6/8/2017, "The Democratic Party Is in Worse Shape Than You Thought," NY Times, Thomas B. Edsall, commentary
Image: 11/9/2016, "White House staff members, including Valerie Jarrett, left, listen to President Barack Obama speak Nov. 9, 2016, about Donald Trump's victory
in the presidential election." (Jim Lo Scalzo / EPA)
(parag. 10) "Priorities also studied Obama-to-Trump voters. Estimates
of the number of such voters range from 6.7 to 9.2 million, far more
than enough to provide Trump his Electoral College victory.
The counties that switched from Obama to Trump were heavily concentrated in the Midwest and other Rust Belt states.
To say that this constituency does not look favorably on the Democratic Party fails to capture the scope of their disenchantment....
A solid majority, 77 percent, of Obama-to-Trump voters think Trump’s economic policies will either favor “all groups equally” (44) or the middle class (33). 21 percent said Trump would favor the wealthy.
In contrast, a plurality of these [Obama to Trump] voters, 42 percent, said that Congressional Democrats would favor the wealthy, slightly ahead of Congressional Republicans at 40 percent.
Geoff Garin is a partner in the Garin-Hart-Yang Research Group which, together with the Global Strategy Group, conducted the surveys and focus groups for Priorities USA. Garin wrote in an email:
[parag. 16] "The biggest common denominator among Obama-Trump voters is a view that the political system is corrupt and doesn’t work for people like them."
Garin added that
"Obama-Trump voters were more likely to think more Democrats look out for the wealthy than look out for poor people."...
If the Priorities analysis is bleak, the 13 American Prospect essays are even more so.
Stan Greenberg, the Democratic pollster, writes in his Prospect essay:
"The Democrats don’t have a “white working-class problem.” They have a “working-class problem,” which progressives have been reluctant to address honestly or boldly. The fact is that Democrats have lost support with all working-class voters across the electorate, including the Rising American Electorate of minorities, unmarried women, and millennials. This decline contributed mightily to the Democrats’ losses in the states and Congress and to the election of Donald Trump."
Greenberg voiced an exceptionally sharp critique of his own party and its candidates. First, he takes on Barack Obama:
"Working-class Americans pulled back from Democrats in this last period of Democratic governance because of President Obama’s insistence on heralding economic progress and the bailout of the irresponsible elites, while ordinary people’s incomes crashed and they continued to struggle financially.""...
[Ed. note: Campaigning in 2008 Obama promised Rust Belt voters he'd renegotiate NAFTA. One month after his 2009 inauguration, he announced NAFTA would remain as is, that US should avoid "beggar thy neighbor" policies. 2/19/2009, "NAFTA Renegotiation Must Wait, Obama Says," Washington Post, Michael D. Shear..."The president's message served as a reminder of last year's private assessment by Canadian officials that then-candidate Obama's frequent criticism of NAFTA was nothing more than campaign speeches aimed at chasing support among Rust Belt union workers." And: 12/10/2009, "Obama's Big Sellout: The President has Packed His Economic Team with Wall Street Insiders," Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi]
(continuing): "Hillary Clinton does not escape Greenberg’s wrath:
"In what may border on campaign malpractice, the Clinton campaign chose in the closing battle to ignore the economic stress not just of the working-class women who were still in play, but also of those within the Democrats’ own base, particularly among the minorities, millennials, and unmarried women."
Greenberg does not stop there, shifting his focus from individual Democratic politicians to the Democratic Party itself: Past supporters "pulled back because of the Democrats’ seeming embrace of multinational trade agreements that have cost American jobs. The Democrats have moved from seeking to manage and champion the nation’s growing immigrant diversity to seeming to champion immigrant rights over American citizens’.
Instinctively and not surprisingly, the Democrats embraced the liberal values of America’s dynamic and best-educated metropolitan areas, seeming not to respect the values or economic stress of older voters in small-town and rural America. Finally, the Democrats also missed the economic stress and social problems in the cities themselves and in working-class suburbs.""...
[Ed. note: Ignoring Ohio: 4/5/2017, "Democrats are still ignoring the people who could have helped them defeat Trump, Ohio party leaders say," Washington Post, William Wan, Youngstown, Ohio]
(continuing): "Along parallel lines, three analysts at the pro-Democratic Center for American Progress, Robert Griffin, John Halpin and Ruy Teixeira, argue that:
"Rather than debating whether Democrats should appeal to white working-class voters or voters of color — both necessary components of a successful electoral coalition, particularly at the state and local level — a more important question emerges: Why are Democrats losing support and seeing declining turnout from working-class voters of all races in many places?"
Griffin, Halpin and Teixeira argue that:
"Democrats allowed themselves to become the party of the status quo--a status quo perceived to be elitist, exclusionary, and disconnected from the entire range of working-class concerns, but particularly from those voters in white working-class areas.
