I have read quite a number of thoughtful and constructive diaries on how to actually have a conversation with wing nuts and some sad ones about how folks feel after being attacked.
I happen to live in the rural south by choice because it is one of the few places left in America where an ordinary person can afford to buy a few acres and escape suburban stepford land. It comes with a price, of course, I am surrounded by fanatical bible thumpers, people who drive around with confederate flags on their trucks, and who wear those t-shirts that say, " The South Will Rise Again."
I am Canadian and I married the last Republican in America who is a fiscal conservative and a social liberal, in other words, a guy who used to represent the mainstream of the Rebublican Party.
I don't talk politics at work because I am in a minor supervisory role and I don't think that is appropriate behaviour for a supervisor but I willingly engage people outside of work and my colleagues have all guessed by my silence that I play for the other team and oddly enough rarely confront me. Once in a weak moment, when I was stressed out and busy I slipped up when a girl I worked with asked me to sign some petition about bringing "God" back into the school system. I told her I would not sign it and that we were not allowed to bring petitions into work. She huffed and said I was one of those "Anti-God" people and I told her quite politely that I had no issues with God at all was very clear in my beliefs but just didn't like Christians very much. I admit I was trying to get rid of her because I had a long list of tasks to complete and it was great because she wouldn't talk to me for a few weeks. I was pretty suprised not to be hauled into the Director's office and rebuked.
When I am feeling calm and relaxed what I like to do rather than engage Jesu-Fascists is to agree with them in a friendly manner. What serious liberal/Prog types don't realize is that these folks do not want to be reasoned with, they don't want to have contructive dialogue or debate, they want to explain to you why you are wrong. They want to validate their flagging egos, self-imposed weenie like insecurities, and their own self-doubt by attacking. They attack to feel good. Oddly enough, a firm belief in Christ doesn't seem to be adequate enough to do that. I am pretty mystified by it. That is why they persist in considering themselves oppressed by non-existent liberal elites or here in the so called "New South" New York types or Yankees in general. They know they are getting fucked and it can't be the God Fearing politicians they support so therefore it must be "us." Another diarist touched on the potential phenomenon of having the raving hordes turn on you especially here the south and I respectfully disagree with him but it was some first rate thinking on his/her part. I disagree with him primarily because southerners are the true professional victims in the sense that they still have not and will never get over the way the Civil War turned out. That is one of the major foundation of their Us/Them paradigm so they will continue to support getting undermined by their own representatives. A southern politician can do anything as long as he sticks to Guns, God, and Gays. Nobody in the south thinks it is odd that most of the politicians who represent them and send their kids to war never went themselves as long as they go to church and hate gays southerners will continue to have a disporportionately high rate of enlistment and national guard service.
The best way to deal with indivuals encounters with foaming attack dogs is passive resistence not bringing your own dog.
When people ask me if I am pro-choice and I reply Yes, they call me a "baby killer" and I say Yes, on my days off I run around and kill babies. This does one of two things: it makes them puzzled or it sends them over the edge. If you are in a rested state of mind seeing somebody do that can be quite entertaining. If they get puzzled they either leave you alone or switch to another topic. You can plug in any other topic Hating America, The Flag ect ect and basically do the same thing. I refuse to try and justify myself to others and that is what liberals do too often when they try and reason with Jesu-Fascists. I am not doing a "piss on my fellow liberals" routine. I don't think we are doing anything wrong at all. We are in the wilderness because the middle has taken an extended vacation in America.
I also respectfully disagree with many strategists who want Dems to "reach out" to southerners and right wing christians. Southerners hate being ignored they like listening to themselves talk about any topic and to be courted. Dem strategists might actually get them to notice by ignoring them. I realize there are quite a few prog christians out there who would like to connect to their brethern on the right but the truth is they don't want to hear from you. They don't think you are really a christian. I disagree of course.
It sounds like I am preaching surrender and I am not. Instead we should reach out to the new "silent majority" the huge number of Americans who do not identify with being a right wing christian. Years ago right wing christians stayed home on voting day now the stay at home types are moderates maybe even a bit conservative but basically reasonable people who did not vote and more or less crossed their fingers hoping that Bush wouldn't be as bad as they thought.
The most patriotic thing we can do for America is to welcome back folks into the middle instead of courting specialty groups like southerners and christians. The best part is since the middle is all but gone we can have a hand in re-creating it.