Back in the old days (meaning, before Ronald Reagan), the South was populated with many, many yellow dog Democrats–so named because they would vote for a yellow dog before they would vote for a Republican. For decades, they kept the South realibly (if not infallibly) voting for the Democratic Party.
BUT THE L.A. TIMES HAS DISCOVERED (LIKE EVERYONE ELSE) THAT THE YELLOW DOG DEMOCRAT SEEMS TO BE AN EXTINCT SPECIES IN THE REGION.
(Backup link in case that one goes bad.)
If the Dems do hope to ever rebuild themselves as a national party, their hopes in the South may lie in a new breed: the blue dog Democrats.
Author: Jimmy Akin
Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."
View all posts by Jimmy Akin
Save the token outreach where you see Democrats claiming that it is OK to be a pro-life Democrat in this country I see this stronghold not budging any time soon. They mentioned gay marraige in the article but unless I am blind they failed to mention the one issue that will prevent this white college educated Southerner from voting Democrat for eons to come. Its abortion stupid. The failure to approve significant numbers of judges who had so called “extreme” pro-life views was a very visible slap in the face to the south where pro-lifers outnumber pro-choicers significantly, at least publically. I cannot remember the last time I saw a pro-choice bumper sticker around here …
Louisiana’s governors election was a fresh look at things. It was actually tough to choose between two Catholic pro-life politicians and despite the fact that my guy lost, I have been very much impressed with the firm stances that Gov. Blanco has taken on issues that are important to Catholics. We need more Democrats like that … A quick end to this tide can be gained by reversing the fortunes and influence of the strong secular pro-choice element of the Democrat party but the question remains, are they willing to concede that in order to take the issue off the table and place at the forefront other issues that ARE important to southerners where Democrats have historically held advantages over the Republican party. I doubt it and it is why I think we will only see gains in Republican seats in the house. Louisiana elected its first Republican senator ever. With the other being one of the more pro-choice out there (and sadly Catholic), expect that seat to threaten to move red 4 years from now …
Besides, Jindal is now in the house of represenatives and I think he would be a strong candidate to get our other Democrat senator out of office in 4 years.
I should not say first Republican senator ever … but since Reconstruction … thats a LONG time
A friend of mine was formerly an active Illinois Democrat, but in recent years (especially following his conversion to Catholicism) he has basically switched over to the Republicans, based on the pro-life issues that the Democrat Party is completely wrong on. He was the first person to tell me about “blue dog Democrats.”