There is an important divide running through the middle of Democratic policymaking that gets very little attention, but may be as important as the much more well-discussed ideological, generational or regional divides. It is a battle between views I would describe as pluralist versus technocratic.
Let me take a moment to go into Political Theory 101, I promise I will get back to real life issues like health care and banking policy soon.
I am loathe to ever admit I am wrong about the horserace aspect of my election analysis. Wrong about anything else in my life, such as career choices, lifestyle choices, and relationship choices? Sure, I'll admit that, I've made mistakes in those areas, but not about my horserace analysis of elections. I was wildly wrong about the 2004 primaries, but only wrong about the 2004 elections because I banked on the incumbent rule, which unexpectedly (at least, somewhat unexpectedly) has collapsed in recent years. However, over 300 people personally told me in late 2004 / early 2005 that I had given them false hope for a Kerry win in 2004. And so, imagining the hundreds of thousands who didn't have a chance to tell me that in person (in late 2004, MyDD was the second largest progressive blog in the county, and might have temporarily moved to #1 on Election Day 2004), I resolved to never be wrong about election predictions again, no matter who I pissed off. And so, after spending three years tweaking my methodology, I finally struck gold in 2006-2007. I called the CT-Sen Lamont-Lieberman election within 1%, I surpassed any professional forecaster in terms of accuracy in my 2006 federal elections, and even recently called the exact 51%-45% finish in the MA-05 special election (all of which were to the consternation of many at the time for not being pro-Democratic / progressive enough). I thought I was invincible in terms of forecasting elections, and so I boldly proclaimed that Barack Obama had already lost the 2008 presidential primaries because I believed he had lost the primarily non-Christian, progressive creative class vote that had served as his base early in the campaign.
I didn't think it was possible for Obama to win without that vote, and I still don't think it is possible for him to win without that vote. However, at the time I thought he had basically lost that vote with a series of events that culminated, but did not start, with the gay-bashing McClurkin event in South Carolina. Now, it seems to me that maybe he just pissed them off with that event, but he didn't lose them for good. At this point, with the time to make a final decision looming, and faced with a primary election that, no matter the inaccuracy of the media narrative, is still primarily a choice between Clinton and Obama, the progressive creative class has decided that it still prefers Obama to Clinton no matter what Obama may or may not have done wrong so far. This is the vote that Obama absolutely needs in order to win either Iowa or New Hampshire, and it seems as though he is keeping enough of that vote in order to stay competitive in both states.
Without any question, 2.67% is close enough for Iowa to be considered a statistical tie. Even though Clinton remains the favorite, Obama could quit easily win the state if the election were held tomorrow, much less if it were held in 50 days. In any analysis, 2.67% in a state with as strange a system as Iowa is virtually meaningless. And yes, Edwards clearly isn't done yet, and Richardson is quite finished, either. However, only Obama remains close enough in New Hampshire to be almost certain of a victory there following a win in Iowa, and only Obama is close enough nationally to be pretty much guaranteed of sweeping to the nomination should he defeat Clinton is both Iowa and New Hampshire. Obama is Clinton's main opponent three ways from Thursday, January 3rd
Now, I am never going to endorse either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton in these primaries. There is no way I could spend so much time working on the residual force issue, which basically puts me at odds with both candidates, and end up endorsing one of them. If I were to endorse someone who overtly favored residual forces at this point, it would invalidate most of the work I have done in the primaries so far, and I would deservingly become an object of mockery. I also have serious problems with what I perceive to be Obama's insider elitism. However, I can't ignore that one of he two leading candidates for the Democratic nomination is potentially the best identity vessel for my ideal progressive coalition to come around in the history of American politics, bar none. I mean, even though I am a white guy who grew up in the suburbs of Syracuse, New York, I can say without a hint of irony or doubt that Barack Obama is easily the candidate with whom I can most clearly identify. It isn't even close. I am a highly educated dude with a serious academic background who moved to one of the forgotten areas of a major city and became something a community organizer. Even after I left Chicago following Obama's 2004 victory, I saw the potential Obama coalition come together before my eyes as my 50-50 white-black neighborhood that threw out the local machine, was the first to endorse the new African-American mayor of Philly back when he was in fifth place, and as a white guy from the suburbs like myself became the partisan representative for one of the poorest, most Democratic, and most diverse areas on the entire eastern seaboard. I haven't just seen the Obama / long-term progressive coalition of largely creative class non-Christians and largely working class non-whites come together, I have lived it. It is totally doable. The local Philly machine even jokes about what is happening out here, saying that the media waits to see what the 27th ward does before it endorses (aka, the local white liberal establishment waits to hear what its neighborhood affiliates "on the street" say before doing anything). It can be done, and I can't deny a deep desire on my part to eventually see it done. Even before I made the identity politics synthesis back in April 2005, I have been writing about my hopes for this for four years. And I know that other people must be thinking about this too, because you don't get a non-flame war diary with 255 comments in November of 2003 without striking a real nerve.
There is a desperate, progressive desire to see the two most left-wing demographic groups in the entire country, working class non-whites and creative class non-Christians, to from a governing coalition in America. Despite their extreme diversity, their massive growth rate gives them the potential to do just that. Such potential is epitomized, at least identity-wise, in Barack Obama. Now that he is pulling closer in both Iowa and New Hampshire, I have to believe that, despite his repeated fuck-ups, the members of his potential coalition have decided that his fuck-ups are less important than the decision at hand. Given his seeming unwillingness to embrace this coalition, I don't know if that is the right decision to make. Also, I could be quite wrong about what is happening in the early states, or at least about why it is happening. However, after living in pursuit of this dream for so long, I have to think that is what is happening on the ground. Even if Obama wins, I worry it could all horribly backfire and self-destruct if the coalition isn't ready to be embraced by the person leading it, and as I said there is no way I am going to endorse him before Iowa, but I have to admit it is still something I will be watching closely over the next fifty days. It is the promise of a coalition that means a helluva lot to me, and I can't ignore that forever no matter how bad it may make past predictions of mine look.
