guess,r counterintuitive, i hope. the intuitive thing is we have a very long historyñi of racial barriers in the south. if we look at the voting rights act of 1965, which is a landmark voting rights, civil rights provision, what we have is a bunch ofe1 southern states bein called out for clearanceqw3ñi supervision to make sure they re not gerrymandering based on race or other characteristics. that s intuitive one. then there s a bigçó debate goi on as to whether or not that s still the case. we know the voting rights has our war paint on, the rise of5a
it s certainly elections and campaigns i think much more brutal in theq south, they re extremely personal. that s a bad side of it. look atr flows, it s hard to put it in terms of is it a solid voting block. do thee1 what s fascinating, i would say to me in my business to places like north carolina, to see how it s evolved overe1 the last 10 to 15 years. q,u begin to see it in georgia. metropolitan atlanta has grown tremendously over the last 25 xd years. i think the interesting thing is to think ahead in terms of what that will do the ebbsrñ$p d flo of southern politics. both of you talked about migration in the case of northeasterners migrating in the form ofe1 retirees, obviously immigration into the country, which is happening in the ì(lc%
south and southeastern states. but also in the last, we saw a remigration of african-americans from the north, from the urban centers in theçó north that had been industrial centers back down to the south whose population is booming. does that mean, maybe not no 2012, but maybe in 2016 or 20201 that the south is truly a two-party in a general election battleground? i think it s resolving this that direction. i think if youñi saw north carolina and virginia, that may po the way. look at georgia and you talk about migration of african-americans. metropolitan atlantae1 added ha a million african-americans between 2000 and e12010. i think that trend is going to continue. it s the e1weather. it s the lifestyle. it s people returning to their roots. also, in many places, it s less expensive. right. at least at the moment. katon, yout( said this is a must-win region for republicans1
identified and that s the one naming, naming the congress and the senators. i think no question, i also think that the presidential elections are clearly about turnout. ife1 you look at 4 and 8, they were who could maximize their base and get the core çóvote. the interesting thing about the south, people talk about the south being conservative or trending socially conservative. but there s an economic populism about the south that s always been there because you have large numbere1 of poor people. that s right. both urban poor in places like new orleans ande1 jackson d birmingham and atlanta and rural poor. koright.lp&h(lc% that s been a trend what you this is a long time. in louisiana, it was a rural coalition i had this fantasy, mr. mayor, that i could run for governor of louisiana, not really run. but that i could run and do nothing but quote huey long. every debate, every question
changes because ofe1 migration people from outside of those states. i think you see growing hispanic and latino population. it s very important not tow3 lo at the south as a monolithic region. the states are vodqdifferent. florida is different than north carolina. right. louisiana is different than mississippi and alabama, although there are similarities. that is so important. it s not a monolithic region of the country. that s right. it s not just one thing. you were talking. we were talkinge1 earlier about sort of what you see when you walk out of your office building in south carolina. when you look at the south, think about southern politics what, are the issues we re missing? one of the things you req missing in states like south carolina and florida, masse1 migration of retirees from north.fáq the weather. the weather qhelps. sometimes bad or good. but the weather e,k>rq&ps. i think just the general nature of the southern states. it s a slower pace.