XPost: alt.politics.bush, alt.politics.usa.republican, alt.politics.democrats.d   
   XPost: talk.politics.misc   
   From: FranzKafka@Oceania.WhiteHouse.GOV   
      
   Bush's problem is that NASCAR is not strictly a sport loved by ignorant   
   white southerners (like himself) any longer (some people dispute whether GW   
   is really a southerner, not whether he's ignorant).   
      
   It seems quite a few of other ethnic groups love watching cars go around in   
   a circle and hoping to see chassises do somersaults, body panels flying   
   off, and the driver climbs out, unstraps his helmet, and raises his hand to   
   say, "I'm OK y'all!"   
      
   God, doncha love good ole fashion American technology some of whose   
   advances came about because moonshiners wanted to outrun federal agents   
   enforcing excise tax collection??   
      
   ------------------------------------------------------   
      
   Race is on for `NASCAR dads'   
      
   DAVID POOLE   
   Staff Writer   
      
   DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Like many people, race car driver Kyle Petty doesn't   
   have a precise definition of "NASCAR dad," one of the trendy new terms in   
   the American political lexicon.   
      
   Petty has no problem, however, assessing President Bush's reasons for   
   coming to today's Daytona 500, the first race of the 2004 NASCAR Nextel Cup   
   season.   
      
   "It's an election year," Petty said. "We've run the Daytona 500 every year   
   for 45 years. But the last time he came was an election year. If I were a   
   politician and knew there'd be that many people in one place, goodness   
   gracious I'd be there, too."   
      
   Bush, a Republican whose brother Jeb is governor of Florida, came to   
   Daytona in July 2000, when he was governor of Texas and a candidate for   
   president. Now, as then, he will likely find a receptive audience.   
      
   "Nothing explains George Bush's sweep of the South and his victory in the   
   2000 election more than the super-majority he got among white male   
   Southerners," said Ferrel Guillory of the project on Southern politics,   
   media and public life at UNC Chapel Hill. "By going to a NASCAR race, it   
   seems he's not so much looking for new voters as he is trying to energize   
   the bedrock of his support."   
      
   Exit polls, Guillory said, showed Bush beating Democratic nominee Al Gore   
   70 percent to 27 percent among white men living in the South in 2000. In   
   its strictest definition, the term "NASCAR dad," coined by Democratic Party   
   pollster Celinda Lake, refers to that potentially pivotal bloc of voters.   
      
   "He's defending his base," Guillory said of the president. "It's not   
   incidental that Daytona happens to be in Florida, which was the most hotly   
   contested state in the past election -- and after it. He has to hold on to   
   Florida in 2004. He won it in overtime last time."   
      
   NASCAR gets something out of Bush's visit, too, of course. "I think   
   President Bush over the past two or three years has developed relationships   
   with some of our drivers," said Jim Hunter, NASCAR vice president for   
   corporate communications. "Tony Stewart went up there two years ago and the   
   president said, `Oh, you're the bad boy!' Then last year, the first thing   
   he said when he saw Tony was, `Have you been good this year?' "   
      
   NASCAR officials and a group of nine drivers, including 2003 Cup series   
   champion Matt Kenseth, visited the White House in early December just   
   before the annual awards ceremony in New York City. During that visit,   
   Hunter said, NASCAR President Mike Helton invited Bush to a race.   
      
   "When he called and said, `I'd like to come to the Daytona 500,' we said,   
   `Well, OK!' " Hunter said.   
      
   Two other sitting presidents have visited Daytona. Both were Republicans   
   and both were here to witness significant events in the career of Richard   
   Petty, the sport's retired all-time winner and a seven-time champion.   
      
   In 1984, Ronald Reagan was here for a July 4 race that Petty won for his   
   200th career Cup victory. In 1992, George H.W. Bush, the current   
   president's father, was here in July for the final race Petty drove at this   
   track.   
      
   Richard Petty may be the quintessential "NASCAR dad." His father, Lee, won   
   three championships in the sport. His son, Kyle, continues to race and his   
   grandson, Adam, was on his way to becoming a fourth-generation NASCAR   
   driver when he was killed in a crash at New Hampshire International   
   Speedway in 2000.   
      
   "The deal with racing fans is that they're pretty independent people, and   
   people who're independent usually are conservative," said Richard Petty,   
   who lost when he ran for N.C. secretary of state as a Republican in 1996.   
   "To me, if you put all of the people on a map -- the working people, the   
   rich people, the poor people and all of that -- we hit right dead in the   
   middle. NASCAR hits the mainstream of the American people. That's the   
   reason the sponsors are here and the reason the fans are here."   
      
   The sport's newest high-profile sponsor is Nextel, the telecommunications   
   company for which today's race officially kicks off a 10-year, $750 million   
   deal that makes it the title sponsor of NASCAR's top series.   
      
   What was Winston Cup under a 33-year partnership with R.J. Reynolds Tobacco   
   is now Nextel Cup, and Nextel Chief Operating Officer Tom Kelly has no   
   qualms with Petty's definition.   
      
   "What surprised us is what defines the middle these days," Kelly said. "The   
   middle is not people making $20,000 a year any more. The middle is people   
   who are fairly affluent."   
      
   While there's no clear agreement on who is really a "NASCAR dad," it's   
   generally accepted that the term should not be seen simply as a substitute   
   for "Bubba" -- the beer-swilling, tobacco-spitting stereotype that long has   
   been a shorthand for stock-car racing fan.   
      
   "NASCAR isn't just a Southern rural sport any more," Guillory said. "It has   
   gone uptown. NASCAR dads range anywhere from the traditional 1950s-style   
   fan to the store manager who lives in the suburbs and to the buttoned-down   
   fan who sits up in the expensive suites."   
      
   Veteran driver Terry Labonte said he sees many different types of people   
   when he goes out to meet fans.   
      
   "But the one thing most of them have in common is that they're all doing   
   something, they're working," he said. "They may be in different professions   
   -- we have doctors and lawyers and we have truck drivers and people in the   
   military and people who work in grocery stores and hardware stores. You   
   name it, it's all kinds of every day people who're out there working."   
      
   For Kelly and Nextel, it's not even all about dad. It's about mom and the   
   kids, too.   
      
   "NASCAR is unique among sports in how it appeals to the total family," he   
   said, quoting NASCAR statistics that say 40 percent of its fans are female.   
   "People who use our products are people who like to get things done.   
      
   "They work every day and know about being more productive, more efficient   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)