Deer Hunting with Jesus by Joe Bageant

[eleny]

This book has been discussed here last year but I just finished it the other day. I liked it a lot since it gave me insight into Scots Irish Borderer culture and why those people vote Republican and like going to war "my country right or wrong".

Bageant grew up in Winchester, Virginia, then lived out west for many years. He then returned to Winchester, is a liberal, and writes about his people in an affectionate way even though they frustrate him. He asserts that the Republicans have put so much effort into grass roots activism from radio to the workplace and into local meeting places like restaurants and bars. The locals are literally infused with anti liberalism from all sides all the time.

[SteveM]

1. Thanks for "re-posting" Bageant's book...

I haven't found it yet in the used book store, but it'll get there.

One of the dynamics of how politics shifted since the '70s is how the far right established a virtual culture of anti-liberalism throughout the South and elsewhere, and did so with virtually no opposition. I think most folks (including many in DU) followed the "strategy" of ceding these areas and focusing on the remaining coasts and some metro areas; in short, the Democrats knowingly shrunk their base. I cannot speak to all of the social issues used to rivet-in support for the GOP, but one of these is most certainly "gun rights."

The "policy" of gun control started showing up in Demo politics in the late '60s, but came to real fruition in the '80s. The movement was and is little more than a conjured-up front in the culture wars, using the conceit of gun prohibition. And like all prohibitionist movements, relies heavily on painting millions of people as despicable, corrupt, reactionary, dangerous and evil because the "research", logic and legal arguments for a prohibition fail rather quickly. I suggest this read:

The Great American Gun Debate, Essays on Firearms and Violence by Don B. Kates, Jr. and Gary Kleck, Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, San Francisco, 1997.

This book gives just a sample of the kind of hateful, degrading speech relied on to "frame" gun-owners. And the folks doing the framing were not a bunch of foul-mouthed bloggers or anonymous poison-pen artists. These folks were academicians, editors, columnists, political leaders, celebrities, etc. If you haven't read this stuff, you will be shocked. But there can be no surprise at how many "liberals" swaggered in to "take out" some conjured enemy. And got their asses whipped.

THIS is the balance sheet of animosity which has to be owned up to before Democrats can win back sizable portions of those fellow Americans we have lost or pushed away. Frankly, the best way to deal with this particular social issue is to no longer include it in the Democratic Party platform and to no longer float more "prohi" legislation, esp. at the federal level where the GOP can most efficiently tar the entire community of Democrats. That is why I am active in Democratic Underground.

Consider: Before the latter '60s the issue of gun control was NEVER in the Democratic Party platform.
70+% of Americans believe the Second Amendment protects an INDIVIDUAL RIGHT to keep and bear arms.
Some 30% of gun owners consider themselves liberal (not to mention independents).

If folks want "guns" to not be an issue (as many have stated in these threads time and time again), then quit proposing more bans, more meaningless restrictions, more attacks on gun owners. Many Dues are doing just that.

[eleny]

2. Bageant devotes a chapter to the issue of gun control

He also discusses the legislations and some books but I don't recall as I read a library book and returned it already. One thing I do remember is that he asserts that the early gun control legislation was really meant to keep guns out of the hands of African Americans. That was an eye opener as it was the first time I ever read that idea. I'm not an advocate of sweeping gun control.

The next book I want to read on the subject of the Scots Irish in the USA is Sen. Jim Webb's book. It's his background and why people knew he could do well in Virginia.

[SteveM]

3. To paraphrase Freud, one who knows gun-control knows the history of racism...

See:

www.georgiacarry.org and scroll down to Heller brief. One of the best condensed versions of how gun-control came about in the ante-bellum South, was perfected during Jim Crow, and was continued up until my days. Even some of the legal precedents cited by today's gun-control lawyers were direct cites of laws banning the ownership of guns by those other than "white"!

You can imagine a bunch of Georgia Crackers (who no doubt make up the big majority of this gun-rights advocacy group) reading this history for the first time and having to unravel their own history on all fronts. The irony! The irony!

[BridgeTheGap]

5. There are many segments within the Democratic party - and "liberal"

certainly doesn't cover them all. There are times when certain constituents (i.e. Labor) take a whooping at the hands of those who think they know best for them (i.e. NAFTA / GATT / Free Trade).
I think you're right that the term Liberal was framed by the right as "elitist" and that struck a chord with many rank & file Dems.
We have know latched on to the term "progressive" as a way of pulling many of those constituents back into the fold. Of course the circumstances created by the repubs help with this more than anything.

[Obama4ever]

4. Adding this to my reading list

Thanks for posting this, now I've gotta read it.

[eleny]

6. Welcome to DU!

:hi:

[codjh9]

7. Yeah, it was good - kind of fits in with 'What's the Matter With Kansas?' a bit. n/t

[eleny]

8. I haven't read that yet

Along with Jim Webb's book about the Scotts Irish, they would make an illuminating trio of books.

Btw, I thought it was great that Obama recently made a stop right in Bageant's home town of Fredericksberg, Va. He gave a rousing speech before about 26,000 people - in the rain. The video is in the DU videos forum.

[Uncle Roy]

9. His essays are wonderful. You can find them at

http://www.joebageant.com/joe/essays/

Roy