Let's take on a difficult subject - how to appeal to the traditional rural democrats of the North and South. Digby started this, then firedoglake took a stab at it, and this got the wheels turning. (inert edit) I'm talking the real gritty redneck culture, people who are stuck working dangerous jobs like logging for shockingly low wages and no benefits. (/edit). This is not as well written, but it is a messy topic, so pull on your rubber boots.
Among the rural population, both the Yanks and Southerners suffer from high rates of addiction, abuse, murder, suicide, DUIs, and accidental death The key difference between the Northerners and Southerners is that the Yankess have that pioneer/union member/tradesman brawling attitude - "It's friday, I'm going to get drunk for 24 hours, get in a fight, and go to church with a hangover." The Southerners are much more secretive because their life is tradtionally based more on the small town culture where everyone knows (or tries to know) everyone elses business. And the Southerner must keep up appearances in order to get the "faith based" financial benefits of being on good terms with the church that controls so much of local life. To their counterparts, Northerners look like heathens, and Southerners look like hypocrites.
In the North, religion is less of a component than in the South. If you go into a backwoods redneck bar full of loggers and ridgerunners, half the regulars have had their front teeth punched out by their friends. You don't have to worry about offending these guys, and an oily born-again Ken doll like Santorum doesn't do well there. And although they may be very pro-military, they are more likely to be National Guard than career military, so they may have very mixed feelings about Iraq. They care more about the export of manufacturing jobs than an influx of immigrants, and they are desperate for basic medical care for when they get hurt on the job or just fall off their quad. But don't tell them that you support gun ownership for "hunters" because these guys will bag a deer on Easter Sunday if it wanders through the yard, so screw you, your hunting licenses, and your patronizing concern for "hunters." Also they just don't relate to the school debate team rhetoric of the Democrats.
In the Southern faith based community, the Democrats need to make inroads in 3 distinct groups : your honest church goers, your Dry Drunk Fundies, and your Crack Pipe Fundies. The Crack Pipe Fundies come at you with a Bible in one hand and a tire iron in the other. Their life consists of joining the army to avoid jail, meth, oxycontin, and abusing their children (who will grow up demanding "respect."). But even the Crack Pipe crowd is realizing that the local army base (and biggest employer) is no longer a safe career alternative. The Dry Drunk Fundies are the yammering scolds that are glued to their chairs by the mix of conservative politics and half-naked cheesecake on Fox. They simply need someone to blame for the anger in their souls, and unless they convert to Scientology and start blaming aliens, they'll blame democrats. They are volatile, and many of them have turned their anger on W, but a real problem is that in a lot of these areas, they are still living in the media bubble with no alternative sources of information. Not only that, they are wedded to the idea that the Church IS the State, because it was always central to their local politics. The best chance for them is that they one day wake up and realize "I've got to get the hell out of here" and leave. But for a democrat to make inroads, the candidate will need to get in there and make appearances to get any media attention.
Democrats have trouble connecting with rural voters in both north and south. The Democrat uses "intellectualization" as a psychological defense, so that the Dem appears remote and emotionally flat. The Dem says "If someone understands drug abuse is bad, they'll stop. All I need to do is explain it to them." So the democrat tries to persuade people to change politically in an extremely codependent fashion, just as if they believed they could cure someone of addiction through some combination of words. As they climb towards national offices, Democratic candidates start acting like Harry Potter whose words have magical powers if they just hit the right combination. They would be so much better off reading Dale Carnegi and working on developing some real empathy.
And they would have better luck with rural voters if they could just look less cerebral and robotic. But intellectualization as a defense is a crutch that's hard to let go of. To register with the blue collar crowd, a democrat might be able to say "This is what I want to do........ however this is more practical...." Think of Dukakis on capital punishment "I want to choke the life out of that bastard with my bare hands, however....."
The Republican uses straight "denial" as their defense. The Democrat tries to rationally prove the sky is blue and the Repub says "No it isn't. No it isn't blue. What are you some sort of commie?" A person that relies on denial may reject the obvious in favor of a very crude lie, and the myth that someone can change with nothing more than a glance towards heavan is part of their psychology. "He was a drunk, but he asked God for help, so I know he'll never drink again. All he had to do was pray." This is also a form of denial, but it is such a strongly held belief that a con man can "reform" any number of times, as long as he periodically confesses his guilt and submits to the church. In this way, the church keeps the Crack Pipe fundies from defecting. So although this "stand by your man" approach may look silly, politicians like W know that if they admit some of their past indiscretions and pledge to support fundie policies, they will earn a get-out-of-jail-free card. This Swaggart strategy should also work to some extent for Dems, especially if they are trying to shed the Northern heathen image. But they have to be up front on the religion issue while making the point that much of our separation of church and state was developed to protect the Baptists who were being persecuted in early America. Most people wouldn't know that, a little Bible trivia like that goes a long way, and it would be nice to see Democrats use their intellectual powers to show the benefits of traditional church and state separation without disparaging anyones faith.
Probably the dominant GOP attitude in the south would be similar to many conservative blogs, which are flooded of contempt and ridicule. Part of overcoming with that is an understanding of their culture and some sincere "respect" and praise. But also their wall of denial is starting to crack, not because of anything the Democrats did, but because they have seen their jobs exported and family members die in the army. But the media will keep them insulated until someone talks to them face to face. Unless the Democrats make a strong showing in 2006, that train will have left the station by 2008.