So, this is the legacy you want, John McCain? You did not start
the race division between the Republican and Democratic Parties,
but you are feeding it generously. We can most likely find its
birth in the moments after Lyndon Johnson had addressed
Congress, advocating for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and
uttering three words that transformed the political divide for
the next 43 years. He looked out at his colleagues and the
nation and said, “We shall overcome.” [ LBJ video ] How’s that
for guts? Could you have mustered such courage? It didn’t take
long for the Republican Party to take advantage of the racist
backlash Johnson’s bold statement had caused in the once “Solid
South.” Up to that point nearly every southerner had been a
Democrat because of racism, since the defeated South had
succumbed under a Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, whose
worst ‘sin’ had been liberation of the nation’s slaves. [
Wikipedia ] With local governments racist to the core, southern
Democrats nevertheless could scarcely im