and yes many rural white people are racist. I’d rather have a world in which racism wasn’t central to their political identity and it wasn’t until fairly recently. Plenty of poor Black people are homophobic and anti-Semitic but that doesn’t mean they’re undeserving of economic justice and the same should go for poor white people in Appalachia. Their kids are innocent and deserve a shot at a better life, so do the children of poor people from any race.
Eh, if you think racism wasn't central to the political identity of downscale rural whites until recently, you need to crack open a history book. And the difference between white racism and black homophobia/antisemitism, to the degree it currently exists, is that we can actually win elections with the latter. We can win elections and pass progressive legislation with black voters. But we can't do the same with downscale rural whites, because their racism trumps everything else. They prefer a racist con artist to a reasonable, moderate Democrat.
Maybe stop nominating "reasonable moderate Democrats" who suck ass.
