In his October 20 nationally syndicated column, Pat Buchanan purports to speak for “white working-class voters” who are “losing” “their country.”

Among other things, Buchanan writes that these voters “have seen trillions of tax dollars go for Great Society programs, but have seen no Great Society, only rising crime, illegitimacy, drug use and dropout rates”; “have seen their Christian faith purged from schools their taxes paid for”; have seen “illegal aliens walk into their country”; and have not “benefited from affirmative action, unlike Barack and Michelle Obama”:

Moreover, the alienation and radicalization of white America began long before Obama arrived. He acknowledged as much when he explained Middle Pennsylvanians to puzzled progressives in that closed-door meeting in San Francisco.

Referring to the white working-class voters in the industrial towns decimated by job losses, Obama said: “They get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

Yet, we had seen these folks before. They were Perotistas in 1992, opposed NAFTA in 1993 and blocked the Bush-Kennedy McCain amnesty in 2007.

In their lifetimes, they have seen their Christian faith purged from schools their taxes paid for, and mocked in movies and on TV. They have seen their factories shuttered in the thousands and their jobs outsourced in the millions to Mexico and China. They have seen trillions of tax dollars go for Great Society programs, but have seen no Great Society, only rising crime, illegitimacy, drug use and dropout rates.

They watch on cable TV as illegal aliens walk into their country, are rewarded with free educations and health care and take jobs at lower pay than American families can live on -- then carry Mexican flags in American cities and demand U.S. citizenship.

They see Wall Street banks bailed out as they sweat their next paycheck, then read that bank profits are soaring, and the big bonuses for the brilliant bankers are back. Neither they nor their kids ever benefited from affirmative action, unlike Barack and Michelle Obama.

They see a government in Washington that cannot balance its books, win our wars or protect our borders. The government shovels out trillions to Fortune 500 corporations and banks to rescue the country from a crisis created by the government and Fortune 500 corporations and banks.

America was once their country. They sense they are losing it. And they are right.

If Buchanan's complaints sound familiar, it's worth referring back to an October 23, 1991, column in which he recounted his advice that the Republican Party should "[t]ake a hard look" at former Knights of the Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke's “portfolio of winning issues; and expropriate those not in conflict with GOP principles.”

Describing Duke's electoral success in Louisiana, Buchanan wrote in 1991 that Duke's “appeal” stemmed from the fact that, among other things, Duke “wants to toss the able-bodied off welfare, stop payments to drug users and freeze benefits to welfare mothers who keep having children”; “favors tougher penalties for crime and an end to 'unjust affirmative action'”; “calls for freedom of choice for parents in sending children to public schools”; and “wants the United States to halt illegal immigration”:

If his resume is Duke's handicap, what is his appeal? In his 15-point platform, he zeros in on issues that should be a wake-up call for all our Big Government Conservatives.

Duke pledges to vote against any new tax increase. He wants to toss the able-bodied off welfare, stop payments to drug users and freeze benefits to welfare mothers who keep having children. He favors tougher penalties for crime and an end to “unjust affirmative action,” i.e. all reverse discrimination, whether quotas or racial set-asides. He calls for freedom of choice for parents in sending children to public schools, and a track system inside schools where the brightest are advanced fastest. He opposes gun control, wants the United States to halt illegal immigration, and would slash foreign aid.

The national press calls these positions “code words” for racism, but in the hard times in Louisiana, Duke's message comes across as middle class, meritocratic, populist and nationalist.

Buchanan concluded his 1991 column by advising the first President Bush that in order to “win ... back” Duke voters, he should “take a hard look at illegal immigration” and root out “reverse discrimination in the U.S. government”:

NEVERTHELESS, both the GOP establishment and conservatives should study how and why white voters, who delivered Louisiana to Reagan and Bush three times, moved in such numbers to David Duke -- and devise a strategic plan to win them back.

What to do? President Bush might take a hard look at illegal immigration, tell the U.S. Border Patrol to hire some of those vets being mustered out after Desert Storm, veto the Democrats' “quota bill,” and issue an executive order rooting out any and all reverse discrimination in the U.S. government, beginning with the FBI.

If that sets off every poodle in liberalism's kennels, good.

Maybe Buchanan can expand on his latest column next time he appears on a "pro-White" radio show.