Long story, bear with me:

I grew up in KY, Louisville suburbs. White, with college-educated parents (Yankees from Illinois). Dad worked at GE Appliance Park (they just announced they're getting out of that business this week -- GE will not be making refrigerators, can you belive that!) When the local kids asked me if I was on the side of the Yanks or Rebs in the war, I said "well, the North won that war 100 years ago, right?" WRONG!

I went to Seneca High School, about 30-40% Black. Wes Unseld's school. His brother George, a huge black mountain of a man, walked the halls as our "human relations advisor" or some-such, ostensibly to keep the peace. Oh, I was scared to go into the bathrooms alone as a 7th grader for fear of getting beaten up, but I feared whites and blacks equally. In 11th grade I transferred to Ballard, over on the upper-class east side, but court-ordered busing came in 1976 and we had a diverse school population. To quote the often-ridiculed phrase, "some of my best friends were Black." I mean, I used to hang with John McHenry on the weekends, and visited his house downtown. John, if you're reading this 30 years later, I hope you are well.

Here's the thing -- I was fortunate to be raised in a liberal home without prejudice. Dad voted republican and Mom democrat -- he worked for GE and she was a teacher -- but they were both liberal in the sense that they gave me a progressive education and world-view. So here I am, 30 years later, a professional, latte-sipping Obama supporter (who would gladly vote for Clinton, too, either way is cool with me.)

But the point I came to make is that when we used to drive to Appalachia to go hiking or camping, and we accidentally took a back road through some dark holler, and those toothless red-heads would stare at us city folk from their ramshackle porches and junk-strewn yards, I would feel a chill up my spine and my neck hairs would stand on end. Those people were different, I thought, and even before I read Deliverance, they scared the hell out of me.

I don't know what Obama can do to buy some hillbilly love, but it won't be easy to get them to vote their economic self-interest. The best outcome would be to hope they and their kin who have dispersed to the 100s of Walmarts from Ohio to North Carolina just stay home and don't vote, so maybe the latte-sippers like me who live in Charlotte and Columbus and Pittsburg can deliver the electoral votes we're gonna need.

TreeHugger: someone who is poised to convince more than half the electorate to pull the lever next to his name has a huge coalition. It's unbelievably shallow of you to throw around words like 'smarmy' and 'callow' because you met a few that rubbed you the wrong way. Shallow and intellectually dishonest.

Couldn't close the sale in New Hampshire, or in California on Super Tuesday, or in Texas, or in Ohio, or in Pennsylvania. What makes you think he'll close the sale with the hillbillies or in the general election overall?

To proscribe "race-baiting" in the same paragraph in which she uses the most shopworn anti-Appalachian cliches is pure asshattery.

Rednecks is the only ethnic group that it is acceptable to make fun of. We've all gotten the "funny" e-mails of the "Redneck Wedding" and the like. Ha. Reading these letters demonstrates that intelligent, educated people believe the stereotype that hillbillies and rednecks are different from normal people.

I grew up in Canada and moved to Florida before air conditioning. I recently worked for 14 years in social services in three interior and rural counties in Florida.

Poor rural whites migrated to interior Florida in the 19th century from Georgia and in the 20th century from Appalachia. They are a proud people.

Some of my observations from the 14 years:

Although many of this group may say racially insensitive things in white company, they also have black friends. This is opposed to many people in the north who say the right things but who have never actually sat down and eaten with a black person.

They believe in self sufficiency. However, if I were to call one of them in the middle of the night from my home on the coast and say I needed to go to the ER, they would say "Sit tight, I'll be there in an hour and a half".

This group is tired of being marginalized. Like African Americans who have taken the n word and made it their own, this group has taken the term "Redneck" and wear it proudly (like Foxworthy). Both groups are not happy when others use the terms.

For Obama (or the Democrats in general) to be successful in reaching this group, he will need to demonstrate that he respects them, respects their values (even when he doesn't agree with them) and that he is willing to help their lives in ways that they will not find condescending. FDR didn't need to go to a Nascar race and wear a tractor hat. He treated them as people worthy of respect and help.

The New York Times has published several in depth articles about the voting shifts in West Virginia, all of them archived.

Rural Poverty Survives Generations of Aid (6/26/88)

Roosevelt tried to solves the persistent poverty in West Virginia through public works spending. Kennedy created the first Food Stamp program to prevent starvation in West Virginia in 1961. Twenty seven years later, the poverty rate in the state remained 50% above the national average, and the poorest people of the state were not taking advantage of the programs already in place because they are hard to get to, or not seen as all that important. The poorest receive checks, but find it difficult to get through the month. "We can't support ourselves."

Wilfong (8/26/04)

West Virginia's social conservatives drive voting patterns, and the Republican party's gun, family values, anti abortion message connects with voters.

10/22/06

Declining union membership, and a strong Republican effort to drive it even lower, account for a shift in voting. Republicans are associated with business-friendly policies, Democrats with policies which are hostile to business. Clean air and water platforms make it more expensive to mine coal. Coal mining has become a much smaller industry, and revitalizing it is important to West Virginians, who believe the industry will fare better under less environmentalism.

5/20/2008

The Republican party has gained the upper hand within the state, a reversal of generation of Democratic state government. Among the reasons for the shift are conservative social issues - gun control, abortion, rise of churches with "conservative character" - as well as economic ones - the decline of the steel and coal industries, trade tarrifs. Democrats, who were in power for so long, are now associated with poverty.

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It may be true that in a contest between Clinton and Obama race played a role in the outcome of the vote. But in the general election neither Clinton nor Obama would win on the social issues, neither would have a vigorous state-level organization behind them, and both would have trouble persuading West Virginians that they represent "pro-business" policies as West Virginia defines the term.

It's not that Obama is elitist, it's only partly that he's black, and it probably has nothing to do with "tone." From West Virginia's perspective, Democrats have promised to improve poverty in the state since 1932, and yet, despite Roosevelt's New Deal, Kennedy's Food Stamps, and Johnson's War on Poverty, poverty has remained embedded at a level 50 % higher than the national average.

Republican economic policies have also failed. Even so, Republicans have managed to establish a powerful base at the state level, and are associated with the social and economic message West Virginians want to hear. If West Virginia has yet to see the effects of pro-business Republican policies, they remain convinced that the Republican party's ideas are headed in the right direction.

Can Democrats win? Spending programs haven't worked, and rescuing declining industries hasn't worked. Someone needs to figure out how to establish new industries in the state. That requires a significant investment in retraining, and a lot of time. It probably also requires tax incentives to lure businesses to the state. Still, without a convincing message on industry, Democrats don't have much of a chance. On the other hand, if Democrats get the economic policy right, abortion, guns and church will matter much less.