Howling in the Belly of the Confederacy

A Letter from Blue Ridge Bush Country

Bluebird, bluebird
Take a letter up north for me
These folks is fixin' to hurt somebody
And it sure 'nuff might be me.
-- From "Bluebird," a traditional blues song

By Joe Bageant

How can the region of America that gave us lynching, Jim Crow, Harry Byrd, George Wallace, Taliban Christianity, David Duke, the KKK, Bible hair, Tammy Fay Bakker, congregational snake handling, the poll tax, inbreeding, and chitterlings possibly take another step back down the stairs of human evolution? Beats the hell out of me. But somehow here in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia we have managed it.