I found this well thought out article on the rise of the South in spite of the disdain with which we are held by our Northern brothers, the elite and people like Howard Dean who in all seriousness referred to how well he related to Southerners in their pick-up trucks with rifles in their back windows. They don’t even know the many ways they demean us.

For generations, American elites from the North have treated the South as a benighted land of knaves, fools, and charlatans, a proper subject of scorn and satire and certainly not a region to be admired or emulated. They are comically wrong.

The South has long risen from the ashes of the Civil War, and by many measures it the most admirable region of our nation. It may well be on the verge of becoming America’s dominant region, eclipsing the Eastern Seaboard that has reigned from our nation’s birth, and sprinting past the ambitions of the West Coast challenge, as the reference point for where America is going and as the heart of American culture.

I’ve seen some of these changes … I almost hate it in a way. I always thought the South was one of the country’s best kept secrets. As long as Northerners think they are taking their lives in their hands to step foot down here we have it to ourselves. I like the South the way it is in spite of the fact others in the nation believe every stereotype they’ve ever heard about it.

h/t: Hillbilly White Trash