War Turns Southern Women Away From GOP - AP\Seattle PI

[WillyT]

Thursday, September 7, 2006 · Last updated 3:07 a.m. PT

War turns southern women away from GOP

By SHANNON MCCAFFREY
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER


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MACON, Ga. -- President Bush's once-solid relationship with Southern women is on the rocks. "I think history will show him to be the worst president since Ulysses S. Grant," said Barbara Knight, a self-described Republican since birth and the mother of three. "He's been an embarrassment." In the heart of Dixie, comparisons to Grant, a symbol of the Union, is the worst sort of insult, especially from a Macon woman who voted for Bush in 2000 but turned away in 2004.

In recent years, Southern women have been some of Bush's biggest fans, defying the traditional gender gap in which women have preferred Democrats to Republicans. Bush secured a second term due in large part to support from 54 percent of Southern female voters while women nationally favored Democrat John Kerry, 51-48 percent.

"In 2004, you saw an utter collapse of the gender gap in the South," said Karen Kaufmann, a professor of government at the University of Maryland who has studied women's voting patterns. White Southern women liked Bush because "he spoke their religion and he spoke their values."

Now, anger over the Iraq war and frustration with the country's direction have taken a toll on the president's popularity and stirred dissatisfaction with the Republican-held Congress.

Republicans on the ballot this November have reason to worry. A recent Associated Press-Ipsos poll found that three out of five Southern women surveyed said they planned to vote for a Democrat in the midterm elections. With control of the Senate and House in the balance, such a seismic shift could have dire consequences for the GOP.

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Link: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110AP_Southern_Women.html

As a Californian, I usually don't like seismic shifts, but this one I will welcome!

:bounce:

[texpatriot2004]

1. I am from the South, I have never trusted *

Glad to hear these women are getting on the clue bus.

[tnlefty]

2. Why am I not surprised that the one crazed, deluded woman mentioned is

in Chickamauga?!!! Except that this article states that the town is in the mountains which isn't true as it is in the valley and perhaps she is in one of the small, surrounding communities, but still, why am I not surprised?!!