Confederate "Heritage" Month 2014, April 14: Jimmy Carter on white racism and politics

It's kind of amazing today that think that Jimmy Carter was considered such a conservative Democrat in 1976 and during his Administration that George McGovern and his whole family voted for Gerald Ford in the 1976 Presidential election.

David Daley's interview with former President Carter appears in "America as the No. 1 warmonger": President Jimmy Carter talks to Salon about race, cable news, "slut-shaming" and more 04/10/2014.

Carter has a lot of interesting things to say, including the comment about US foreign policy in the title.

And it includes this exchange:

[Salon:]You were elected governor and president as a white male Southern Democrat, which is a segment of the population that has deserted the Democratic Party. In some Southern states now it will be maybe 30 percent of white Southern males who back the Democrats. This is something your grandson Jason is dealing with now, certainly, as he runs for governor of Georgia. But why do you think this is? The economy only gets tougher, inequality only worsens, and the response of white men in the South is to back the party of the 1 percent. Is it race? Gender? Fear?

[Carter:] No, it’s race. It’s race. That’s been prevalent in the South, except for when I ran, I secured every Southern state except Virginia. Ever since Nixon ran — and ever since Johnson didn’t campaign in the deep South, the Republicans have solidified their hold there. And even this year, as you may know, the Republicans have put forward a proposal that we have a license plate made available in Georgia with a Confederate flag on it. Well, those kinds of things, the subtle things and the appeal to richer people, which is almost always white people, and the derogation of people that get food stamps and that sort of thing, which are quite often poor people. And the allegation that people who go to jail are just guilty people, when they’re mostly black people and Hispanics and mentally ill people. Those kind of things just exalt the higher class, which is the whites, and they draw a subtle, but very effective racial line throughout the South.

I guess Carter didn't get the memo that it's wicked to suggest that Republicans might be demagoguing with white racism.

I have to wonder if President Obama will ever in his life says such a thing, because that would certainly be un-Bipartisan.

Tags: confederate heritage month 2014, jimmy carter, us south, white racism