>I deliberately rejected the Nader - Buchanan comparison in 2000 because
>conservatives already had their prime choice candidate in the persona of
>George Bush.
George Bush did not run as a right-winger. He ran as the "compassionate conservative" who promised a "humble" foreign policy. It seemed likely he'd be a reprise of his father, who was mostly an old-style WASPy Republican.
> Not so for the leftists. Nader was in similar position vs
>other candidates in 2000 and the potential supporter as Wallace was in
>1968. Besides, did not you say in one of your previous postings that
>1960s and 1970s were much more left leaning than today?
The center of gravity was more "liberal," but there also was a high level of race-fueled white ressentiment that Wallace tapped into. Buchanan in 2000 was much more analogous to Wallace in 1968 than the Bush of 2000 - racist, xenophobic, and emotionally driven by aggression and hate.
>I also think that central PA is more representative of the US population
>at large than NYC.
I didn't claim that NYC was representative. But central PA is rural, and most Americans live in metro areas.
> As soon as I go to Baltimore suburbs I am surrounded
>by flags, bumper stickers proclaiming support of our troops, George Bush
>and the Republican party (the more blue collar the neighborhood, the
>more of them), derisive comments about women, gays, blacks and
>foreigners, etc.
Much of NJ, which is where I get my experience of America outside NYC, is full of women (as are most other places), gays, blacks, and foreigners. There are Indians and Korans all over northern Joisey.
> I am pretty sure you would encounter the same if you
>went to Brooklyn or Staten Island, left the five boroughs altogether (I
>guess Tim McVie grew up upstate NY, no?)
Though SI has some black neighborhoods, it is fairly reactionary in the way you describe, but Brooklyn? There are 200,000 Haitians in Brooklyn. Central Brooklyn is mostly black. Queens is one of the most ethnically diverse jurisdictions in the U.S. The country is far more diverse in every sense than you give it credit for. In fact, one of the right's great confidence tricks is to posit a "real" America - that of simple white folk, living in their nuclear families in small towns - that is actually a statistical minority. Why play along?
Doug