Southerners should get this message: Bush = Sherman

[Francine Frensky]

140 years later, mention of Sherman's burning of Atlanta and the huge path of destruction he wrought in his march to the sea STILL brings a fire to the eye of the true southerner, atleast here in Georgia.

For Iraqi's, the "smart" bombing of cities and civilians, the bulldozing of Fallujah, and the prison attrocities will be remembered for generations in Iraq and the Middle East.

If nobody else in the country gets it, atleast I would think the southerners would. They know what it is like to be beaten, raped and humiliated on their home field.

[JayS]

1. I almost brought up Sherman's March but decided against...

...it. People know too little about the causes and effects of the Civil War these days to be able to discuss it....civilly.

[Francine Frensky]

6. It's still a pretty hot topic down here in the south

When I moved here, I heard that the reason people had all the memorials and did the re-enactments, etc. was because the war was actually fought down here, right in their backyards. Now that I've been here a while, I understand the deep, deep distrust and hatred these people have for northeners, and I think it goes deeper than a physical closeness to battle, I think William Tecumsah Sherman was the "final straw" for these people as they describe his methods as just beyond brutal.

Georgia just went through this whole "bring back the rebel flag" deal, just settled this past year, and lots of states have done the same. There is some racial motivation, but I think the flag people are sincerely passionate about the south's feeling that they not only lost the war, but it was also a loss of honor, the atrocities that were committed to their wives, their property, and honor is a Very Big Deal to these people.

As it is to the Iraqis.

What I'm suggesting is that there are a lot of poor, multi-generational southerners who vote republican and listen to Rush and would quickly state the party line, that of "why is the media giving us all this bad news and ignoring all the good". But this might be the one message that they would GET. That the Iraqi people are like the southerners of the 1860's, and thanks to Rummy and Dummy, they will now hate us, with passion, for GENERATIONS.

[anarchy1999]

33. Enough with everything posted below. Go read Nostamj and GrannyD!

If you really truly care, listen up and pay attention. GrannyD has the roadmap!

www.grannyd.com

Soil of Good Democracy
By Doris "Granny D" Haddock
t r u t h o u t | Perspective

Wednesday 12 May 2004

Detroit, Michigan - I am on a long journey to take a good, long last look at my beautiful country and to encourage as many people as I can to take up the ballot and to brighten up the colors in our fast fading democracy. It has been a long journey for me. While I enjoy making so many new friends along the way, I would rather be back in my home in New Hampshire and walking for leisure instead of in desperate search for a few more good Americans to do the right and necessary thing.

My life has been long and grand, and I am about done with it, but I am determined to not say goodbye to all of this until I can go to my rest in the soil of a good democracy.

I know that many of you are working hard to speak the truth and speak for justice, and to bring America back to some more sensible path. But I am asking you now to do something more. This advice comes from what I have seen along the 20,000 miles I have traveled since I left home in October.

The good news I bring you from a thousand places is that Americans who have resisted voting in the past do want to vote this year. They are motivated, and even in places where they are afraid their votes will not be fairly counted, they are determined to vote anyway. And here is some more good news: you do not have to believe the polls that say the election will be close. It will not be close. The pollsters do not reach the many millions of people who do not have regular phones. Many of the people I met in housing projects, in workshops, in music clubs, have only cell phones or no phones at all to answer pollster questions. They all have strong opinions on the election and they all are preparing to vote. That is the story everywhere we have gone, from the Overtown and Little Haiti neighborhoods of Miami to the Great Lakes.

On my way here I stopped in Battle Creek to visit the grave of Sojourner Truth. There is also a statue of her with her words: "Lord I have done my duty and I have told the truth and kept nothing back."
http://truthout.org/docs_04/051604B.shtml

[ArkDem]

40. deep distrust and hatred for nottherners?

please

[NuttyFluffers]

2. you'd think they would get it...

but the south has an unfair amount of support for bush, in comparison to the west and the north.

wonder what that says about southerners...?

[RoyGBiv]

8. What it says...

Mostly, it says that large segments of the Southern population are still being effectively disfranchised.

[NuttyFluffers]

14. then i am stumped on how to support them...

ACLU? more guns? honestly i have no idea how to effectively help the disenfranchised of the south. they have our moral support, but they need to take back their own personal hells. if it means they have to create new cities or something to focus their strength, then... that's what it takes. but they need to do something fast because their neighbors are dragging us on the highway to hell with little thought to the consequences.

[QC]

25. It's so easy to sit thousands of miles away,

in the safety of one's home, and tell other people what they should do.

