The South & the Presidency

I've been thinking a lot about the South and Democratic Presidential politics. Until very recently, I believed unreservedly in the conventional wisdom: that to have any possibility of winning the Presidency, the Democrats had to nominate a Southerner; even better, they had to double-size the order with a Dixie Veep, as Clinton did with Gore.

I did notice that Gore almost won in 2000 without any Southern electoral votes at all (well, aside from Maryland, and I think it's pretty well agreed that Maryland is no longer Southern but has mutated into a Mid-Atlantic state instead). He almost won, in fact, even without Florida. If he had taken either New Hampshire or Nevada, both of which Clinton had carried . . . Well, it's best not to torment oneself with the endless numbers of 'might have beens' from 2000. But even so, this was the exception that proved the rule - that is, tested the rule -- and the rule held. Or so I thought. It was simply cutting it too close. At least a few Southern states were needed to be in play to be able to assemble a winning electoral college bid.

But there have been a spate of articles recently that challenge that wisdom, and they've prompted me to begin to reconsider. The Nation proposed an alternative Southwestern strategy: write off the South, which is lost anyway, and work on building a reliable compensatory base in Arizona, New Mexico and Nevada. Then there was an anti-Southern strategy – or anti-Southern, depending on your POV - article in Slate yesterday, discussing the arrogant sense of entitlement the South has, despite having been responsible for an excessive number of the historical problems that have plagued the country. That piece had a link to a fascinating article in The Washington Post (which incidentially also recommends a southwestern strategy). It's clear this meme's time has arrived.

Were the Democrats to attempt to go with a Southern strategy this year, their choices are fairly circumscribed. A Yankee with a Dixie Veep doesn't seem to carry any water (remember Dukakis/Bentley?), so Kerry/? or (even worse) Dean/? doesn't sound too promising. There are only two Southern Presidential hopefuls in the race right now: John Edwards and Wes Clark. I don't know if Edwards could even carry North Carolina in the fall, much less any other state in the region. And Wes Clark has never been elected to anything before, so we have no idea what kind of pulling power he might demonstrate.

The Republican party is clearly consolidating itself ever more firmly in the old Confederacy. Even with hypothetical Southerners on the ticket in the top, bottom, or even both slots, there may well be no winnable Dixie states for the Democrats, with the possible exception of Florida. (Depressingly, one of the articles suggests that even Florida may be beyond reach!) What strategy will our nominee take? Will he continue to plow money and time into ads and campaign stops for this region, or will he cut his losses and direct his resources elsewhere? This is one of the most important decisions he will make.

I have to say it would be great if some way of bypassing the South to Presidential power could be found, because the most reactionary elements of the Southern character tend to assert themselves in Presidential elections and impose themselves on the nation as a whole. Fundamentalism, racism, violence as a first resort, anti-intellectualism . . . (Gee, can you tell I don't much care for my native region?) I'm not as sanguine as the fellows devising these pretty shortcuts, however, that there is a such a golden path.

My thinking is still evolving, and I will be reading more on this . . .