First the coalition: Obama's powerful appeal to minorities, women, and young people propelled his decisive wins in 2008 and 2012. But those voters didn't show up at the polls in 2010 and 2014.
Some Democrats are confident the coalition will be back in 2016, when interest in a presidential race is far greater than during midterms. But will it return in the strength it showed in '08 and '12? Or will Democratic voting return to pre-Obama patterns?So, this is a great time for the GOP to appeal to and pick up these stray black, Latino and female voters and shore up their legitimacy as a national party, right?
Don't be silly. York has no advice on that, because even Washington Examiner readers wouldn't understand why he was bothering. But white people -- that's another story:
"Given its sheer size, the working-class white population in the U.S. is of keen importance to politicians and strategists on both sides of the aisle," Gallup wrote recently, noting "the complex set of attitudes and life positions which … have pushed this group further from the Democratic president over the past six years."
If Democrats don't find a way to connect with those "attitudes and life positions" of working-class whites in coming years, they'll have a big problem..."No single group" is a nice evasive harrumph-harrumph, but the message of York's column is clearly that women, youth, and minority votes can only be lost -- like some kind of gas that escapes, evaporates, and is seen no more -- whereas white votes are something you can win by appealing to their "complex set of attitudes and life positions." Normally, based on his previous writings and conservative history, I would assume York considers these to be the usual hatred of minorities, contempt for the poor etc., but his column suggests he's at least dimly aware that the most effective thing conservatives can communicate to white people is that they are to be taken more seriously than anyone else.
In the end, no single group will mean defeat for the Democrat and victory for the Republican in 2016. But President Obama's troubling legacy — a weakened coalition and growing ranks of alienated white voters — could mean a serious post-presidential hangover for Democrats.
HNIC
ReplyDelete"Husky Neeeeee'r In Charge"?
complex set of attitudes and life positions
Women and minorities are monolithic blocs who all think exactly alike because reasons, but white boys are all unique because shut up. One also gets the feeling that this is a veiled concern trolling for the Dems to move even further right, since obviously these are the people who listen to talk radio and watch FAUX and need to be catered to with proper deference.
the most effective thing conservatives can communicate to white people is that they are to be taken more seriously than anyone else.
ReplyDeleteAnd this would be different from previous (and current) practice how?
If you follow York's logic, Obama's leaving office should actually work the other way: Once our first blah president is outta sight, Democrats will no longer be scaring the White folks by waving a minority in their faces.
ReplyDeleteBut, I guess a Byron has to dream. And dreaming of White voters dancing to the GOP tune of tax cuts for the wealthy and polluted water for all is as sweet as it gets for him.
I note with amusement that, as Hillary Clinton's announcement that she's running for president draws ever closer, Sen. Orrin Hatch is once again back to talking about Democrats as the party of demon worshippers. I figure the actual announcement will make his head spin as he walks backwards on all fours like a crab.
ReplyDeleteYes, that was my thought as well. He also seems to skip over what happened during those pre-Obama elections that put Democrats in the White House and/or gave them majorities in Congress. But I guess fairy stories meant to comfort the frightened man-children of the right don't need to be consistent.
ReplyDeleteFun fact: Until recently, the GOP was making great strides among the Hispanic population. They increased their share of the Hispanic vote by 10 points between 1996 and 2000, and then Bush gained another 13 points between 2000 and 2004. Weird as it is to imagine now, everyone at the time really thought that the Democrats and Republicans would end up neatly splitting the Hispanic vote.
ReplyDeleteAnd then, all of a sudden, Republicans started to lose that bloc to the Dems. It had to be the black guy in office, because I can't think of anything Republicans did between '04 and '08 that might have offended Hispanics at all. Nope, nothing.
Alas and alack! M. Dork has revealed that the Republicans can take the administrative and legislative branches (and from there t'would be a swift march into Poland the judiciary) if they focus all of their efforts on the people who still buy their bullshit and are so afraid of blackity blackness that they'll vote against a man who isn't running for office.
ReplyDeleteWe're doomed. Doomed I tell ya. I am going to run off to the People's Republic of Canada now, to beat the rush. But first, a final act of fixorating:
women, youth, and minority votes can only be lost -- like some kind of gas that escapes, evaporates, and is seen no more and becomes JoBerg's latest column.
Merci et adieu!
Wasn't there some silly thing they got all concerned about... something like "meemeegal smimeegrants" or like that there?
ReplyDeleteWell, if I can't think of it it must not have been important.
