The Southern Strategy

[BSB]

Yes, I would say it absolutely did not rely entirely on racism. Even where it appeared to be all racism, it wasn't.

Someone brought up bussing in Mass. That was mostly an issue in the hardcore working class sections of Boston. Those sections of Boston were full of people who had to fight for every dime they had. The black community was competition for the available dollars to them. In South Boston, a community that traditionaly sends it sons to the Marine Corps, suddenly was asked to help out the competition, and except the fact that their sons may have died in vain in Vietnam, all at the same time.   

[Xavier_Onassis]

The Southies in Boston sure as Hell sounded like racists. If they thought of the Blacks as being their competitors, it was the result of decades of the oligarchy pitting one group of proles against another,

If you are rational about it, everyone in Vietnam died in vain. Everyone, including the South Vietnamese, would have been lots better off if the US had just let the elections agreed to after
Dien Bien Phu occur.

[BSB]

I didn't say there wasn't racism in South Boston. I made it very clear that I'm saying the Republican strategy, that included the South, had as much to do with the abandonment of the working class by the Democrats, as racism. South Boston being an example.

Being rational you must realize that a community like Southie is going to be far more concerned with those that they lost rather than those the Vietnamese lost. The same would be true of a village in Vietnam. Do you think they would care about the Marines from South Boston that died as much as their own?   

[Xavier_Onassis]

Again, everyone who died in Vietnam died for naught. It does not matter who. Everyone. And of course they were missed, and of course the losing side will have more difficulty with seeing any worthy result of the war than the winners, even though they are just as dead.

The Democrats did not "abandon the working class". They embraced equality, and it was about time they did so, too.

[Plane]

Again, everyone who died in Vietnam died for naught. It does not matter who. Everyone. And of course they were missed, and of course the losing side will have more difficulty with seeing any worthy result of the war than the winners, even though they are just as dead.

The Democrats did not "abandon the working class". They embraced equality, and it was about time they did so, too.

Even the Russians who died there were wasted?

[BSB]

Well, XO, I'm not going to waste my time. Either you're willing to get the points I'm making, or you aren't.

[Cynthia]

"The "Southern Strategy" didn't come out of nowhere. The Democratic party abandoned the working class by turning their backs on their sons, who they were sending to Vietnam, and ignoring upon return for the jucier black is beautiful, and feminists, issues. That set the table and allowed for the "Southern Strategy" to be served."

I find this interesting. The Democratic party of the time (Kennedy/then Johnson) were cleaning up the mess that was started years before. Am I not right on this one? The Democratic party sent the boys into the arena of war against communism, albeit crossing fingers that the "war" would push back the evil that is pink.
Democrats in that era were actually more reasonable than those today. When the ball was in the running process, don't you think that everyone was turning their backs on everyone who was over 30? No matter the political affiliation? No matter the class or race?
I agree that the issues were ripe for civil rights, and the woman's bra burning in the street. Sesame Street was also the rising child star of the time. Education/rights, war ...all were ripe in a way back then. The paradigm was a shiftin'.
Set in motion, yes. Southern Strategy served, sure 'nuff. I don't think we as a country knew just what the hell we were doing....back then. Times were shifting and tides were ripping open hearts all over the place.

It wasn't a time in history where one can pinpoint a direct finger in teh direction of blame toward any ONE thing.

I disagree with Xavier in terms of vainity and death.
No human being dies in vain. The intent speaks for the soul in any case.

The war was fought and perhaps not won, true. But, to say that the war was in vain doesn't make sense.
If a person kills himself...perhaps that death is in vain. No effort to make what is only temporary worth the fight. The end is just that....the end. Solution=death. No choices.

Turning one's back on the soldiers was not the intent, or perhaps it is perceived that way, BSB.
But, then again, everyone turns his/her back on something in life. That's the fact of life. If it were that the war was the only issue at hand, and the backs were indeed turned against the soldier, that would be one thing. But, there were other issues on the docket.....and confusion was more the sign of those days.

Of course, all in my opinion...just a thought.

I will never ever consider the death of any soldier a waste. . .unlike XO.
Life just isn't so black and white. Brown or yellow, Purple or blue.

Grace gets many of us through the tough times...and one has to have a sense of faith in humanity to see that.

Now, mind you, I have only my opinion on this one based on my "gut". so, pardon me if I stepped on this thread a bit.

Continue on with your argument, Xavier and BSB.

