The Isolated South

Adam Nossiter's New York Times' piece argues that election day may have ended "the centrality of the South to national politics." Of the 410 counties in the Appalachian belt running from New York to Mississippi, President-elect Obama won only 44. Merle Black of Emory University posits that the Republican Party has "maxed out the South" and has limited that party's "appeal to the rest of the country." Nossiter also notes the view of one woman in Lamar County on the Mississippi border who fears that blacks will now become more aggressive, and another woman's view that "there are going to be outbreaks from blacks. From where I'm from, this is going to give them the right to be more aggressive."