For Democrats who argue that the adoption of economic populism is the best way to counter Trump, Guy Molyneux, a partner in Garin’s polling firm, warns in his American Prospect essay, “A Tale of Two Populisms,” that voters drawn to Trump are anti-government, deeply wary of a pro-government Democratic Party.
“Many analysts and leading Democrats,” Molyneux writes “have attributed Donald Trump’s impressive 2016 vote margin among white working-class voters to his embrace of economic populism.”...
While “Democrats can take obvious comfort in a story about Trump winning in large measure because he stole our ideas,” Molyneux writes, “this assessment misses the mark in important ways.” Why? Because,
"Trump’s brand of populism--and more importantly, that of working-class whites--differs in important ways from the populism of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren."
While the populism espoused by Sanders and Warren is economic, challenging C.E.O.s, major corporations and “the billionaire class,” Trump is the messenger of what Molyneux calls “political populism,” which “is, fundamentally, a story about the failure of government.""
To say that this constituency does not look favorably on the Democratic Party fails to capture the scope of their disenchantment....
A solid majority, 77 percent, of Obama-to-Trump voters think Trump’s economic policies will either favor “all groups equally” (44) or the middle class (33). 21 percent said Trump would favor the wealthy.
In contrast, a plurality of these [Obama to Trump] voters, 42 percent, said that Congressional Democrats would favor the wealthy, slightly ahead of Congressional Republicans at 40 percent.
Geoff Garin is a partner in the Garin-Hart-Yang Research Group which, together with the Global Strategy Group, conducted the surveys and focus groups for Priorities USA. Garin wrote in an email:
[parag. 16] "The biggest common denominator among Obama-Trump voters is a view that the political system is corrupt and doesn’t work for people like them."
Garin added that
"Obama-Trump voters were more likely to think more Democrats look out for the wealthy than look out for poor people."...
If the Priorities analysis is bleak, the 13 American Prospect essays are even more so.
Stan Greenberg, the Democratic pollster, writes in his Prospect essay:
"The Democrats don’t have a “white working-class problem.” They have a “working-class problem,” which progressives have been reluctant to address honestly or boldly. The fact is that Democrats have lost support with all working-class voters across the electorate, including the Rising American Electorate of minorities, unmarried women, and millennials. This decline contributed mightily to the Democrats’ losses in the states and Congress and to the election of Donald Trump."
Greenberg voiced an exceptionally sharp critique of his own party and its candidates. First, he takes on Barack Obama:
"Working-class Americans pulled back from Democrats in this last period of Democratic governance because of President Obama’s insistence on heralding economic progress and the bailout of the irresponsible elites, while ordinary people’s incomes crashed and they continued to struggle financially.""...
[Ed. note: Campaigning in 2008 Obama promised Rust Belt voters he'd renegotiate NAFTA. One month after his 2009 inauguration, he announced NAFTA would remain as is, that US should avoid "beggar thy neighbor" policies. 2/19/2009, "NAFTA Renegotiation Must Wait, Obama Says," Washington Post, Michael D. Shear..."The president's message served as a reminder of last year's private assessment by Canadian officials that then-candidate Obama's frequent criticism of NAFTA was nothing more than campaign speeches aimed at chasing support among Rust Belt union workers." And: 12/10/2009, "Obama's Big Sellout: The President has Packed His Economic Team with Wall Street Insiders," Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi]
(continuing): "Hillary Clinton does not escape Greenberg’s wrath:
"In what may border on campaign malpractice, the Clinton campaign chose in the closing battle to ignore the economic stress not just of the working-class women who were still in play, but also of those within the Democrats’ own base, particularly among the minorities, millennials, and unmarried women."
Greenberg does not stop there, shifting his focus from individual Democratic politicians to the Democratic Party itself: Past supporters "pulled back because of the Democrats’ seeming embrace of multinational trade agreements that have cost American jobs. The Democrats have moved from seeking to manage and champion the nation’s growing immigrant diversity to seeming to champion immigrant rights over American citizens’.
Instinctively and not surprisingly, the Democrats embraced the liberal values of America’s dynamic and best-educated metropolitan areas, seeming not to respect the values or economic stress of older voters in small-town and rural America. Finally, the Democrats also missed the economic stress and social problems in the cities themselves and in working-class suburbs.""...
[Ed. note: Ignoring Ohio: 4/5/2017, "Democrats are still ignoring the people who could have helped them defeat Trump, Ohio party leaders say," Washington Post, William Wan, Youngstown, Ohio]
(continuing): "Along parallel lines, three analysts at the pro-Democratic Center for American Progress, Robert Griffin, John Halpin and Ruy Teixeira, argue that:
"Rather than debating whether Democrats should appeal to white working-class voters or voters of color — both necessary components of a successful electoral coalition, particularly at the state and local level — a more important question emerges: Why are Democrats losing support and seeing declining turnout from working-class voters of all races in many places?"
Griffin, Halpin and Teixeira argue that:
"Democrats allowed themselves to become the party of the status quo--a status quo perceived to be elitist, exclusionary, and disconnected from the entire range of working-class concerns, but particularly from those voters in white working-class areas.
