As a military brat I was often raised in areas in which the white children were in a minority. But as most people my age, I have seen massive changes in racial transactions of all kinds. I work on a Job Corps center which draws its students Washington, DC and Baltimore, as well as rural parts of the Virginias and Carolinas and is currently 87% black 8% white, and the rest hispanic, etc. These students are far more racist than even the most vocal racists in the 60's, but they just don't have the official policies of the state governments to back them up.

And what is far more interesting, the further into the Deep South we draw our black students, the better they perform. I have three black instructors and four white instructors, and they all regard the students from the South as gold, while the frequently better educated students from the urban areas, are universally regarded as lazy and duplicious. And the black instructors are harder on them.

But I can point to positive changes, in which politicians led the way instead of following. Doug Wilder was elected as the first black Governor of Virginia almost twenty years ago, without a rancorus campaign, and with a majority of white votes in a state which is almost 20% black.

The general view of a Dixiecrat South, is not only a mistake, but I can see signs that the South is becoming the cultural center of the US. Country music now outsells Rock and Roll, while hip-hop is the only countervailing music. The famous "Red" areas identify more with the South, than any of the "Blue" areas. The roll call will not just be between the dying Northern culture and the New South, it will also include the Dying Urban from the New Suburban/rural.

I was interested to note that in a recent article in the Post about revamping the standard poverty indicators to include the price of housing, it was pointed out that traditionally, the white southerners have rejected poverty programs that would have really helped them, and as a result such programs offer far fewer benefits than Northern programs. People from outside the South have regarded this misalingment as evidence that the white South does little to help the poor black South. What they ignore is that there are far more poor Southern whites, who in those states are a voting plurality, and who refuse to demand, or outright reject more extensive benefits. (My only explanation, is that they really don't want to attract "Lazy Northerners". So maybe we all need to examine our stereotypes... )