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Posted on 07/20/2008 4:23:24 AM PDT by Kaslin
“The Appalachian voting bloc will be critical in the … 2008 presidential election,” former Democratic National Committee executive director Mark Siegel says.
Yet his broad statement comes with its own geopolitical caveat: location.
“It all depends on what part of Appalachia you are talking about,” says Siegel. “If they live in Pennsylvania and Ohio, then, yes, without a doubt they are the key voters. If they live in West Virginia, then no, because for the Democrats that is not a state that is in play.”
Appalachia is not a single state but a region that has its own unique frame (or perhaps frames) of mind that extend well past the borders of West Virginia and Kentucky, the states most often associated with the term.
As a geographical entity, Appalachia cuts a diagonal path from western New York to Alabama and Mississippi. The regions and cultures that go along with it include big swaths of Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Maryland, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee.
Who are the people that live, work, raise families, go to church, defend their country and die in this region?
According to U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., the bulk of them descended from Ulster Scots (lowland Scots who migrated to the Ulster plantation in Ireland) -- a hybrid people, “strong and unfulfilled,” who came to America looking for a new start.
Descendents of the great Scottish warrior William Wallace, these immigrants brought with them a distrust of a heavy-handed government, a demand to worship God as they saw fit, the right to bear arms and the zeal to protect their country -- far more than any other ethnicity.
Many of those core values remained with these people as they settled in Appalachia, even as they married other early settlers such as Germans, Welsh and Native Americans.
Exactly who are these voters today?
In the Democrats’ primaries, they were the white lower- to middle-class voters in Ohio, Western Pennsylvania, Western Virginia, Kentucky and West Virginia who went heavily for Sen. Hillary Clinton.
They are not activists who attend rallies and speak out -- but they will vote.
They are hurting economically, the people most impacted by spiraling gas prices because they drive -- to work, to shop, to the doctor, or to care for an elderly parent -- and they have no alternatives.
Government has forgotten them in many ways and taken them for granted in others.
These voters are dedicated to family, country and God. That is not to say they wear those things on their sleeve for all to see; they don't talk about those things unless asked.
They are simple people who want their leaders to be honest with them.
All of which is why they became Reagan Democrats: Reagan sided with them on love of country and on economics. Today, the question is whether they will give that same level of support to John McCain.
Many of them respect McCain’s service and dedication to country -- but their pocketbooks have been emptied, and it happened on the Republicans’ watch.
“Economically, they should be voting Democratic,” says Siegel. “In terms of social values, they should be trending Republican. They are a very difficult political target.”
Political analyst and numbers-cruncher Michael Barone has noticed problems for Obama among this voting bloc, which he refers to as “Jacksonian” -- for the famed Scots-Irish president who was a friend to the warrior class in Appalachia.
“I don’t know if it is enough of a problem yet, time will tell,” Barone says. But he believes the challenge for Obama is that he is viewed as an elitist by many of these people.
Along with that, a tinge of racism is at play. But clearly it goes beyond that, to Obama’s style, his substance and the way he carries himself.
Everyone thought Karl Rove and George W. Bush were crazy to spend time and money in West Virginia in 2000; a Democrat-blue state, it only went Republican in 1972 and 1984. What Democrats missed was the change in their party from Bill Clinton to elite -- and it cooked Al Gore and sank John Kerry.
No academic has scientifically determined if Appalachia’s Scots-Irish heritage can predict its natives’ voting patterns.
That means the hows and whys of their vote remain wildly unpredictable -- as well as crucial to Obama and McCain, both of whom can claim Scots-Irish heritage.
My Mother-In-Law, a life long dem, is voting Republican for the first time in her life, at 89 years old. oBami comes on the news she changes stations and complains about how the news fawns over him. She is a sharp cookie and, at her age, can see threw the media. She thinks oBami is a wet suit. Thought I would never see the day she would vote R. It’s great. OH yah her elderly friends feel the same.
Born in Huntington but family moved when I was 4.
I go back as often as I get a chance.
Just got back about 8 weeks ago. Went to ride my motorcycle on the Blue Ridge and had to go see the bridge and gorge once again.
Also went to Summersville to Dominics Chop House an old beautiful bank converted in to my favorit restaurant in the world.
Every time I go to do whitewater rafting or sightseeing I have a most wonderful time.
Folks are just plain nice and friendly.
Would rather spend an hour in W.Va. than a week in New Jersey.
That, notwithstanding, I deeply resent the insinuation that these people are racist. Many of them ran underground railroad stations and fought for the Union in the Civil War. West Virginia, the center of Appalachia, was so pro-union that it split off from Virginia.
Eastern (Appalachian) Tennessee was solidly Republican from the Reconstruction Era while the rest of the state was part of the solid south for Democrats.
Appalachian North Carolina was so pro-Union that the Confederates wrote it off early in the war as not worth either defending or exploiting. The famed abolitionist Levi Coffin and other Quaker groups operated openly.