For Democrats who argue that the adoption of economic populism is the best way to counter Trump, Guy Molyneux, a partner in Garin’s polling firm, warns in his American Prospect essay, “A Tale of Two Populisms,” that voters drawn to Trump are anti-government, deeply wary of a pro-government Democratic Party.
“Many analysts and leading Democrats,” Molyneux writes “have attributed Donald Trump’s impressive 2016 vote margin among white working-class voters to his embrace of economic populism.”...
While “Democrats can take obvious comfort in a story about Trump winning in large measure because he stole our ideas,” Molyneux writes, “this assessment misses the mark in important ways.” Why? Because,
"Trump’s brand of populism--and more importantly, that of working-class whites--differs in important ways from the populism of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren."
While the populism espoused by Sanders and Warren is economic, challenging C.E.O.s, major corporations and “the billionaire class,” Trump is the messenger of what Molyneux calls “political populism,” which “is, fundamentally, a story about the failure of government.""
.......................
Added: In Ohio, 4 months before a single Wikileaks email had been released:
18 Mahoning County, Ohio Democratic precinct captains crossed party lines to vote for Trump in the 2016 GOP primary (4 months before a single email had been released). GOP yard signs popped up in the Ohio Dem. stronghold. "Trump not only flipped the state [of Ohio] but also won by the largest margin of any presidential candidate since 1988." (4/5/17, Wash. Post)
Added: In Ohio, 4 months before a single Wikileaks email had been released:
18 Mahoning County, Ohio Democratic precinct captains crossed party lines to vote for Trump in the 2016 GOP primary (4 months before a single email had been released). GOP yard signs popped up in the Ohio Dem. stronghold. "Trump not only flipped the state [of Ohio] but also won by the largest margin of any presidential candidate since 1988." (4/5/17, Wash. Post)
4/5/2017, "Democrats are still ignoring the people who could have helped them defeat Trump, Ohio Party leaders say," Washington Post, William Wan
Dec. 2017, "Party Hoppers: Understanding Voters Who Switched Partisan Affiliation," Democracy Fund Voter Study Group, Author: Robert Griffin (formerly with Center for American Progress and others)
*While most Obama to Trump voters once identified as Democrats, a majority now identify as Republicans. Since 2011, there has been a 28 percent decline in Democratic identification and a 43 percent increase in Republican identification among these voters....
For the Democratic Party, the loss of white people without college degrees is highly problematic. For starters, this group is a larger share of the electorate than is commonly understood. While the national exit poll of the major networks and the AP indicated that non-college white voters made up 34 percent of voters in 2016, the actual number is probably closer to 45 percent.(ii)
Even small losses among these voters can have a decisive impact on parties’ electoral fortunes — particularly in state and local elections. The reason for this is that non-college white voters are well distributed throughout the country for the purpose of political representation. With few exceptions, they make up a significant, if not overwhelming, portion of voters in counties across the nation. This geographic dispersion makes them influential in every state and in a disproportionate number of congressional districts (Figure 6).
Even if it were the case that the Democratic Party was making more enduring inroads with other demographic groups, these other groups are presently distributed in comparatively inefficient ways.
White people with college degrees, for example, are not only a smaller group but also tend to be clustered in densely populated areas. The fastest growing groups — Hispanics and Asians — are well represented in a relatively small number of counties located in electorally uncompetitive states. Additionally, black people already identify as Democrats at such high rates that further gains among them would be marginal at best.
Equally problematic for Democrats is the loss of voters from older age cohorts. Not only are those 45 years of age and older significantly more likely to vote, but they are also especially reliable voters during midterms when turnout is down overall. Even if a majority of the younger voters departing the Republican Party found their way into the Democratic camp, their lower participation rates would still make it an uneven trade....
Partisan affiliation is one of the most stable features of the
modern American electorate. While individuals’ feelings toward
politicians or their attitudes about policy can change quickly,
partisanship is a deep-seated identity resistant to change."...
Added: "Non-college white voters" aren't exactly a fringe group:
..........
Added: "Non-college white voters" aren't exactly a fringe group:
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Above maps from Dec. 2017, "Party Hoppers: Understanding Voters Who Switched Partisan Affiliation," Democracy Fund Voter Study Group
...............................................
Added: A New
York Times reporter said it's "tempting" to blame "racism" for Trump's win, but
can't because many white Trump voters had been white Obama voters. (Why would that be "tempting"?)
Above 11/10/2016 NY Times twitter image via 11/11/16, "2016: The Revenge Of The White Working Class Voter, And Where Millions Of Obama Supporters Flipped For Trump," Matt Vespa, Townhall
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Comment: Unfortunately, the Republican Party is as bad as the Democrat Party. Neither makes a penny by acting on wishes of their voters. Conversely, trillions can be theirs by trashing America and Americans, ensuring open borders, cheap foreign "legal" and illegal labor, constant military interventions and regime changes, and submission to the UK monarchy.
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