket more votes percentage wise than any other region of the country didn't listen to their accents and say, "how can I vote for a couple of hicks from the south!!" Too many southern/border state types are still fighting the civil war and can't stomach yankees.

...convince people that they're voting for him for president in 2012.

not to get the southern vote, but to get votes in swing states.

Plus the excellent populism to boot..

...or, in the unlikely event Kerry loses, a Presidenital canddate in 2008.

I like Clark as VP, too...

Edwards needs to be VP.

I have no idea how to combat it. I'm originally from Connecticut, and I cringe everytime I hear those "liberal, elitist, latte-sipping, NYTimes reading etc. etc." adjectives. Why is it *better* to be a "hick" southerner who drinks Bud and may or may not read anything?

I've voted for Southerners, why can't they vote for Northerners? On the other hand, I know I've got a grain of bigotry in me, too, because when I hear Southern accents preaching about prayer or "real Murcans" I just hate it. I can't even stand that ad with the Mom who's choked up talking about "Hannah can be a three-year-old" and it's for a good diabetes sugar-test product! So I fight my own bigotry too. (But I still didn't hesitate for a second about voting for Clinton and Gore.)

Too bad more people didn't listen to me when it counted.

Want to believe their President will stick up for them, and understands the values that are held out here: work, faith and family. Any candidate that comes across as not understanding those values, will not carry the state.

are not exclusive to the Republican party nor the citizens of the state of Missouri.

Bush embodies NONE of those qualities.

WORK: Bush is an inheritance billionaire who never worked a day in his life and had everything given to him on a silver, oil-bought, Nazi supporting platter.

FAITH: Bush is using the "aura" of fundamentalism to score votes, but as Al Franken has pointed out, when cornered, the pres and his friends can't accurately quote from the bible. Plus, when did Halliburton become God's Corporation?

FAMILY: Read Kevin Phillip's "American Dynasty" and tell me that Bush's family represents the best America has to offer. Or just try to convince me that Neil Bush is a fine upstanding bag of protoplasm.

"STICKING UP" FOR THE AMERICAN PEOPLE: 9/11 happened on his watch. Hundreds of young men and women from America's heartland died in the desert so that Bush's cronies could lay claim to the area. Well over a million jobless. Enron, anthrax, Plame, "bring it on...." THAT'S "sticking up" for Missourians?

Seriously, why are so many people so eager to be duped?

Chimp or Kerry. They won't vote for Chimp because they don't like Kerry's accent, or where he went to school, or where he's from. They'll vote what people always vote on: their pocketbooks, the broad brush direction they see the country moving, their party loyalty.

This kind of bullshit is a writer publicly struggling for an interesting idea, and failing. It's inside the beltway mumbling by a Kool Kid who doesn't know the Midwest or anything else outside a ten mile radius of 16th and K.

If things keep going the way they are and we have a decent GOTV effort, we'll win MO in a walk.

They don't know Kerry, They do know Bush -- yet are undecided.

but God FORBID we call someone from the South :puke: or MidWest a "Jesus Freak", "Bible Thumper", or a "Redneck"! :mad:

Oh Heaven forbid that. We can only call we Northeasterners bad names and mock them!

:wtf:

and I call the people around me that all the time.

Anyone who can judge someone by their accent... and then pronounce the Arkansas River Ar-Kansas (not Ar kan saw) like we do here....or say "warsh" for wash...or think that GW is an honest man because of his "faith"...

that runs thoughout the south. If he doesn't talk like you they won't vote for him. Idiots

am I the only one who thinks the reason * does so well with the demographic he does is because he's managed to internalize that southern accent? I don't even know if some of the people who like him so much could articulate it to you, but I wonder if that's not a big part of his 'mystique.' I mean, he's rich, his daddy bought him off so many things a poor kid would have done jail time for ... and yet he can pull off this 'man of the people' shtick. It's that drawl.

And don't accuse me of 'south-baiting' -- there are plenty of southerners who aren't fooled by it, and plenty of Midwesterners who seem to be buying into it.

What can Kerry do? Well, it's a little late in life for him to develop a drawl. I think it's as simple as the accent, I really do.

It's the accent.

Seriously. When I lived in Nashville, the people there would tell me verbatim what you just said, with a straight face. "Ah cain't vote fer nobody who don't have a Southern aiccent." Why not? "Because I don't trust 'em."

I had a few conversations like that. it's hard to beleive anyone could be so stupid, but there it is....

not counting FL, as FL is not culturally a southern state, taken as a whole. We don't need it to win. The only states Kerry has a hope of winning anyway is LA, and AR.

Believe me, that drawl doesn't just 'work' on people who live in the south.

Hell, listen to anything Will Rogers recorded -- he had a twang.

I'm talking states like Ohio, Indiana and Missouri, where -- with the 'swing crowd' demographic (i.e., those who don't outright affiliate themselves with either party, but are swayed by things like charisma and effective advertising more than places that are more polarized) -- voters who aren't 'dyed-in-the-wool' D or R will vote for someone because they 'like him.' Not because they think he's a good statesman, or will represent them well, but because they get 'warm fuzzies' off him. Bush is, apparently, better at inspiring those kinds of 'warm fuzzies' out of people who don't understand they're being manipulated or can't see past someone's accent to really think about what they stand for and what they're saying.

Ohio has almost a quarter of the electoral votes you say the South has. 'The South' doesn't have a trademark on ignorant voters, trust me. I walk among 'em here in Ohio every single day of my life.