[RoyGBiv]

26. Look at what Clinton did in the South...

And look at Clinton's numbers. He took several states that he wasn't initially expected to take, and even in those Southern states he lost, he didn't lose by the same majority that Mondale, Dukakis, and Gore did.

Gore, for some reason, didn't follow that strategy, and now, it seems, Dems are just willing to abandon the area again. That's wrong-headed.

It doesn't take guns. It does take a carefully considered strategy that speaks to the particular interests of Southern people, i.e. a specific, focused message that negates the "divide and conquer" strategy the Republicans have been using for decades. I don't see why that's acceptable in every part of the country but the South.

[JayS]

16. What do you mean by this? n/t

n/t

[RoyGBiv]

24. Several things...

You've heard of Florida, I assume? Over 90,000 voters taken from the rolls, the majority of which were black, i.e. people who traditionally vote for Democrats?

But beyond that, the Conservative strategy in the South has always been, in one way or another, to marginalize and dilute the the impact of minorities, the poor, women, etc. on elections. (I say "Conservatives" because the positions of the parties as a whole have changed over the years, and this goes back to ante bellum days.)

Today we have legal barriers against disfranchisement, but these aren't always honored. Again, see Florida. In addition, Conservatives seek to discourage those who would vote for more progressive candidates from even going to the polls, sometimes through private intimidation:

"Ya know, John, I don't know if I'll be able to keep you on as an employee if they increase the minimum wage..."

Misdirection: "Doesn't really matter who gets elected. Why even bother to vote." < - Be assured; today, this is a Republican argument. Low voter turnout benefits Republicans, especially in the South.

And different forms of legal disfranchisement: Criminals shouldn't be allowed to vote, so let's pass laws that make more and more criminals.

As one specific example that considers only one demographic variable, look at some statistics from counties in Southern states like Mississippi and Alabama where blacks are in the majority. Democratic, largely progressive candidates claim the majority of votes in these places, but not in the expected proportions. For example, in Hinds County, Mississippi where blacks are 61% of the population and the number of people living below the poverty level are almost 10% higher than the national average, Gore only took 53% of the vote. He should have taken close to 70%. Why didn't he? Answer: blacks and poor whites either didn't vote or in some cases when they voted did so after having been "convinced" to vote against their own interests.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

27. You forgot to add that some votes for Democrats just "disappeared"...

...as if they had never been cast in the first place. Then we had the roadblocks, the closed polling places, and the closing of polls when hundreds of people were still in line.

And as you noted, Florida was not the only state in the South to experience voting "irregularities". But Florida got all of the captive media attention because that state had the highest number of Electoral Votes in the South outside Texas.

[RoyGBiv]

29. You're right....

I did forget to add that, and it's a very important feature to consider.

I got wrapped up in looking at and comparing some statistics from a few previous elections and the 2000 census. I expected some of what I found, but I didn't expect the degree of it.

[JayS]

31. That is a good answer. What I want to throw into the mix is...

...what I have seen here over and over and over again. We have a HIGH minority population in my state, Texas, but just try and get them to the polls. If any of the above that you mentioned happened to them, they would not care all that much, in my opinion. They may complain but that is about it. How do you change this? I've tried for a long time. It is not that they are apathetic, they just are indifferent about voting. :)

[RoyGBiv]

37. I don't pretend to know all the answers...

What I know is that until about 30 years ago there were people willing to accept the possibility of death just to exercise their right to protest for their right to vote.

Now? Now we have people who will seriously tell you they didn't get around to voting because they were too busy, and when you press them on it, you find out what they're saying is that they didn't bother to drive around the block. Most of my life I lived across the street from my polling place, and neither of my neighbors ever voted. Both belonged to demographic categories that should have a strong interest in changing the status quo.

It's a multi-faceted problem with no single cause and no single solution, so it's difficult even to talk about it without generalizing far too much. Nevertheless, I think one major aspect of the problem that threads itself through all the other reasons is a perceived lack of reward in the act of voting. People expect to get something for their effort, even when that effort is essentially effortless. For a long time, the reward for the disfranchised was the vote itself. But now having the right to vote ostensibly guaranteed, they want, and have the right to expect, something more.

This is where it gets trickier and more complex and thus not subject to simple answers. It's a systemic, national problem, but it's more pronounced in the South because of the combination of a high proportion of minorities and the lingering racist elements that work against them no matter what they themselves do. The Conservative strategy of convincing minorities and others that voting is effectively pointless has worked because there is an element of truth to it. Change comes slow, and for many, the slow pace has extended across centuries. Republicans have told us that the problems of race are solved, and unfortunately, too many Democrats have let them get away with that. As you say, minorities may care, but they don't think that voting will help them because few candidates are giving them a reason to believe otherwise.

