First off, I've been waiting a while to re-post the following. I wrote it four years ago (back when my handle was familydoctor) and it was my first post to ever make it to the top of the "Greatest Page" back when that first came out. I was able to find it tonight due to the magic of Google (thank you Google Gods for your big internet magic!). I was inspired to look for it because Obama stumbled his way into talking about rural issues. First here's the text:
Original Link >>
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1337329
Title: "My message to McAuliffe, Kerry, Clintons, Carville, DU, dems"
Develop a damn relationship (whatever you think it needs to be)
with rural areas for Christ's sake.
_________________
On edit, I'm adding this as a poster below requested my ideas:
Much of the following are generalizations and assumptions
by me. I doctor in county of 20,000 voters that went
this time 61% for Bush. I have experience living and working
in San Francisco, Lansing, MI, rural maine, and I am back
in my hometown rural community in Michigan. My points of view
come from the comparison and contrast of these experiences.
1.) Advertise in local newspapers. It's extremely cheap to
do. You can get near 100% exposure in a local paper like mine.
2.) Advertise on local billboards. Even Bush Cheney did that
in my county of only 20,000 voters.
3.) Get on local radio stations. In my town, we have two. Most
people that vote listen to those two. They are extremely cheap
to advertise on.
4.) Develop a relationship w/ churches or foster an "outside
of the party" push to get more progressive people to start/run
church's congregations. Socially, people are organized by
"what church do YOU go to".
5.) Work the natural constituencies better: farmers and public
school teachers.
6.) Work avidly to dispell the notion that Dems want to "get
rid of hunting and sporting guns". The Dems need to do more.
7.) Embrace sport hunting and tie this to eco-concerns more.
Hunters understand that a healthy environment is important to
their sport. Consider even championing setting aside more public
land for hunting/recreational activities that they like.
8.) Talk about religion but not in terms of scapegoating gays,
celebrating homophobia. Talk about the real moral issues
surrounding corporate greed and war. There's a whole bunch of
Pro-Christ-teaching that undermines the planks of the Republican
Party platform.
9.) Get "moral", honest, straightforward candidates to run. Rural
people "want someone they can trust" on a gut level. Is that
really too much to ask for? It would go a long way if they
were only married once and have a pattern of meaning what they
say and saying what they mean. It may sound hokey but it's important
to the rural voter.
10.) Run candidates that have military service in their resume.
A lot of soldiers and soldiers families are rural white voters.
Both symbolically and realistically, we can "represent them more"
by have similar experience. Kerry would have done better if his
campaigned had challenged the SBVT smear better. Clark would have
been and even better candidate.
--- I'd like to clarify that the candidates don't need to
be white, I am just trying to characterize the rural
voter and in understaning them better, represtent them
more. The whole thrust of this post is to have the dems
engage rural voters on what they really care about so
we don't have to compromise on equal rights issues for
gays, people of color, women and so we don't have to
compromise on freedoms protected by the constitution.
11.) Actually deal w/ local "Democrat Orginizations" - We have
one here and it even used to have a "downtown" office front. It's
withered and we are now having meetings in a local church. Even
though 7000+ people in the county voted for Kerry this time around,
they get like maybe 8 people to the meetings and they are really
unorganized. Many Dems here are so bullied and cowed by the
Republicans, we don't even speak out, we don't even know who each
other are. If Dems on high were to help us, we could more effectively
organize, turn out the vote and sway others that we work and
interact with.
12.) Work actively to bring back good jobs to rural voters. Our
town is in decline, property values are down, Jobs are Nafta'ing
to Mexico (and the local workers go down to Mexico to train the
folks taking back their jobs). If the dems are working on this,
you can't really palpably feel it. It doesn't help that the
guy who signed nafta into law was a Democrat.
13.) Work change the food system in this country. Farmers are
on the brink all the time and could make a lot more if they
could market effectively directly to the consumer. However, the
system is gamed so that they get 19cents for a gallon of
milk even though you pa $2.69. The middle man gets the food dollar,
not the farmer. Work ostensibly as a party to tie agriculture,
farming, organics, economics, back to the local farmers/families
and local retailers. Right now, I have a family of patients that
owns the local grocery store that is up against a Kroger chain
and now a Super Walmart. I many, many farmers up against Mosanto
and the agriculture giants living from milk check to milk check.
