The Apex of the Southern Strategy?

Pumping up the White Vote has been the GOP's electoral strategy for over 40 years.  It started with appeals oriented toward racial prejudice in the first twenty years of the Southern Strategy. It shifted toward incorporating white evangelicals during the last twenty years.  And since President Obama has been elected, the GOP has turned to vile teabaggery and right wing populism to ensnare the white working class.

All in all it has been a fairly consistent GOP electoral strategy to capture increasing majorities of the white vote in order to win elections. With that being said, not everyone is surprised that the internets have reported that the Willard Romney campaign is not vetting Marco Rubio as a VP candidate because Willard's electoral strategy appears to be designed to cater to entirely different demographic from the one Rubio appeals to:

[T]he conventional wisdom that Romney needs to cut his large deficit with Latino voters to prevail over Obama may also be missing the mark.  On his bus tour this week, Romney spent time in the white, working-class Rust Belt, hitting small towns without much of a Hispanic presence.  It’s becoming as important for Romney to win over white voters in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin as it is to appeal to Hispanics in Florida, Nevada and Colorado.  As Ron Brownstein noted last week, Romney could win the election even if he loses the vast majority of minorities, thanks to Obama’s Mondale-like standing among white voters.

That means Romney could badly use a running mate with working-class appeal.  Ohio Sen. Rob Portman is at the top of many pundits’ lists, but it is another Midwesterner who campaigned energetically for Romney over the weekend that is getting renewed attention in Boston: former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

Targeting white folks. Who would have thought that?

But T-Paw, the creator of the scary Obamneycare Slur, may be just the man for the job.  Of course he exudes the energy of sleepy Fred Thomson and has the charisma  of Mitt Romney. But he is white and from the working class. Check that one off.

Personally I prefer Sarah Palin.  She would do a wonderful job as Romney's VP choice in my  opinion.

The problem is that the GOTP can't rely on getting increasing majorities of white folks forever.  Sooner or later they run out of voters.