The answer to that is simple to say but difficult to implement. Make voting matter; make change more obvious and beneficial. Democrats must speak to Southern voters, not simply minority voters because the problems of minorities living in Los Angeles or New York are different from the problems experienced by minorities living in Jackson, MS.

That will require a candidate with a little fire in his or her belly and a willingness to express it. Clinton, for all his flaws, had that fire, and he started something. Unfortunately, Democrats have by and large abandoned what he started and are back to square one.

Sorry for the length...don't know if this makes any sense or not, and I know I've not offered any practical advice.

[JayS]

38. I wish we could get all candidates to demand a return of a Poll...

...Tax, but as an "April Fools" joke of course. It would be so much fun to see everyone get all riled up, and then hopefully get the point when the joke is revealed. :)

Your statement below is particularly insightful. I think it may also be a big part of why the South has gone from nearly 100% Democratic (or more than 100% since it is...the South) to a high percentage Republican. I hope we can find a way to show people that there is a long term interest in voting in the right candidates even though there may be no short term perceived gain.




***************
It's a multi-faceted problem with no single cause and no single solution, so it's difficult even to talk about it without generalizing far too much. Nevertheless, I think one major aspect of the problem that threads itself through all the other reasons is a perceived lack of reward in the act of voting. People expect to get something for their effort, even when that effort is essentially effortless. For a long time, the reward for the disfranchised was the vote itself. But now having the right to vote ostensibly guaranteed, they want, and have the right to expect, something more.
**************

[tom_paine]

15. It says NOTHING about Southerners. There are good people everywhere

There are bad people everywhere. There are neutral people everywhere.

[Gildor Inglorion]

3. Hi, Francine...welcome to DU!

from a fellow Georgian. I grew up hearing tales of my great-grandfather losing a leg in the War, and my great-great grandfather being strung up by his thumbs by stragglers from Sherman's army. The horrors in Iraq fill me with dismay, but I'm currently residing in Mississippi and they really don't get it. :(

[RebelOne]

36. Welcome to DU from another Georgian.

[Mistress Quickly]

4. What's liable to happen

is that the whole damn south tries to secede again, saying screw the whole federal government.

[Gildor Inglorion]

5. Not a chance...

the south as a whole receives MUCH more in funding from the rest of the country than it contributes. See: "Special Report: Federal Tax Burdens and Expenditures by State" from the Tax Foundation at www.TaxFoundation.org

Very enlightening. Mississippi (of course) ranks #50 in federal tax burden, yet receives 116% of its contributions back from the feds.

[TNDemo]

7. Not true.

We had a thread about this on DU within the past year. I can find the website if need be but what your link shows is the tax burden of what people PAY in taxes. The top ten states that RECEIVE federal money are as follows:

1. New Mexico
2. Montana
3. W. Virginia
4. Mississippi
5. N. Dakota
6. Alaska
7. Virginia
8. Hawaii
9. S. Dakota
10. Alabama

[TNDemo]

9. I just went and looked at that site again.

It says things about expenditures per state but I can't seem to find it. Did I miss it?

[Gildor Inglorion]

13. Here ya go....

always happy to help out a fellow southerner

http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxingspending.html

;-)

[QC]

20. Can you find the source for that?

I need to use it in another discussion. Thanks!

[CatWoman]

10. Welcome to DU, Francine

:hi:

Stone Mountain here :D

[hatrack]

11. Interesting proposition, but one problem with the analogy

Sherman was an able leader and a brave soldier, as well as being one tough, ruthless general.

Bush, on the other hand, is just a prancing pantload.

But in terms of overall effects, you may be on to something here!

[buycitgo]

12. ya know......when I read the title by itself........

I thought the topic would be about what he's doing to THIS country, not Iraq

[DivinBreuvage]

17. Under this analogy the Southrons are damned LUCKY Sherman was all they got

Sherman never massacred wedding reception crowds, he didn't kill women and children and call them collateral damage, he didn't round up thousands of southern men and hold them indefinitely and degrade them and take photographs of them and then beat them to death. He didn't openly insult their religion and destroy religious texts. And despite what you appear to allege in your initial post, Francine, Sherman's army just didn't rape confederate (i.e. white) women. In the extremely few instances when it occurred the offenders were severely punished. Confederate women weren't negroes or indians after all.

