re: #27 Dr. Matt

The only problem with their logic is that the Southern Democrats were right-wing conservatives allowed to exist in the Democratic Big Tent. Following the CRA, they left the Democratic Party and were welcomed with open arms in the GOP.

Yeah, they always ignore that pesky fact. That the GOP pandered to those Southern white Democrats who were angry at the party’s leftward turn on Civil Rights and other social issues. And if they ever read about the Conservative Coalition, they’d find that many of those old segregationist office holders were quite right wing on other issues too. They just hated the Republican Party because the Republican Party had the party of Lincoln label and Lincoln was and sadly in some parts of the South still is a very unpopular person. Took Nixon and later Reagan pandering to their bigotry to convince them that the GOP was okay with them.