I suspect Chalmers Johnson places far too much weight on Obama’s underpowered train. I say this because the Democratic Party today has neither the programmatic focus, the leaders nor the constituencies needed to achieve effective reforms. And Obama’s work to get the Paulson plan through Congress reveals his loyalties with great clarity.

Briefly put, an Obama victory in the 2008 election may in fact signal the appearance of an electoral realignment. But so what?

Stephen Zielinski

Allison Park, PA

I am in favor of identifying the persons and organizations that supported and defended slavery, and supported and defended Jim Crow, and forcing them to pay reparations. There are no persons now living who fit this description. However, there is an organization which wholeheartedly supported slavery, fought against the aboliton of slavery, and then enacted through the "Black Codes" a second-class citizenship for African-Americans. This organization has been in continual existence from before the Civil War to the present. It is called the Democratic Party.

C. James Small

Wallburg, NC

This is a well-written, scholarly article on what divides Americans, But the present economic situation is similar to the 1929 crash, in that the poor economy effects all Americans and the world. How the next president handles this situation effects the future of the world, this country, his party, and his reputation. For those who are fascinated by the election process, Roosevelt was re-elected for three more terms! He did it by dealing effectively with the economy, war and peace. These are issues that touch every American and, in this globalized economy, the world. While divide-and-conquer may work for the weak-minded candidate, it does not produce a president who can effectively lead this nation or the world. This is hard, but not impossible, because we have done it all in the past. We have the Progressive movement, the New Deal and the Great Society as examples. The Founding Fathers were not perfect, but America was damned lucky to have them. In his "Report on Manufactures," Alexander Hamilton designed the American market that brought us prosperity and made us an industrial giant that created American jobs. We now have idiots in both parties who are outsourcing these industries and jobs overseas and, in the process, destroying the American market which they have supported. Main Street is the American economy. Support Main Street, and you fix the real American economy.

Pervis James Casey

Riverside, CA

This is a well-articulated and understandable historical perspective. All I have to offer is some anecdotal and personal "stuff"that may or may not be relevant. I feel that we are on the verge of "a generational shift" and the kids may in fact really surprise us this time around. I was born in 1938 in a small French Catholic town. and remember the later stages of the Great Depression and the end of the Second World War. My early memories are that 100 percent of the community was religious (i.e., Roman Catholic). When I go to church now, however, all I see is a sea of bald heads and white and purple hair. The kids aren't there. My own two children are less impressed by the status quo and seem liberated from "the good old days," and history.

JAMES PINETTE

Caribou, ME

Regarding the article by Chalmers Johnson, which was excellent, it seems to me that everyone is dancing around the fact that Dixie shifted from predominantly Democrat to predominantly Republican after President Lyndon Baines Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act.

If my observation is correct, it says a lot about regionalism based on racial prejudice. Dixie conveniently forgot that they hated Republicans because they freed the slaves and conducted Reconstruction in the Old South. Now their ire is directed on the party that gave blacks long-overdue civil rights.

I am from the South, most of my relatives are crackers, and I love all the good things about the South like Southern-fried chicken (Mark Twain suggested that the angels are jealous because they don't have any), mint juleps, corn pone and collard greens, but damn!--can't they get over slavery and its aftermath?

I'm old, so I suppose I'll be long dead before Dixie gets a life.

John D. Stephens

Big Timber, MT