These folks would consider a Democrat if a Democrat could help
them cut Walmart and Mosanto out of the loop.
I'll stop there for now.
Any other Rural Red DU'ers got other ideas? ________________________________________________________
Fast forward to 2008. I stand by my recommendations. Perhaps they are ineloquently stated but there they are. A lot of people liked my comments back then and I think they are sympatico with what Obama is saying now.
However, I'd like to elaborate.
First, rural America is embittered and distrustful of politics as played out these days and by politicians that treat it all as if it were some kind of game. With people dying and going hungry, "Politics is a blood sport" is just a really ugly thing to say if you stop and think about it. However, they generally don't understand what the economic forces are that contribute to their misery.
They don't "cling to God and Guns" out of this misery but they do gravitate toward churches as they provide a spiritual home and an extended family in a world that seems bent on ripping each other apart. The love of guns and gun ownership culture in rural America is part of the heritage and for many people, a hobby and a way of life.
Though I believe the second Amendment, which I strongly support, is about a whole set of different things other than hunting and personal self-defense, it's still there and open to interpretation. Those that are on the inside of rural gun heritage culture hold it as sacrosanct as the liberal of San Francisco cherishes the right to free speech.
The urban effort to reduce street crime by way of gun control directly conflicts with rural sensibilities about guns because their set of experiences is entirely different than urban Democrats when it comes to guns. In a nutshell, by way of heritage, guns are seen as a "good thing" overall.
Democrats have lost election after election because they have lost touch with rural voters in my opinion. If you look at the map, there is no such thing as Red and Blue states, there are only purple ones. However, there are Red and Blue counties and if you look at the color maps in detail you will see that the overwhelming trend is that urban counties are Blue and rural counties are Red.
It doesn't have to be that way but it can't be reversed overnight.
Although it's not likely to happen, the Democratic party (if it ever means to garner the mandate that would bring about things like Universal Health Care and assuaging poverty) needs to begin a multi-decade conversation with the rural areas of America.
Barack is right, both parties have left the rural areas of America flagging in the wind, just like they have the inner city. Neither the Republicans or the Democrats are really listening or caring. The Republicans use the rural areas by throwing up wedge issues (gay marriage, abortion) every four years but forget about the real bread and butter issues that affect the rural voter except for promising to lower "TAXES!". But as you and I know the tax breaks they bring about only marginally impact your average rural voter. The windfall of those breaks go to the rich people that live in the cities. Those rich people are the sort that look down their noses at the provincial bumpkins that vote their friends into power, so that's gratitude for you.
Obama and the rest of the Democratic Party really needs to study the rural mindset and how it revolves around family as the fundamental refuge of the soul, church as prime social organizer, idiosyncratic cultural features like gun heritage, and the bigger issue of economic concerns.
As much as I love the guy, I would give Obama a failing grade on rural matters so far. Frankly, up to this point I think he has largely ignored the topic when compared to how I see him spend his energies elsewhere. Hilary Clinton is worse in my opinion because she is using the rural white vote just like the Republicans do, with a variety of cynical "dog whistle" methods.
Maybe, Obama stumbled onto fertile ground more than he knows. I think he should run with it because he is right when he says there is a lot of anger and distrust out here. If he gives voice to that, he could win a lot of people over. All he has to do is say the truth, say it loud, and say it often: economic policy in America is killing small towns and it is a "bipartisan" slaughter. Agribusiness is killing farmers, China and NAFTA is killing our manufacturing base, health costs out of control are killing our small businesses, bad health policy is bleeding our hospitals, and rising fuel/heating/food costs are creating a pervasive squeeze on everyone from the truck driver to the local concrete company owner. The Walmartizition of America has pushed our jobs overseas and gutted our downtowns. It's time for someone to spend A LOT of time in the country, talk to us, and really find out what makes us tick not to mention what ticks us off.
However, if the Democrats continue to fail to do that they will continue to scrape by every election cycle and wonder why they can never get a big enough majority to get anything done.
We really are the low hanging fruit and the holy grail.
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