Long ago, Richard Nixon unleashed the politics of hate with his “southern strategy”, aimed at exploiting animosity toward President Johnson’s civil rights legislation to convert the South (i.e., the Confederacy) from Democrat to Republican.
What’s wrong with a politician reflecting the wants and desires of voters? Isn’t that rather the point?
LBJ was well aware of the likely effect of his Civil Rights legislation. He said as he signed it: “I have lost the South to the Democrats for a generation.”
Because it’s “Who? Whom?” all the way down with progressives.
So “pale and male” is an acceptable pejorative, but you’ll never hear of a group of people being ridiculed for being brown and female.
It’s OK for the ANC to steal from, and discriminate against, white South Africans. But it’s not OK for white people in America to vote Republican.
On he hand Tim what is wrong with a politician having the courage to fave down attitudes prevalent in the electorate? To lead, being prepared to lose if necessary?
The UK at the moment is in the middle of a ‘bash the rich’ rhetorical mania that can only lead to stupid tax policy, anti-trade protectionism and wirch-hunts. We have people who feel no embarrassment condemning the Camerons for doing exactly what the legislation envisages, exactly what Parliament intended, exactly what they would do. And we seem not to notice.
No. Give me a politician prepared to stand up to this.
On he hand Tim what is wrong with a politician having the courage to fave down attitudes prevalent in the electorate? To lead, being prepared to lose if necessary?
The UK at the moment is in the middle of a ‘bash the rich’ rhetorical mania that can only lead to stupid tax policy, anti-trade protectionism and wirch-hunts. We have people who feel no embarrassment condemning the Camerons for doing exactly what the legislation envisages, exactly what Parliament intended, exactly what they would do. And we seem not to notice.
No. Give me a politician prepared to stand up to this. Give me LBJ.
Ukip are, of course, often called “angry old white men”.
I’ve no idea if this is true or not, I’m not a member. But it’s interesting how the media describes Kippers in dismissive terms, while the Green Party and the Respect Party (for example) receive no such demographic scrutiny.
Ironman – how comes you left the New South Africa? (innocent face)
Depends on the kind of democracy you support: simple majoritarianism or something more Burkeian.
“ukliberty” (misnomer there if ever I saw one) is now going to pretend that the kind of Orwellian nightmare-world he supports is really a kind of Burkean Conservatism. Jesus wept.
LBJ was scum.
The most likely candidate to have been behind killing Kennedy. He was hated by the brothers who were plotting to expose LBJ’s massive corruption. He started as a school teacher and then a professional polit–on a “modest” salary for such pork. Yet was worth £100 mil (in today’s money) by the time he became VP. Funny how that seems to happen a lot in politics everywhere.
He began the process of turning America into a socialist shithole with his “Great Society ” welfare wonderland.
He was also a true Democrat in his attitudes to blacks. The Democrats being the party of slavery and the Klan.Ironman should also consider his other famed quote regarding welfare and civil rights “The niggers will vote for us for a hundred years for this” were, I believe, his reported words.
Ironman,
Because there are limits to leadership.
Most political change isn’t about great men. It’s about science and technology changing the world and someone taking on conservative forces in the light of it. When slavery was abolished it was after lots of other states had had slavery and abolished it. If a president had tried what Lincoln did in say, 1790, it would never have happened. You can only lead as far as Lincoln did -you see a crumbling wall and push it over.
You see, I think Nixon actually did as well as he could. if he’d not done what he did, those voters would have found a home somewhere else. You’dhave had a KKK party. Instead, Nixon made some noises while raising spending on school integration and passing the first affirmative action program. He might have been a bit of a cunt, but there’s not much evidence that he was a racist count.
Incidentally, I don’t detect racism about Trump. I think the bloke, and many of his supporters are bellends, but I’ve read interviews with people and they aren’t racists. They’re old and have a certain perspective on the past, but these are the civil rights era kids voting for him.
“Hate” is what the other people do.
Incidentally, I don’t detect racism about Trump. I think the bloke, and many of his supporters are bellends, but I’ve read interviews with people and they aren’t racists.
Trump may be America’s last hope of avoiding complete racial balkanisation.
The Democrats are now the SJW and minorities party.
The Republicans have become the white guy party by default. And not through choice, they’ve been desperately pandering to those “natural conservatives” sneaking across the border from Mexico for nearly 20 years.
It just hasn’t worked, because the Dems can always outbid them when it comes to welfare and identity politics.
Trump’s non-racialist American populism and focus on immigration restriction is the GOP and the USA’s last plausible chance of preventing their demographic fractures turning into impassable chasms.
If anybody else gets in, the USA as we knew it will dissolve in the acid bath of mass migration.
