13/10: A New Conservative Force in California Politics
Category: American History and Politics
Posted by: an okie gardener
I have been hearing anecdotal reports and second-hand information from the Sacramento, Ca., area on the large number of "Russian" (as in former Soviet Union, many are from the Ukraine) immigrants. These have established large and thriving Pentecostal and Baptist churches. I have been told that these folks are like "old-fashioned" American pentecostals and baptists in their "anti-worldliness."
Now, these folks are starting to make news on the conservative side in the culture wars in California. See this article from the LA Times. California politics is usually interesting; we'll now see what these new folks add to the mix. Perhaps Farmer, a transplanted Californian, has a comment.
Now, these folks are starting to make news on the conservative side in the culture wars in California. See this article from the LA Times. California politics is usually interesting; we'll now see what these new folks add to the mix. Perhaps Farmer, a transplanted Californian, has a comment.
A Waco Farmer wrote:
Growing up in Southern California during the 1970s, I witnessed the conservative revolution firsthand. My governor, when I reached the age of political accountability, was Ronald Reagan. After the Jerry Brown interlude, California elected a series of very conservative Republican governors for two decades (concluding with the election of Gray Davis).
What fired that conservative golden age? Ronald Reagan personified it, but at the heart of mass conservatism were conservative immigrants from all over the world--but especially from the heartland of America. The Okies (who started out FDR devotees) gradually came together to form the bedrock of the conservative movement in the state (which served as a template for the nationwide Reagan Revolution).
What transformed the lowly Okies, grateful to the party of FDR, from Pat Brown Dems to RR-Repubs? Mostly, it was religion. Evangelical Religion.
If you wanted to meet a Texan in Southern California, going to a Southern Baptist church was always your best bet. One caveat to that: cowboy bars were also way up there. Drunken Texans were always a big law and order problem.
The key questions: will these new evangelicals bring about another conservative social and political revolution? Will Arnold typify the new California immigrant as Reagan embodied the transplanted Midwesterners?