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A chronic flaw in political analysis is the tendency to forget that yesterday’s demographic cleavages and political allegiances have not been frozen in amber. The periodic talk of putting the “New Deal Coalition” back together always makes me wonder where and how we are going to get the white ethnic urban bosses and southern segregationists who were important parts of that coalition. For many years after the turbulent days of the 1960s and 1970s, you’d hear references to the “Wallace vote” in discussions of southern politics, long after many actual “Wallace voters” were dead and buried. The same is even more true of “Reagan Democrats,” still around to many writers even though Ronnie has long since passed into hagiographical status.
That’s why I found it interesting to read AEI vice president Henry Olsen’s essay (at National Review, of all places, where Rickyphilia is rampant) suggesting that Rick Santorum’s appeals to white-working-class voters represent a doomed effort to revive a sort of ghost vote, based on “Reagan Democrat” stereotypes that are at least two decades out of date.
Today’s white working class, says Olsen, is no longer characterized by stay-at-home moms and fathers working in stable factory jobs, attending neighborhood churches and embracing sturdy folk virtues. Their lives are often chaotic and surrounded by intense economic pressures, and they are as likely to look to government as anywhere else for relief. Here’s the nut graph:
A political strategy for today’s working class would address its current mindset. To begin with, it would recognize that Reagan Democrats are no longer Democrats. Those who are not already Republicans are likely to be independents convinced that big government is not the answer to their problems. But they do not support Republican economic policy, because they think that an unfettered market is not the answer, either.
Interestingly, Olsen thinks the economic nationalist themes the president hit in his State of the Union Address are a lot more in touch with white-working-class sentiments than anything Santorum and other Republicans are talking about.
You can read the whole thing, but I will warn you: Olsen veers off into discussion of the trucking industry and truckers as voters about every third paragraph. I found myself humming “Six Days on the Road” at one point. I don’t know if the dude made his bones in Washington doing transportation policy, or just never got over a childhood Tonka obsession, but it’s a little distracting. Still, it’s interesting to read the occasional conservative who doesn’t seem to believe laissez-faire economics is the answer to every political question.
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DAY on February 09, 2012 2:35 PM:
Never mind the Reagan Democrats; I am concerned that the Millard Fillmore Whigs will turn out for Romney!
ex-curm on February 09, 2012 2:40 PM:
Olsen is also pushing the conservative meme that Fannie Mae caused the mortgage/foreclosure crisis, but with a variation--he wants politicians to feel the pain of the working class in trouble on their mortgages. Good luck with that.
CJ on February 09, 2012 2:45 PM:
I don’t know if the dude made his bones in Washington doing transportation policy, or just never got over a childhood Tonka obsession,...
I still have the scar on my ear from the stitches I received as a toddler after falling out of my bed and landing on my big metal Tonka Mighty Dump Truck--my earliest memory. That said, I harbor no animosity towards truck drivers or their vehicles.
theAmericanist on February 09, 2012 2:45 PM:
Ed starts to catch up to the 1990s.
The same chunk of American demographics were Reagan Democrats in the 80s when they elected Reagan twice and Bush 41 in 1988, 'white ethnics' in the 90s when they voted for Clinton over Bush 41, then voted in a Republican House in 1994, re-elected Boomer Clinton over WW2 hero Dole in 96, Gore lost them to Bush 43 because he forgot about 'the economy, stupid', and Kerry couldn't bridge the Boomer divisions. Obama got 'em back because he promised to move past those divisions...
And now, having just noticed what dominated politics twenty years ago, you want to re-create the divisions that defeated Democrats in 1988 (not to mention 1968), 2000 and 2004, which we won in 2008 because we gonna move past 'em.
Danp on February 09, 2012 2:49 PM:
I read Olsen's essay completely differently. To me it could be summarized as "Obama would be a great president, if he were only white."
Danny on February 09, 2012 2:50 PM:
Between Olsen and George Will de facto endorsing Obama on foreign policy, you almost get the feeling some conservatives have already decided they've lost 2012 and it's time to get around to the soul-searching they never bothered with in 2009.
KK on February 09, 2012 2:52 PM:
Weed, Whites and Wine...
I've been from Tucson to Tucumcari
Tehachapi to Tonapah
Driven every kind of rig that's ever been made
I've driven the back roads so I wouldn't get weighed
If you give me: weed, whites, and wine
And you show me a sign
I'll be willin' to be movin'
Little Feat, not Linda Ronstadt version.
T2 on February 09, 2012 2:53 PM:
the few Conservatives/Republicans left who haven't gone nuts can see it was their past decade of policies that got us where we are - not 3 years of a black president. They see the radicalization of their Party into a lynch mob, but more importantly, and I think this is what Olsen is getting at, they realize the Genie is out of the bottle for Republicans as a serious player. I mean, when the choices to run for president are Santorum, Gingrich and Romney, what other conclusion can you come to? When your Party's hero is a guy who was senile (by his family's admission) for probably one full term as president, well, what can you say?
John B. on February 09, 2012 2:55 PM:
Re "Six Days on the Road": There are worse songs to hum, you know. That said, I do indeed grant you your larger point.
The good people over at Conservatives4Palin sure talk about "Reagan Democrats" as though they are still alive and intact and how their gal Sarah is the only one who can re-animate them for the GOP ticket, if only she'd deign to bless us by changing her mind and running. When I hear that kind of talk, though, all I can see in my head is crowd scenes from The Walking Dead.
Geds on February 09, 2012 3:49 PM:
where Rickyphilia is rampant
So does Rickyphilia cause Santorum, or is Santorum a prime cause of Rickyphilia?
Tom Parmenter on February 09, 2012 5:01 PM:
Just to toss this in here on 'childhood Tonka obsession'. On a documentary about widening and improving the Panama canal, the interviewer asked an local bulldozer driver (through an interpreter) if he had played with building toys when he was a boy: 'Todo Tonka' came the untranslated reply.
smartalek on February 09, 2012 10:50 PM:
Lowell George, RIP.
That was one great American; thanks for the reminder.