The political reality of Democrats in the South

[wyldwolf]

Ignore all the centrist vs. progressive infighting you read on DU - especially if your region of political activity is the deep south. No one with a 'D' behind their name is getting elected to a state-wide or Federal office ... yet...

In the racially polarized South, where white voters have been trending Republican for more than a generation, the Democratic route to 50 percent is mainly a matter of racial demographics. Democrats must wait for more nonwhite voters to overcome their disadvantage with white voters.

That wait might end soon in Georgia, but not in this November’s election. In the midterm balloting, the share of whites will be around 64 percent of registered voters, down from 72 percent in 2002, when the Democratic senator Max Cleland lost re-election by 7 points. Ms. Nunn will need nearly 30 percent of white voters to prevail. If Mr. Cleland were running today, his 30 or 31 percent of white voters would probably be enough to squeak out a win.

But most Democrats running for federal office in Georgia fall well short of that 30 percent. The next-highest tally was Jim Martin’s 26 percent in 2008, when he lost a close Senate race to Saxby Chambliss, a first-term incumbent Republican running in a disastrous year for the G.O.P.

The difference between 26 and 30 percent of white voters might not seem like much, but it is very significant in the South. It is even harder for Democrats to reach 30 percent of Georgia’s white voters today than it was in 2002. The state’s white voters have moved toward the right since then, in part because the old Southern white Democrats have departed the electorate...

(BUT...)

Demographic change has pushed Georgia far enough that a Democrat could conceivably squeak out a narrow win if everything goes right. But there should be no mistaking this race for a true tossup. Ms. Nunn will need to match the best performance by a Democratic candidate for federal office in more than a decade, even though she’s not an incumbent and the state’s white voters have become more conservative. It is possible, but hardly an outcome to count on.

(UNLESS, of course, Obama voters come out in very high numbers...)

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/22/upshot/narrow-path-to-victory-for-michelle-nunn-in-georgia.html?rref=upshot&_r=0

comments in parenthesis are mine

[Tsiyu]

1. They've gerrymandered the Southern states so much

and the Dem leadership won't spend down here...considered a lost cause.

So, yeah, I hope for better but not holding my breath


We've basically been abandoned by the Dem leadership