The subsequent article to follow this title was written by David Paul Kuhn in order to help sell copies of his new book: "The Neglected Voter: White Men and the Democratic Dilemma." Reading through the article felt like I was caught in some sort of time warp in American politics, where the 2006 elections never happened and the non-white population of America wasn't exploding. Beyond simply 2006, it read as though it came from an even earlier era, like the 1980's or 1990's, when conservative backlash against "PC" was all the rage. For example:
As portrayed by the new breed of liberalism, the white man held all the cards, and everyone else's bad deal was his fault. The problem was that the bulk of white men did not feel like dealers or players. They felt like pieces on someone else's table, and their livelihood, their family's very stability, was in richer men's hands, as well.
And:
These men are seen as failing to capitalize on "white male privilege." Those who felt powerless, like so many women and minorities, were told they were indeed powerful. Conservatives came to validate a struggle many liberals had demeaned as merely the anger of the "angry white male."
Thank you very much Morton Downey Jr. I have a couple of quick responses to the basic thesis being presented here:
Democrats are not losing all "white men." In fact, Democrats are performing just as well among non-Christian white men as they are among non-white men (about 65%-70% vote Democrat in both cases). Democrats also score about 70% of the male LGBT vote, and 65% of the male union member vote. I imagine many of those groups are white, too.
Democrats are actually losing the white, straight, Christian, non-union male vote. More than just losing, Democrats are getting thoroughly trounced in this demographic, and are lucky to score more than 30% of the vote here in any given national election. This group forms about 25-30% of a shrinking percentage of the electorate, as both self-identified Christians and self-identified whites are dropping precipitously as a percentage of the electorate. These drops easily cancel out the drop in union membership.
If the Democratic electoral problem is actually among white, straight, Christian, non-union men (termed WSCNUM from now on), then doesn't the cause of this problem become pretty obvious? It is a combination of multi-faceted identity backlash and the collapse of union density in America.
Given the scope of the causes that led to this electoral situation, isn't it as equally obvious that this isn't something political strategy or a change in rhetoric can solve? These are massive, underlying, ideological and economic trends in America, and will not be fixed unless there is a broad shift in the operation of several important ideological state apparatuses. Democrats can't paper over these differences with a few tweaks in candidate recruitment and national convention rhetoric. These divisions will persist in America almost no matter what Democrats do, even during a long-term period of governance.
Looking to the long-term trends, rather than the past, the WSCNUM vote (25-30%) is smaller than the non-white and / or non-Christian vote (NWNC, 35-40%). This wasn't always the case, as the WSCNUM vote was equal in size to the NWNC vote as recently as 1994, and before then was much larger than it. Sure, this is how Republicans took power from 1968-1994, but in 2006 Democrats lost white men by 9% and still won the election by 8.2%, a margin greater than any Republican victory since 1984. In fact the entire reason why Republican blowouts in the mode of 1972, 1980, 1984, 1988 and 1994 don't happen anymore is because of this demographic shift. Democrats never won this vote, and in fact never really made a dent in this vote outside of Bill Clinton and Iraq-fueled 2006, but they kept getting closer anyway because the size of the two bases were moving in opposite directions. Republicans were actually winning by less and less from 1972 to 2004, and unless there was a demographic change in the two coalitions, eventually they were going to start losing without any shift in the WSCNUM at all.
My point is all of this is two-fold. First, Democrats are not losing all types of white men, and are actually doing quite well among some groups. Second, the groups they are doing the worst among are also shrinking relative to the rest of the electorate. Basically, this means that Democrats don't need to do any better among white men, but the occasional moments when they do as the result of a major national catastrophe like Iraq will lead to huge landslides ala 2006. Further, in another nine years, Democrats won't even need Iraq to replicate results like 2006. By that point, the gap between WSCNUMs and NCNWs should reach 16% as a percentage of the electorate, giving Democrats a built-in advantage equal to 2006 election results if there are no changes in the partisan preference of existing demographic groups.
And even apart from all of that, how does changing your electoral strategy to appeal to your least favorable demographic group make sense, especially now that you are starting to win elections across the board and since that demographic group is declining in size? Personally, that sounds like snagging defeat from the jaws of victory.
The concept of political re-alignment first took place to describe how and why rock-ribbed New England Republicans shifted their allegience to become New Dealers. The idea is built on that of "political identity". Once you build a political identity, you hold onto it for the rest of your life - unless something happens that shakes up the world. The old guard New England Republicans became faithful Democrats and stayed that way until they died. Their children then picked up the standard and ran with it.
Since that "first realignment" was discovered, countless others have tried to identify others. My personal belief is that modern polling techniques and the ability of both parties and candidates to reach beyond the limits of their districts/states have rendered a lot of realignment theory moot. Still, we have to admit that the South turning Republican was the biggest partisan shift we've seen in decades. We all know that was over racism and civil rights, but it doesn't go far enough to explain larger shifts.
But I think Chris Bowers may have his finger on the pulse of it. I hope I can enlarge the understanding of what is going on and where it will go from here.
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