Max Brantley of the liberal Little Rock alt-weekly Arkansas Times writes:
We're at a historic turn, obviously. I've been trading notes all morning with other umpteenth-generation Sons of the South about what our fathers and grandfathers might say and do about the opportunity to vote for a black presidential candidate, not to mention the likelihood that a historic first is about to transpire.
My own father, I believe, would have put aside his Louisiana-typical feelings about race and followed a much deeper bias. He believed nothing good ever came of voting for a "G** D***** Republican." The epithet and the word Republican were inseparable in his usage. (He did marry a Republican, though, and treated her with enduring love and respect throughout their 45 earthly years together.) Right, Waddy? I think Betty might have crossed over on this one, too. She didn't have much use for men who'd ditched their first wives for younger models.
Quick historic note for my international readers: Until the '60s the south was solid Democrat. That was because the Republican party was seen as the party of Lincoln and of reconstruction, which was effectively a period of northern occupation of the southern states after the Civil War.
