Big Jim, Little George and Another Bozo Averted

When I went to be last night, the election returns made it look like my political-regime pedigree was going to have yet another grotesquery of leadership foisted on what years I have left as citizen-above-the-turf.

I tossed and turned. When I went to bed last night, the Commonwealth ship of state seemed destined to sail another four years in the windless, oxygenless sea of GOP.

As a life-long southern Appalachian, I’m weary of being guilty by geographic association on both counts. Culturally toothless or cerebrally or ethically misshapen politicians have for too many decades offered an ongoing source for late-night parody and lampooning of the stereotypical kind that sullies all of us in these parts. We seem doomed to live out our type-cast as inbred buffoons.

Big Jim Folsom and Little Gov George Wallace and Theophilus Eugene “Bull” Connor were political caricatures from my Alabama past that I’m just as happy to barely remember.

So when I went to sleep thinking Virginia would have to survive four years under Governor HoochieCooch and his Flat Earth Misogynists, I was sore depressed.

Somebody else won instead. Why am I still depressed?

On a related note, we hillbilly types are at least hip now.

Moonshiners TV Review: Appalachia Has Never Been Hipper | New Republic

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Fred First holds masters degrees in Vertebrate Zoology and physical therapy, and has been a biology teacher and physical therapist by profession. He moved to southwest Virginia in 1975 and to Floyd County in 1997. He maintains a daily photo-blog, broadcasts essays on the Roanoke NPR station, and contributes regular columns for the Floyd Press and Roanoke's Star Sentinel. His two non-fiction books, Slow Road Home and his recent What We Hold in Our Hands, celebrate the riches that we possess in our families and communities, our natural bounty, social capital and Appalachian cultures old and new. He has served on the Jacksonville Center Board of Directors and is newly active in the Sustain Floyd organization. He lives in northeastern Floyd County on the headwaters of the Roanoke River.

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  1. So are you comparing Cuccinelli to George Wallace?
    Does name calling relieve stress?
    And if you disagree with a person, can you still respect his name?
    I’m glad you can finally get some sleep. Sweet dreams.

  2. I include Mr C in the list of politicians that, in my opinion as a southerner and an Appalachian, reinforce the southern and the Appalachian stereotypes. We will see if the winners do any better. I am not placing any bets.

  3. Hell Fred, I can’t see that you have that much to complain about… Try being a liberal/progressive in small town Texas if you want to feel left out of social discourse… Ever since Miss Molly died I haven’t even been able to grin and bear it.