Street-Level Southern Sensibilities are defective, founded as they are in a hatred for the Federal Government (this is Civil War stuff still moldering, like John Brown's body), a hatred of unions (an invention of the North and a tool of Communism - alla Billy Graham and other right-wing sorts) and the need for a permanent underclass to make the ruling elite feel powerful and good.
Right now, our nation is locked in a Civil War of ideas, and what with Reagan and his cheery smile, and before him, Nixon and his cynical use of Christianity, the South has clearly won enormous territory in the American soul.
It's war that no one can afford to lose, not even the South.
As much as the South fought to retain slavery, it was a war they couldn't afford to win. Had the Union disintegrated and the Confederate States perpetuated the institution of slavery, the cost to all is unimaginable - the balkanization of America and an economy built upon forced labor, an economy that would have been doomed to fail.
Romney and Gingrich and all the rest are held in the grip of Southern Sensibilities.
They look to the past for guidance.
They fail to see the future!
