In his recent book, American Theology Kevin Phillips traces the demographics of the emergence of what he calls the "Southern Culture". He traces its roots back to the postbellum south as it recovered from the loss of the civil war, spiritually, culturally, and religiously redefining itself in the process.
Phillips maintains that there is a definite and powerful demographic that could easily be called an ethnic group for this Southern Culture, and its state church is the Southern Baptist Convention. Its intellectual sphere is distinctly anti-enlightenment, and its religion is markedly apocalyptic and fundamentalist. Their politics are conservative in the old definition of "states rights", not surprisingly, but have morphed into something else as it has faced a fearsome and ever more modern world. So in that respect their politics have responded to the modern world much like their religion has and those forces are often indistinguishable.
That they consider themselves patriots yet have no respect for the Constitution is more easily understood when you consider that much of their world view is rooted in the trauma of losing the civil war to the federal government. It encourages in them a mistrust of all "elitist organizations" in general which include those high falutin congressmen and that "nawthun" notion of a Constitution and institutions of higher learning as well as scientific academies. All of these are viewed by them as nothing more than carpetbaggers come down from the North to rob them of their culture, exploit them commercially and threaten their individual autonomy.
His contention is that this culture has expanded well beyond the borders of The South, finding fertile ground in the northward and westward migration of southerners and their direct descendents over the years since the civil war. They all easily and proudly can self-identify as "rednecks" even if they are from Illinois, because the borders of this new ethnicity are far now beyond the Mason Dixon line. Like the nation of Islam, this is a culture defined by its ethnicity and beliefs rather than the geography of borders.
He overlays the demographic maps of the proportion of membership in the Southern Baptist Convention as compared to other denominations with the voting demographics in the last few elections. There is a frightenly direct correlation between these factors and an even more frightenening demonstration of its rate of expansion across the country.
He characterizes the last 4 or 5 presidents as being "southern" by his cultural definition and predicts that we will not see a president elected for a long time in the future that is not considered a kin by this "southern" ethnic group. Through this it is easy to understand why GWB has been refashioned into this slow talking God fearing southern comman man by his handlers while noone else in his family even has a hint of an accent.
This song we are discussing could be the national anthem of this southern nation, whose borders are no longer geographic. I am sure that all of this is well understood by the marketing people in Nashville who know exactly who their audience is. This song was written to resonate with the same cognitive frames that are exploited by neo-con politicians and fundamentalist religious groups. This is Southern Culture rising as Christian Nationalism and voicing its anthem from its own Radio Free Redneck network.
The thing that makes the message from Phillips most scary is that he is a longtime Republican strategists, not some flaming progressive chicken little. His alarm comes from his observations as a Repbulican insider and a brilliant historian.
We are all essentially screwed. Its time to head for the caves and bunkers underneath all the Starbucks we have built across the country just for this occasion. And its time to unleash our ultimate scorched earth secret weapon. The Final Solution.
Gentlemen, its time to unleash Mme Zora on the entire...redneck...population.
Good luck and Godspeed.