I just wanted to make a  heart-felt statement.
Cindy

[Xavier_Onassis]

By saying that the soldiers who died in Vietnam died in vain, I meant that they did not have to die. Their deaths accomplished nothing. This does not mean that they were not good people. They were betrayed by a government that knew it could not win and fought on and on just so that the leaders would not be blamed.

I never saw anyone act in a mean way to any soldier. They were the victims of a failed policy.

[Cynthia]

By saying that the soldiers who died in Vietnam died in vain, I meant that they did not have to die. Their deaths accomplished nothing. This does not mean that they were not good people. They were betrayed by a government that knew it could not win and fought on and on just so that the leaders would not be blamed.

I never saw anyone act in a mean way to any soldier. They were the victims of a failed policy.

No, they did not fight so the leaders would not be blamed. That's saying the Gov. was a murdering run a muck organization, XO, Come on. They were NOT VICTIMS. They were soldiers. Pure and simple.

By the way, I am not here to fight the argument between you and bsb. No.

I just disagree with your "take" on the outcome of this thread of sorts.

Continue on with your debate. I should not have interferred. My best friend, Mark fought hard in VN. Screaming Eagles he was a member Screaming until his had no life when he returned....He suffered. His life was full of turmoil....nervous breakdown until just recently when he (at age 60) found peace.
By damn.
I fight for him every damn time I hear anyone say the words died 'IN VAIN".
So, pardon me for stretching the point into something more personal and real in my own life. Pardon my taking such a post/thread personally.

 Mark Bird made a dent that only he and his kin can understand. So, tread carefully when you speak of the point of no return when it comes to that war, if you please.

For, it was the soldier, the nurse, the children, the mothers- dead or alive who fought for something more than what we see on the side lines, More than any run -of -the mill militant anti-war hippie..

Those folks fought in a conflict, not unlike any other war or conflict. 



Ok, BSB, pardon my interruption here....I will be back to work tomorrow. Back to the war that is education. ...where my own children deal with murdered fathers. (two of them just this year). PTSD? yeah.....I deal with that issue in the young child...age 7. daily. You should see it. You would never use the word 'IN VAIN" in my space.

Death is not to be taken lightly, Xavier. (gosh, I wish I knew your real name at this point in the conversation)

g'night.

Cindy

[Xavier_Onassis]

I am sure that very few soldiers fought in Vietnam so that LBJ and Nixon and their cronies would not be blamed for the defeat. But that is still why LBJ and Nixon sent them. That is what I meant when I said they (ie the government) fought on after they knew it was unwinnable. Both LBJ and Nixon knew that the war was going to be lost by any means other than major nuclear weapons strikes, which would have turned the US into a major villain in every other country on the planet. So from early in 1965 on, they were fighting just to piss away a fortune in weapons and to prolong the inevitable defeat.


The soldiers do not consider themselves to be victims, but they were certainly victimized. Our military is seriously brainwashed as part of their training. Take McCain, for example: he still thinks Vietnam could have been won. Why? because otherwise he was simply a victim of not just the Vietnamese, but the clowns who put him in that plane and sent him off to bomb North Vietnam.

There was this very intelligent flyboy on my college faculty, a Colonel in the USAF, who believed that Saddam was armed to the teeth with biological weapons (weaponized anthrax and Smallpox) chemical weapons, and atomic weapons. He believed anything and every morsel of crap you could find on rightwing websites. He thought Joe McCathy was a major hero.

He retired after the Iraq War was into its first year.

Only the weapons industry benefited from the godawful mess that was Vietnam. Everyone else it touched got screwed royally. That included Vietnamese, Americans, Laotians and Cambodians.

[BSB]

>>Our military is seriously brainwashed as part of their training.<<

Rubbish. If there's any brainwashing going on it's each soldier/sailor/marine brainwashing his or her self.

[Xavier_Onassis]

If they brainwash themselves, they are sure as Hell given a ton of bogus info to do it with.

[BSB]

XO, nobody listens to Lt. or Sgt. so and so when it comes to politics. People bring their own beliefes into the military. Well, except for the very young, but they grow up fast. You can't hide the truth for very long in a combat zone. Soldiers search for some meaning, some human benefit, to connect to their actions. If they can't find that meaning, or benefit, they get discouraged. You can't brainwash them out of that.


 

[Xavier_Onassis]

This guy I knew was not stupid, but pretty much everything he knew was bogus. He must have had some help to know so many things that were plain untrue.

He also felt that invading Panama and Grenada was absolutely essential.

[BSB]

I suspect that like you, XO, he was a self made man.