Posted on 11/14/2004 1:58:09 PM PST by Libloather
Blue blue town
Published: Nov 12, 2004
Election"s aftermath leaves Democrats down in the dumps and looking for ways to cope with four more years of W.
By ANNE BLYTHE AND MATT DEES, STAFF WRITERS
TVs have been off. Some of the political commentary is too much to take.
Radios are tuned to music, not talk.
Newspapers with front-page pictures of President Bush either go straight into recycling bins or get flipped over quickly to hide what die-hard Democrats and Anybody-But-Bush fans commonly refer to as “that smug mug.”
Sure, 11 days have passed since 59 million Americans cast ballots for “43.”
But in this blue town — a Democratic stronghold in the middle of a red state — it is still a mourning after for many. Heads are hanging low. People are a step or two slow. And there is a pervasive sense of alienation.
“The outcome of the election was difficult in many regards,” said Mayor Kevin Foy, a Democrat. “My impression is that in 2000 it was a much more belligerent mood here. People thought the election was stolen. This time, I think it’s much more a mood of sadness and disappointment.”
At local eateries, there has been a run on comfort food.
“I’ve been noticing that,” Hanna Schueler, a manager at Elmo’s Diner in Carr Mill Mall, said Tuesday. “We ran out of broccoli casserole and mashed potatoes on Monday night.”
The first President Bush, as in George Herbert Walker, was anti-broccoli, and with all the political spinning going on, one culinary interpretation in this blue town is that maybe diner customers were being a bit rebellious in their post-election eating.
Terry Sullivan, a UNC-CH political science professor who specializes in the presidency and is a strong and disappointed Democrat, says the blue in Chapel Hill and Carrboro have reason to be down.
“People think this was a watershed election,” Sullivan said. “One way to think about it is, you had quintessential liberalism against quintessential modern conservatism. People on the Democratic side hoped the new Democrat kind of approach would have been as successful as it was under Clinton. Obviously, it was not.”
Despite media focus on Iraq and national security, Sullivan said, many Democrats are even more worried about Bush’s impact on domestic issues.
Not only do they fear what might happen if Bush were to appoint three justices to the U.S. Supreme Court, they fret about the post-election spin that puts the religious right in the driver’s seat for the next four years.
“That impression becomes important because it affects policy,” Sullivan said. “I think people look at that and get kind of depressed.”
Jordan Selleck, chairman of the UNC College Republicans, felt like Nov. 3 was designated as a campus-wide wake.
“You could just tell how bitter everyone was,” he said, adding that he and his fellow Republican students couldn’t resist smiling a bit as they walked across the quads, a political minority enjoying a moment of schadenfreude.
“They still are. I mean, bitter, bitter, bitter. It’s not just my friends and acquaintances, it’s my professors and (teaching assistants). It seriously gets in the way of class. I have never felt such a depressed atmosphere.”
Chapel Hill, all 20 precincts, backed Sen. John Kerry and his running mate, John Edwards, a new Orange County property owner. And with Carrboro, and its strong Kerry support, Orange County was overwhelmingly a blue county despite the rural, northern precincts that went for Bush. Sixty-seven percent of the voters went for Kerry-Edwards.
If, as the old adage goes, misery loves company, then blue Chapel Hillians are not alone.
Durham County went 1 percentage point stronger for Kerry than Orange. And Chatham, after the provisional ballots were counted, went from a Bush-red to a Kerry-blue by just five votes.
As some of the county’s newer Democrats battle their funk, others know from past experience how to shake it off. This state hasn’t gone for a Democratic presidential candidate since Jimmy Carter.
Martha Jenkins, president of the N.C. Federation of Republican Women and a Chapel Hill resident, is nowhere near as glum as she expects her neighbors are.
“I’m not gloating,” Jenkins said. “But I do think most people feel pretty opposite of me. I’m just very happy that our president was re-elected. I felt like he was the best man for the job.”
Words like that still make many cringe here.
Psychologists and therapists have seen an upswing in business since the election. Some patients come seeking anger management strategies. Others are looking for quick elixirs for beating the doldrums.
Rather than spending the next four years on the couch, many are choosing to organize.
Students on the UNC-CH campus held a forum Wednesday night.
Selleck hopes the election outcome, with his party controlling the White House and both Congressional bodies, will encourage Democrats to come to the table.
