In an article by Harold Meyerson of the American Prospect entitled "How the American South Drives the Low-Wage Economy" , he describes in great detail how the U.S. South is the low wage center of America.  He explains that while the North was developing banking, finance, and factories the South was a quasi-feudal outlier with a sprinkling of banks and rails and virtually no factories at all. The South's economy was based totally on slave labor that generated "unprecedented profits for manufacturers and bankers who lived hundreds or thousands of miles from the Mississippi Delta." 

In addition Meyerson goes on to explain how some industrial areas of China are experiencing such wage growth that they are catching up to the wage levels of Mississippi. He even cites a study that U.S. manufacturing is experiencing some growth due to the South's low wages, lack of unionism, and the South's aversion minimum wage standards. One driving force behind this phenomena is "the DNA of white Southern elites, whose primary impulse has always been to keep African Americans down. To those elites, the prospect of biracial unions threatening not just their profits but the legitimacy of their social order. To counter the biracial Southern populist movement that emerged in the 1890s, those elites created Jim Crow laws that legitimated and promoted white racism and it was largely by manipulating that racism that they were able to thwart almost all the Southern organizing campaigns that unions have waged since the 1930s."

So the question arises: when are Southern whites going to wake-up and realize that they have been puns in a scam created by the rich greedy elites to enrich themselves by using racism. When are they going to stop electing trolls of the elite who maintain the "new slavery", promote anti-unionism, voter suppression, poor infrastructure, poor public schools, substandard healthcare, and the poor standard of living. Are Southern whites ever going to realize that they have been used or are they going to hang on to the racism, their bogus "Southern Pride", their Confederate Flag, and self- imposed economic oppression? After 150 years, you would think they would figure it out, wouldn't you?
  

Scott Walker on the Iran nuclear deal, “We need to terminate the bad deal with Iran on day one, put in place crippling economic sanctions and convince our allies to do the same.” This statement from a college dropout, billionaire troll, and slimy corrupt governor with no understanding of foreign policy, domestic economic policy, women's rights issues, and in general a panderer to the right-wing of the racist Republican Party.  A man totally lacking in ideas, history, fundamental decency recently compared unions to ISIS rebels in the Middle East. In a blog on Smirking Chimp by Ted Rall,  he stated, "In fairness to Gov. Walker, the union-ISIS smear, professed agnosticism about Darwinism and the Obama stuff are right-wing pandering to the GOP's know-nothing base of idiotic white-trash voters, rather than an indication of personal ignorance." 

Scott Walker represents the lowest common denominator of what is the know-nothings that inhabit the GOP. He is a poster child of the anti-intellectualism of right wing America. He is a man who is personally trying to destroy the public educational system of Wisconsin, says the minimum wage is "lame", is against a living wage, and whose three top aides now sit in jail for corruption during his tenure as Milwaukee county executive. Gee, can the turds get any worst?

The US House's GOP tried to pass an amendment to allow the confederate flag on public buildings and the Demos successfully blocked the racists from passing the amendment. The party of racism always complains about the injuries to its "southern pride" and how the confederate flag is key symbol of that "pride". I have always been a bit confused about the term "southern pride" because I have never been able to understand what they are proud of.

Are they proud of poor public schools which according to a Huffington Post article by Rebecca Klein (Aug. 2014) the entire South ranks below average for public schools and in many instances the worst in the country. Are they proud of their economies which according to a Forbes article June 2014 ranks Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, West Virginia, Arkansas, and Mississippi in the bottom ten in the country. Are they proud of their healthcare systems which rank at the bottom nationally along with Nevada and Oklahoma (basically any state with a Republican governor and legislature) according to The Atlantic Magazine (May 2014). Are they proud of their poverty rates which according to Fact & Fun.com (Feb. 4, 2014) eight southern states (South Carolina, Louisiana, Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, West Virginia, Arkansas, and Mississippi) ranked in the list of ten poorest states.

I could go on of course but I just marvel at how anyone can talk of "southern pride" with such facts staring them in the face. What are they proud of has to be answered, I suppose, in terms of some moral, religious, or  lifestyle basis. But if that is the criteria how do they ignore slavery, homophobia, anti-semitism, lynchings, the KKK, and white citizens councils. Maybe that is the key to "southern pride": amnesia.