Letters to the Editor
-
Virginia -- not a Bellweather yet
For the record, Doraville, GA isn't that Southern. Like its neighbor, Chamblee, it has absorbed a great many immigrants from SE and E Asia, and is not far from a corridor where most peope are from southern Mexico.
Virginia has a long way to go before becoming Cleveland or St. Louis. Webb promises to break a streak of truly weak Seantors: Warner, Robb, Allen. And the Dem governors from Wilder to Kaine would be considered conservative in real bellweather states like Washington, Ohio, or Michigan. And Ollie North happened not that long ago.
Outside of NoVA, Virginia is still stuck with the neo-Feudalism and hardshell Protestant conservativism of the traditional South. Midwestern conservatives can be dragged kicking & screaming toward something new, but Southerners won't even do that. And although NoVA is more liberal than say, metro Atlanta, it's still too Southern for a lot of people who live across the Potomac. When stroll down Clarendon Road in Arlington, I start getting flashbacks of living in Atlanta.
May be 10 years from now, Virginia will be more obviously "purple", but until then this boosterism about a new Virginia just seems like a new version of Washingtonian myopia--usually from people who crossed a bridge into DC.
-
Virginia . . .
200 years of tradition, unmarred by progress.
-
Historical Amnesia
I hate to break it to you but the south was traditionally a Democratic bastion until Reagan's 'revolution' of 1980. Lincoln's party was considered an anathema until that time and the social changes that occurred hence. Southern Democrats were certainly not liberal as their "Yankee" New Englanders, it was traditional and still to this day is, for a Northern Yankee to select a southern Democrat as a running mate for taking the southern vote; Kennedy/Johnson, Carter/Mondale, Dukakis/Bentsen and most recently Kerry/Edwards, not that it works very well however.
Since Reagan the south has certainly voted red and how ironic, as an aside is the term "Red", in my youth being a "Red" certainly meant something far more loaded and sinister, as in Communist.
While the general information in the article seems to be accurate, it was not that long ago when things were different. Hell when I was a kid growing up in Richmond, Va the south was sill under the cloud of our own homespun apartheid, lest we forget our recent history and its cloud of influence that still lingers above us.
-
Doraville, GA
Garrett Epps' observations on the political shift in Virginia gives all southern moderates and liberals hope that the same can come true in places like my home state of Georgia. With the exception of Atlanta (mainly inside I-285), this state is still firmly under the thumb of hidebound conservative Republicans.
However, I can tell you that Doraville is probably a poor example to hold up as "Old South". I can't speak for Biloxi, but anyone who's been to Doraville in the past 25 years can tell you that it is probably the most ethnically-diverse community in the Southeast. Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Hispanics from many Central- and South American countries, Indian, Vietnamese, new citizens from many African nations...the businesses along Buford Highway show Doraville and DeKalb County are what the rest of the nation likely will look like in another 25 years. Mr. Epps clearly mistook Doraville for one of our fine rural towns where the stereotypes may or may not still hold true. Otherwise, a fine piece of analysis.
-
Vaporland: that is a cheap shot
Do you like having a high speed internet? Before they were known for the second largest accounting scandal, MCI was known for being one of the biggest backbones for the Internet. Even though they've gotten a bad name due to their users, AOL is another big player in the online world.
Perhaps you like the concept of DNS (Domain Name Service), which allows you to type www.salon.com instead of 206.80.4.40 to read these articles? Check out Wikipedia on "DNS" or more importantly "Root nameserver". Do you see the location of Server A? That would be in Virginia.
Is the state conservative? Yes. Are there parts of the state that have nut job conservatives? Unfortunately, Lynchburg is probably the definition of that. Is the entire state this way? Absolutely not.
Take a look at this picture:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9d/Virginia_population_map.png
That big red blob at the top is NoVa, well-to-do, liberal suburbs of DC. Due south of that blob is the liberal, blue collar city of Richmond. That's right, vaporland, the former capital of the Confederacy is reliably Democratic. The big red section to the southeast of the state is the Virginia Beach/Tidewater area. A military district first and foremost, they generally are conservative but as you saw this past election, they vote on what is best for the military, not social issues.
Due west of Richmond are two smaller but concentrated blobs. The western one is Roanoke, the eastern one is Lynchburg. As much as it pains me to admit it, you are not going to find larger conservative bastions than those two in Virginia.
Those are your five most populous spots in the state. Guess which ones are grown, and which ones aren't?
Oh yeah, Virginia is responsible for giving Democrats control of the Senate. :rolls his eyes:
-
Maybe Not a "Bellweather" But Certainly a Birthplace
Virginia (do any of the first five writers know anything about it at all?) may not be the "bellweather" Epps seems to take it for - although it is certainly a watershed for the moment, and that's all that matters right now - but it wasn't born yesterday, either. It is more the birthplace of the Great Experiment that is our nation, having been the birthplace of Washington, Jefferson, et al, as well as the incubator for the Republic, the one-time Flower of the Confederacy, and, farther back, the place where John Smith's ass was saved by a shortsighted Pamunkey Indian.
Virginia is exactly what it would appear to be: the great and defining off-center of the American South, and it has everything necessary to the kind of unbelievable story that has sprung from its bosom: the United States of America. Yes, there are bunches of crazy hillbillies down there, vast armies of Wal Mart Shoppers, several fortresses of right-wing religious lunacy and considerable of their flocks; but there are also huge corporations, numerous military reservations, shipyards, waterways, incredible natural beauty and a personality that truly is "for lovers."
My mother was born there. Her name: Virginia.
Jim Webb was born there. His native state: Virginia.
George Allen managed to fool some of the people some of the time, and the state which finally rejected him and his slimeball ways, thus giving this nation permission to exhale after 12 years: Virginia.
Give credit where credit is due. On top of everything it is, there is one thing Viriginia is not: Texas. Thank you Jesus!