“The Democratic Party had a huge wake-up call,” he said. “We saw the most important issue for voters is the candidate’s morals. Fifty-one percent of the country said we don’t agree with John Kerry’s morals. I’m ready for a true, respectful dialogue to begin between the two parties on moral issues.”
But where many are already looking to 2008, Fritzi Ross, a Chapel Hill resident for 24 years and a registered Democrat, is not yet ready to give up on 2004. There is a murmur, albeit a very muted one, she says, that Kerry still could “unconcede” the election. She worries about possible electoral fraud and all the reports of the unusual Republican results in some of the heavily Democratic precincts in Florida and Ohio.
“It’s going to be the morning after until we get Bush out,” Ross said. “I feel kind of deadly shocked that Kerry conceded when he did. It might be said I’m in a combination of denial and bargaining stage.”
Others are trying a bit of purple prose with the goal of turning some of those red places blue.
“The only way to get out of it is to have hope,” said Arthur Finn, a left-leaning retired physician who fixes clocks. “You can fold up and cry, or say ‘I’m moving to Canada.’ Or you can say, ‘Well, geez, there has to be a better way.”
Barry Katz, chairman of the Orange County Democratic Party, is another one who says he hasn’t spent much time being woeful.
“You know, Orange County did so well that I never had a really depressing time because I had to follow up and keep working,” Katz said. “I’m sure it’s waiting for me somewhere.”
Believe it or not, he said, there is room for optimism.
“First of all, I think we have to accept the election as legitimate,” Katz said. “But it was so gratifying that so many realized the importance of this election and they worked so hard in support of their candidate and their political party and felt much better about themselves and about the election.
“I know so many people who want to keep working, to continue to energize our grassroots efforts. We want to spread that energy beyond Orange County up to the next election. Together, I think we can accomplish everything we want to accomplish. I feel great about that.”
Sullivan, too, has words of comfort for Democrats, though granted they’re somewhat less sunny.
“For God’s sake, we lived through Nixon and we lived through Reagan.” Sullivan said. “We can get through this.”
It was. (And this goober is a UNC-CH political science professor?)
Tarheels may need to switch from blue to red. Looks good on 'em...
That would be 60 million and counting, thank you.
Oh cry me a river! They need to move on.
"Radios are tuned to music, not talk."
That doesn't bode well for Air America...
And quite possibly owe your continued existence to Reagan, ingrates.
Chapel Hill is a nice place to visit, bit if you're a conservative, you surely don't want to live there.
"You could just tell how bitter everyone was,” he said, adding that he and his fellow Republican students couldn’t resist smiling a bit as they walked across the quads"
I know how he feels. Everytime I get in back of a car with a Kerry bumper sticker on it, I get this huge smile on my face. Then I start to laugh out loud, alone in my car. I can't help it.
The condescension of the liberals in the area of UNC-CH is amazing. They think they're just the smartest people in the world, and everyone who disagrees with them is just too stupid or incompetent to know what's best for them.
On November 3, as all the liberals I attend school with were getting ready to slit their wrists, I was grinning from ear to ear. It was a beautiful day.
That was YOU?
It makes it all that much sweeter when I keep gloating : )
MKM
"we lived through Nixon and we lived through Reagan"Aw darn the commies didn`t win that one either.
"you surely don't want to live there".
No kidding. These folks are as condescending as anyone from the coasts.
I worked at Research Triangle Park, lived in Durham, while working on a doctorate at NC State. Chapel Hill -- I wish I had never been in the place. Memories are beyond horrible.
Their arrogance extends to total disparagement for the real people who live in NC. It was explained to me as a "Plantation mentality." That about hit it as well as any other description. They are above it all. They can tell other people how to live. They can IMPOSE thier decisions on other, mere mortals . . .
We ate at a Frenchish rest. in Chapel Hill -- they charged as much as a fabulous meal we had had at the Court of Two Sisters in New Orleans! It wasn't NEARLY the meal, nor the atmosphere. But, they are so full of it, they charged as though they were Paris itself.
Stay away - don't give them your $. Durham is better, more grounded, more real . . .
Oh good God, they need to get over it. Up here in the mountains of NC we are quite happy with the results. I only see Raleigh/Chapel Hill/Durham on my way to the other part of the state that is red....the beaches.
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