The historian Thomas Lowry, in his book "The Story the Soldiers Wouldn't Tell", mentions one delightful instance of Southern breeding in which a Southern woman accused two Union soldiers of raping her. The men were tried, found guilty, and hanged by their own army. At the end of her life the woman gleefully admitted having lied about the rape so she could do her little part to rid the earth of Yankee scum.

Before anyone pulls out the oft-used argument that the war wasn't about slavery, that most Southerners didn't own slaves, that Southerners weren't any more racist than Northerners, or that most Southerners were fighting because the North just maliciously invaded them one day out of the clear blue sky for no conceivable reason at all, I would advise you to read "For Cause and Comrades" by the eminent Civil War historian James McPherson, who convincingly shows how big a factor race was in the mind of the average Southerner when he went to fight.

But of course we all know that the Confederates, much like modern conservatives, were substantially an amalgam of conservative rich white folks who considered themselves the natural ruling class and racist poor stupid folks who considered themselves the virtuous salt of the earth, and so they were the most put upon and victimized of all peoples and Sherman's depradations were at least the equivalent to the current goings on in Iraq. Perhaps Sherman is even as bad as Hitler in Poland or Stalin in the Ukraine!
Read about the behavior of soldiers in the Thirty Years' War, the Napoleonic Wars, the Zulu War, World War Two, or almost any other war or conflict human beings have fought since the dawn of time. You'll find very few conquerors who were as humane as William Tecumseh Sherman.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

30. I guess this topic may come as a shock to most posters....

....but Civil War History is a pretty complex subject. For instance, what are we to make of Blacks serving in the Confederate Army? Read the links below for more information:

Black Confederates
<http://www.blackconfederates.com/>

On Black Confederates
<http://www.37thtexas.org/html/BlkHist.html>

UNITED STATES COLORED TROOPS & BLACK CONFEDERATES
<http://www.coax.net/people/lwf/cwappoma.htm>

BLACK CONFEDERATES PAROLED AT APPOMATTOX
<http://www.coax.net/people/lwf/paroled.htm>

Black Confederates Fact Page
<http://www.geocities.com/11thkentucky/blackconfed.htm>

Writings About and By Black Confederates
<http://www.louisville.edu/a-s/english/subcultures/colors/teal/sdisaa01/writings.html>

[RoyGBiv]

32. For the record...

I know a few of the people who are behind some of these sites. Some of them aren't right in the head.

I can give you details if you like, but I don't want to hijack the thread into a CW discussion.

You are correct in your initial statement. It is a complex subject, and the actual existence of "black" Confederates is just one thing that makes this so.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

34. Yeah...I got the sense that there was more to telling about the Black...

...confederate than just discussing the history. It looked like there was an attempt on at least one site to use that information as a means of attempting to state that slavery was not one of the major issues of the war.

[JayS]

35. About the best sources you can find are...

...reports from the period preceding the war. Looking at newspapers from both the North and the South can be incredibly revealing, as can the Congressional Record. A lot of things make sense after you read through this information.

[DivinBreuvage]

18. By the way...

HELL NO, I WON'T FERGIT!

[DoNotRefill]

19. Well, if so many "progressives"

didn't treat all Southerners like complete and total dog-shit, maybe they'd pay attention to us.

I'm not holding my breath. Hating everything about the South is one of the few "acceptable" prejudices out there.

[QC]

21. Ain't that the truth.

I sometimes think that most "Progressives" are more concerned with preserving their moral purity by refusing to associate with people who are insuffiently pure than with actually making some changes in the world.

[jdsmith]

22. One of the GOP's successful strategies since the thirties

has been to drive wedges between obvious allies--poor whites and poor blacks--thereby diminishing the political strengths of Southern progressives. In SC, we had 57,000 people show up for a take-down-the-flag rally--and no one, except the GOP, has capitalized on the show of unity ever since. (I've lived out of state for four years--if someone can tell me how that enormous groundswell yielded good results, I'd be more than happy to hear about them.)

[anarchy1999]

23. All I read was Bush = Sherman......... Bush is finished someday.

Probably only in history.

I fear we have to live through a few more years. And yes, you would think at least the "Southerners" would get it. The "Southerners" (as have most, including the North, East and West) though, have been dumbed down for the most part. Just think about it and really take the time to research into it. It just might scare you to death.

Bush = Sherman
Made me laugh, just a little.

[Hubert Flottz]

28. Or more like General "Black Dave" Hunter!

Hey these guys were cruel but they never went AWOL!

http://www.vmi.edu/archives/civil_war/hunter.html

[ArkDem]

39. I'm only 53. I don't remember any o that stuff.

.

[mmonk]

41. Already got it