NASCAR DEMOCRATS?:

Huntin' for Nascar-Lovin', Moon-Pie-Eatin', Bluegrass-Listenin', Shotgun-Totin' Democrats (Matt Bai, September 15, 2002, NY Times Magazine)

Theoretically, the Democratic message should play well in small-town America at a time when the economy lags and corporate scandals are decimating retirement plans. But now, more than ever, Democratic candidates face a cultural problem in these districts; they must overcome the perception that they're in league with effete urban liberals, people who wouldn't know a Moon Pie or an RC Cola if it whacked them in the head. The party of Jefferson and Jackson, which not long ago owned the nation's back roads and general stores, is seen in much of the country as disconnected from -- if not contemptuous of -- the people who spend their weekends hunting, at church or watching stock cars.

This divide, long a source of concern within the party, has lately become a burning preoccupation. Since the 2000 election map highlighted a deep cultural tension between the cities (the blue states) and the sticks (the red states), some Democrats in Washington have been calling on the party to concentrate its efforts on rural voters. Byron L. Dorgan of North Dakota, chairman of the Democratic Policy Committee in the Senate, says that the party's standing in rural states is in serious peril, after years of neglect. ''They will not see senators and congressmen elected 20 years from now in those states unless they give a damn about helping to build a political base once again,'' he says. ''You ask, 'What do people think of the Democratic Party?' Frankly, I don't think much of it.''

But the people who run the party, many of them from the urban political machines, insist that the party's appeal in rural America is in fact growing; they point out that Democrats control most of the statehouses in the South and hold both Senate seats in West Virginia, Georgia and both Dakotas. From their point of view, the only thing Democrats need to do in remote areas is talk louder about the economic issues -- like Social Security and health care -- that define the party.

Into this widening breach step a pair of new-breed political consultants: Steve Jarding and Mudcat Saunders. Jarding, who once plucked chickens in South Dakota, his native state, and his sidekick, Saunders, a self-described ''hillbilly'' from Virginia, helped win a surprising victory for the party in the Virginia governor's race last year. Their unconventional rural strategy centered on issues that aren't usually the focal point of Democratic campaigns, like taking vocational education and broadband technology to remote areas. But what really drew attention was how they got their message out: the campaign featured a bluegrass band, a race truck and their very own hunting brigade.

Since then, Jarding and Saunders have taken their tactics on the road, aspiring to create a whole new army of what might be called Nascar Democrats.

Any headway you can make with such folks by playing up economic resentments surely has to be dissipated by the national party's stances on cultural issues--guns, abortion, affirmative action, etc.--and by how wifty the Democrats have gone, once again, on the war. Posted by Orrin Judd at October 6, 2002 10:31 AM