You mean the myth of the
Southern Strategy.
Calling something a myth doesn't make it a myth...
Per my link, the phrase was actually popularized by one of Nixon's own campaign managers that outlined their precise strategy for aquiring the votes of "Negrophobe Southern Whites" to fill in the gaps for the states in the northeast and west they were losing to the democrats.
These are the words, directly from the mouth of Nixon's political strategist who implemented the plan:
From now on, the Republicans are never going to get more than 10 to 20 percent of the Negro vote and they don't need any more than that... but Republicans would be shortsighted if they weakened enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. The more Negroes who register as Democrats in the South, the sooner the Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans. That's where the votes are. Without that prodding from the blacks, the whites will backslide into their old comfortable arrangement with the local Democrats.[1]
Did you think that guys like Strom Thurmond, Trent Lott, and co. simply switched parties because they thought it would be something fun to try?
Party switching in the United States - Wikipedia
Review the list of people who switched from the Democrat to Republican party between 1963-1973. Look at their stances and voting record on segregation, and civil rights in general. ...and then ask yourself, if the purpose wasn't to pander to racist southern whites in order to pick up some quick and and easy votes, why in the heck would anyone go out of their way to recruit guys like that and bring them into the fold?
You and I have been through this numerous times...each time you say the Southern Strategy was a myth. The facts, documented party switching history, and the GOP strategist, himself, who implemented it, all suggest otherwise.
Really read this line, and really consider exactly what it is the GOP strategist Kevin Phillips was saying:
Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans. That's where the votes are.
"Negrophobes, that's where the votes are". Sounds to me like they were precisely banking on pandering to, and acquiring the votes of racists...because in his own words "that's where the votes are".
Even if you want to call the Southern Strategy a myth, you'd still have to explain why it is that nearly all modern day republicans seem to have a hard time grasping why the black community votes democrat, and dismisses it as if they're just gullible children who got tricked into voting (D), and then trot out the "Democrats are actually the racist party" nonsense. Democrats made a consistent effort to distance themselves from that in the 1960's...where as the republicans strategists decided to go with the mentality of, and I quote, "
Negrophobes, that's where the votes are"
"Negrophobe whites" (largely concentrated in the South)
"That's where the votes are" (referencing a strategy)