I am from rural, small-town America. That is why I enthusiastically embraced the Rural Recovery Plan put foward by John Edwards. Not only is it badly needed, but it addresses huge swaths of rural voters who have voted against the Democrats, and gives them a reason to come home to our party again. That being said, I realize that it is not only rural and small town Americans who are falling further and further behind.

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It is no big secret to any Democrat that the rural and non-urban parts of the country have been a problem for our party for a good while now. Not only the south, but rural areas of the midwest and west have been consistently voting Republican. There are many reasons for this, but one of the main ones is that the Republican Party has heavily invested in these areas and the Democratic Party has ignored them, and not reached out to this valuable block of voters.

Everyone wants to fuss about Florida in 00 as well they should, but is it lost on everyone that if Gore would have just carried his home state of Tennessee, Florida would not have mattered. I remember that election, and our party abandoned not only Tennessee but all the surrounding mostly rural southern states. We did not reach out to them.

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