Isn’t the purpose of a politician to do the bidding of the likes of Richard Murphy – thus reflecting ‘society’s’ wishes?
@”The Inimitable Steve
April 11, 2016 at 11:12 am
Ukip are, of course, often called “angry old white men”.”
I am a member and was a Lib Dem before hand the demographics of both parties was the same when I changed.
Well, angry old white men are the sort of people who join political parties in the first place, except perhaps for things like green parties and ‘legalise cannabis’ parties.
Well, it rather depends on where you think the engine of real progress comes from.
If it’s the sweaty masses, then it’s a Very Good Thing to have elected politicians represent their thoughts and desires – that way, the engine o’progress is directly represented in gummint.
If it’s more likely to be a small number of driven, smart or effective individuals, then it doesn’t matter a used dachshund whether the elected pols reflect the tiny minds of the higgerant electorate.
I did see a celeb on Twitter lamenting that it was somehow unfair that the elderly had a disproportionate impact on democracy PURELY BECAUSE they turn out to vote more than young people. I mean! Outrageous! A democracy being based on the number of votes cast! Appalling.
The only problem with a politician pandering to the desires of voters is that so many voters are idiots. I cite Murphy to prove the point. But, it is the system we have and there is nothing wrong with Nixon’s southern strategy. We have plenty of reasons to not like Nixon but this is not one of them unless you are a lefty loon.
Don’t get me started on LBJ. I’m sure he had noble intentions but the actual policies have proven to be terrible.
This is as close as the Left will ever come to admitting the truth that the racist laws in the South were Democrat laws.
Richard Allan,
Blimey, who pulled your chain?
“This is as close as the Left will ever come to admitting the truth that the racist laws in the South were Democrat laws.”
Ah, but those were the *old* Democrats; the Dems have Now Seen The Light. Old Democrats are basically mislabeled hysterically-evil Republicans.
As Dylan Thomas put it, an alcoholic is someone that drinks as much as you that you don’t like
Substitute alcoholic for a host of political terms and that seems to be the status of politicos today
Ye gods where to start on such “democrat” inevitability puff piece!
“Votor suppression” aka ensuring voters are entitled to vote, as well as being alive, is dismissed out of hand. Which makes me wonder which party benefits from fraud.
No Latino would vote for another Latino if said Latino was Republican, because Latinos are not racist?
Black people will vote for an old white person because they know that old white people aren’t racist?
To sum the article up, Democrats are good and will win in the end, whether they support or oppose slavery, Jim crow, trade, protectionism or whatever.
Pat,
Thankfully the Commonwealth Court invalided our law as it didn’t solve any real world problems while the 4% of PA voters without appropriate papers are left disenfranchised. Virtually all of the 4% are in urban areas with public transit that traditionally vote democratic. Since there are no recorded cases of in-person fraud which party do you think benefits from this law?
“Since there are no recorded cases of in-person fraud”: how often are cases investigated?
If there are no cases to investigate how do you investigate them?
No one is pointing out the obvious – the myth of the Southern strategy is a myth. Yes, the Republicans turned to the voters of the South. No, they did not design racist policies to appeal to them.
The Republicans have always been the party of racial equality. They are the party of Lincoln and the NAACP after all. They did not change. The Democrats did. The Dems realised there were more votes in pandering to racial minorities who were not Southern Whites than there were in pandering to racial minorities and Southern Whites. So they turned on the South. The Republicans had plenty of appeal in the South without race. The Democrats being the party of defeat in Vietnam for instance.
If you refuse to countenance that such a crime is even possible, it is not surprising that you will find no evidence of it.
Tim, I have exactly the same question: is a politician who panders to the electorate not the ultimate democrat?
Of course, to be the ultimate democrat he’d also need to actually do what he said. In which case he’s probably not a politician 🙂
“If you refuse to countenance that such a crime is even possible”
Your words. The only people I’ve seen that have made that claim are those that want to disenfranchise 4% of voters that will probably vote against them.
I never claimed that in-person voter fraud isn’t theoretically possible, only that the is zero evidence that it has happened in the real world. Find one real world instance and we can discuss whether the problem is severe enough to justify a law against it.
What bothers me most about the law is that there is no provision to pay the costs of ensuring the validity of the id on election day. Fake ids that can pass a visual test are relatively cheap. If someone is going to go through the trouble of committing in-person voter fraud why wouldn’t they get a fake id? The obvious solution is to spend a few million extra to install card readers with access to all applicable government databases at all polling places. Unfortunately we still have a weak point in the operators of the card readers. It is possible that election officials will simply claim they did everything to follow this law while breaking it so we’ll need some addition tax money to prevent this hypothetical situation. I could keep going but I hope the point has become obvious.