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blue bits. red rocks.
Tuesday 2 March 2010

It seems worth noting that [George] Wallace himself was smart enough to recognize that the brand of populist politics he espoused in 1968 would lead straight into a political cul-de-sac. He spent the rest of his career broadening his appeal to blacks, the uneducated, and the disenfranchised, with the result that he became a thorn in the side of the G.O.P. and a new sort of populist. The question in my mind is not whether the G.O.P. is consciously evoking Wallace—Rauch is correct, they are—but whether they have studied Wallace closely enough to identify the aspects of his career that could help them. If they did this, they might quickly come to very different takes on healthcare reform and education, and the nation might move to a much more positive political dialogue in which a broad consensus could be reached on some populist issues. Scott Horton

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