Recruiting Trench Liberals and Leftnecks

[Wiregrass Willie]

Joe Bageant tells us how much we need to recruit his Red Nation friend "Buddy" to the Democratic cause.

Recruiting Trench Liberals and Leftnecks

Buddy voted twice for the president that has perhaps crippled America permanently. Yet it is not a case of working folks' like Buddy crippling America, but the American system crippling working people through neglect. The working class of so-called Heartland America -- which is all that stuff between the big cities -- gets a very poor education. They operate with a sixth grade grasp of history and politics and zero understanding of the economy. They have been told all their lives that America is absolutely the only free and prosperous place to live and that it is the product of divine providence. This is not the exclusive view of rural and small-town America. Much of the new suburban America also believes the same.

Like it or not, the Democratic Party needs Buddy. Standing together, with a percentage point or two from guys like him, we cannot be beaten at all, assuming an honest election. But first we must to learn to care about the guy with the plumber's butt rotating our tires and the single mom driving the forklift on the night shift at the big box store warehouse. Once we do that, we will come to understand that most red state voters are not our unchangeable adversaries, but merely among the millions of Americans coarsened over the last couple of generations by toil, ignorance and debt and misled by the worst elements in American politics.

http://www.joebageant.com/joe/2007/06/recruiting-tren.html

[Bluzmann57]

1. Ok, I suppose I could be considered a "leftneck"

or something along those lines. And I certainly can operate at more than a sixth grade level. I also know that a majority of educated people respect those of us who are blue collar types. At least here in eastern Iowa.
The article is correct in saying that we working folks are being crushed, but it is due, in part, to the bush philosophy of saying, "screw all but the very wealthy" and allowing the very wealthy to dictate policy. Things like hiring illegal immigrants to work cheap, things like pricing fuel at $3.00 a gallon, things like trying to destroy Organized Labor, things like trying to keep very smart people who happen to be poor, down and out. They want us to beg and then be greatful. Well, not this "leftneck". I am smart enough to know right from wrong and what's going on now is just wrong. By the way, "leftneck" is sort of an interesting term. I kinda like it.

[OnionPatch]

2. I kinda like it too.

I guess I'm a bit of a leftneck, myself. :)