Even the famed Shenandoah Valley of Virgina only got fully on board with the South during the later years of the war in reaction to ill treatment by the invading Union armies.
Our own western Pennsylvania, of course, was a prime recruiting ground for some of the best and bravest of the Union Army, including General Thomas Kane whose service in the cause was so faithful that he was later given a town site which still bears his name.
What the Appalachian people deeply resent is outsiders who tell them that somehow certain folks are better than others. Does anyone prominent in American politics fit that group of elitists any better than Obama and his supporters?
“...crucial to Obama and McCain, both of whom can claim Scots-Irish heritage.”
Truly, Obama is all things to all people. It is funny, and frightening.
What I deeply resent is the insinuation that "pro-union" equates with being "non-racist."
And my heritage is deep into Applachia as well.
You have to keep in mind who was Clinton’s biggest competition. A lot of the Clinton votes were votes against Obama.
I don't see why. After all, he's got an Irish last name.
That's your yellow dog Democrat for you. They don't care that their beloved dems place abortion and gay "marriage" above everything else (they'll vote for anyone and anything with a "D" by its name), but let someone come along who's a little too dark and they can't take it.
I hope FDR is proud of such people.
It’s quite telling how many died in the wool Democrats can vote for McCain “with no clothespin”, but millions of conservatives are refusing to vote for him.
I'm just telling you like it is, man! I was born and raised there and know exactly what the people there (at least in Southwest Virginia, Southern West Virginia, East Tennessee, and Eastern Kentucky) say and think, when reporter reporters hovering around looking for a sound bite. (My mom's family arrived in 1642 and my dad's in 1682)
That Hillary got 90% of the vote throughout this whole region during the Rat primary should speak volumes about what is really going on there with the Democratic vote. It's not about Liberal or Conservative, or even Republican or Democrat. It's about not voting for Obama there because he's black and was a member of Wright's virulent church.
Just wait until election day, and you will see that McCain will win that region by AT LEAST 70%.
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I define it rather narrowly such as people who not only believe in racial superiority, but would implement laws to institutionalize it if given the chance. Robert Byrd, when he was grand dragon of the KKK more than five decades ago would certainly fit the bill then and possibly now. Rev. Wright's followers, even more than Rev. Wright himself, would fit the bill. I'm not convinced that Rev. Wright himself actually believes the crap he preaches, he's just found it to be a good business model given the idiots who will lap it up.
I'm convinced that the average voter of this area wouldn't only support a candidate who happened to be black, they would embrace him. Look at the solid majority Michael Steele polled in the Maryland panhandle if you doubt me.
What this voter isn't, however, is one which can easily be intimidated by calling them racist. They've been talked down to so much, they really don't give a rat's a** what the rest of the country thinks about them.
Do you recall the Roger Coleman case back in the early 1990's? The national and even international media painted this as a case where a bunch of ignorant hillbillies were going to send an innocent man to the electric chair because he was so articulate he didn't fit in to the community.
Well, I've traveled extensively nearly the full length of the Appalachians from Chattanooga to western New York. There are few places in the country which have more colleges per capita. I do not recall a single town of 5000 or more which didn't have at least one institution of higher learning. Yet, the stereotype and inbreeding jokes persist.
The bottom line is that most of them don't see B.H. Obama as a black man, but as a smarmy, self-important big city snob who looks down on them and has thinner actual qualifications to be president than the average mayor in one of those 5000 plus small towns near the Blue Ridge Parkway.
btt
Roger Coleman was from my hometown, Grundy, and he raped and murdered Wanda Dotson at her home about seven miles from my house.
So yes, I do remember his case and how the media slammed us all as a bunch of ignorant hillbillies who couldn't give him a fair trial. Needless to say, it gave me great pleasure to see that last minute DNA test finally prove his guilt just before he fried in Virginia's electirc chair.
My point is that we're not a bunch of ignorant hillibillies in keeping with the stereotypes, BUT politically speaking, the Democratic element in that part of Appalachia is about 30 years behind the rest of the Democratic national establishment, which is why they will not vote for ablack man, no matter who he is, Obama OR Steele.
Like I said, I was born and raised there, and didn't leave until my late 20s. I know how the folks back home think, and what their motiviations are when they pull those levers on election day.
Obama's biggest weakness is among Appalachian protestants, and elderly blue collar Catholics. Its not just "anti-elitism" because these same people (particularly the latter) had no problem voting for Gore or Kerry. The racial element (especially among those with memories of the black migration to "their" neighborhoods and the riots) is very real.
Ethnically, it is not all that different from SW Virginia except for a substantial Amish population. But generally, Amish do not vote, so I don't think that can explain it.
What sickens me is that Steele could have won that election with a shift of about 4% of the African-American electorate who stuck with a while lieberal instead. It wasn't for lack of an attractive alternative in Michael Steele.
Please explain how Appalacian voters have more in common with Obama - black, liberal, pro-abortion, anti-gun, promisor of tax hikes - thank McCain.
I call BS.
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