Thursday, October 9, 2008

Rednecks for Obama

With the frightening developments of recent weeks, I offer some encouragement. It seems that not all of the "Joe Six-Pack," "God-Fearing," "Gun-toting," "Hard-working," "Values Voters" are drinking the McCain-Palin kool-aid. Some of them are actually voting with their heads:


Tony Viessman, 74, and Les Spencer, 60, got politically active last year when it occurred to them there must be other lower income, rural, beer-drinking, gun-loving, NASCAR race enthusiasts fed up with business as usual in Washington.

"We need to build the economy from the bottom up, none of this trickle down business," Spencer said. "Just because you're white and southern don't mean you have to vote Republican."

Racism "has softened up some, but it's still there," Viessman acknowledged from Belmont University, site of Tuesday's McCain-Obama debate in Nashville, Tennessee.

Surely [Obama] alienated many rural voters earlier this year when the Harvard-educated senator told a fundraiser that some blue-collar voters "cling to guns or religion".

But Viessman, who says he owns a dozen guns, said Obama "ain't gonna take your guns away."

Viessman says he'd like to think his grassroots movement could sway enough people in small-town America to make a difference.

"There's lots of other rednecks for Obama too," he said. "And the ones that's not, we're trying our best to convince them."

7 comments:

cornbread hell said...

that's downright hope-inspiring.

Anonymous said...

I live in one of the reddest states there is. Yeah, there are backward racists but all rural Southerners who like a little huntin' shootin' and drinking are not ignorant and uninformed.

Monolithic stereotypes of huge groups of people are usually wrong. Thanks for a bit of cheer!

Anonymous said...

On a day where McPalin spews more Ayers bile and subtle racism, this warms my heart a little bit.

Funny pro-Obama video: http://tinyurl.com/6xr3b7

The Scientist said...

Go Obama!

Werner Herzog's Bear said...

Apropos, down here in East Texas I have seen a button that reads "Bubbas for Obama."

Anonymous said...

This warms the cockles of my heart. If we can get the working and middle class of all hues to work together, we could turn this puppy out.

Anonymous said...

A Luta Continua! ;-)