And all those "Stop the invasion" signs outside the trailer holes.
ReplyDeleteThe rest of us having a simplistic set of attitudes and life positions because SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP!
ReplyDeleteSigh. Byron York. The "Obama's not really popular with people - his popularity with black people just makes it seem that way" guy. http://prospect.org/article/black-people-and-women-ruin-everything
ReplyDeleteIs it possible that VD Hanson is posting from a different timeline? I do not recognize the scandal-ridden, catastrophic presidency he's describing. He also seems to live in a universe where global warming has been proven to be a hoax. That must be a relief for his people.
ReplyDeletethe complex set of attitudes and life positions which … have pushed this group further from the Democratic president over the past six years.
ReplyDeleteNow, that's a verbose way to write "racism".
They're fantasizing about a K-Lo nation.
ReplyDeleteI think he meant to hyperlink the DSM on "complex"
ReplyDeleteThe dumb part is that the GOP had a real shot to win, if not a majority of the Hispanic vote, at least a large enough portion to check the Democrats. Then they decided "Eh, fuck that. Let's scapegoat the entire group to win over a group we've already won over many times before."
ReplyDeleteAnd once again, the Republican obsession with The Base screws them over. Sometimes, I wonder how Republicans win elections at all. Then it his me - they're running against Democrats, aren't they?
It's probably a good thing Townshend didn't get the Les Paul with the plasma cutter option.
ReplyDeleteComplex set of platitudes would be more like it.
ReplyDelete"Given its sheer size[the only largish block people like me can even pretend to give a shit about], the working-class white population in the U.S. is
ReplyDeleteof keen importance to politicians and strategists on both sides of the
aisle,"
Fixed
A point I made a few weeks ago on some other website, which I modestly call Haystack's Rule, is that Democrats have to concede, right out of the gate every time, 22-27% of the electorate. The batshit deranged, if you will. But they can take comfort in the fact that they command a majority of the the non-insane and campaign accordingly.
ReplyDeleteA good start: stop making futile appeals to the teabagger fringe.
I am going to run off to the People's Republic of Canada
ReplyDeleteMandatory:
Yeah, dragging tortilla chips through the pool water and claiming there's sharks in there only fools the foolish.
ReplyDeleteI actually find this sort of off-hand "yeah, but they don't count" sentiment more offensive than the jokey "women shouldn't vote" articles that come out every two years. I think its because I can believe the latter is just strategic (if nasty) thinking, while the former reveals their true feelings completely.
ReplyDelete"Have you seen what those greasy fuckers are made out of? I mean, I like grease and salt as much as any other any, but there are fucking limits, you know? Like I want to drag twenty kilos of blubber saturated with Lipitor and Cialis back here to poison the colony."
ReplyDeleteI've seen the giteratti declare on multiple occasions that Minority Group X should vote Republican because Minority Group X holds a bunch of socially conservative opinions.
ReplyDeleteThat's it. End of discussion and return to comparing Minority X to radioactive plague rats.
Until after the election, when they start to say things that make the talk about radioactive plague rats seem like sweet nothings.
As I never tire of pointing out, economic growth under Democrats has been consistently better than Republicans ever since Herbert Hoover. Thus far,over 5 million jobs have been created since Obama took office. G.W Bush? A little over 1 million. The Dow has grown 142%; under Bush, -9%. We're in a slow recovery still, but the economy is hardly in a shambles, as they claim. Oh, if only we could cut taxes more and reduce regulations, so the mighty American economy can take off, just like under Reagan (Dow Jones growth 88%, job growth rate less than Carter's).
ReplyDeleteTypical right-wing tactic of trying to make their base feel smarter than they actually are. Limbaugh has been doing it for decades.
ReplyDeleteOh noes! Numbers! Facts! Argh, I've got a cluster headache! I'm gettin' upset, I can't breathe!
ReplyDeleteTell me what to make of them, Hannity!
This divide-and-conquer routine of the Repugs is in their DNA. It's impossible for me to forget that William Rehnquist came to the attention of the Nixon administration not because he was a paramount legal mind, but rather because he was, like Nixon, a devious fucker, and he'd made his bones with the Repugs by chasing away blacks, Hispanics and American Indians from the polls. Whether it was Strom Thurmond and his Dixiecrats cum Repugs, or Nixon pitting the conservative super-patriots against the commie liberals or the hard hats against the students, or the "Reagan Democrats," the Repugs have, at least since 1945, been courting the white working-class (a group they'd pretty solidly lost during the FDR years), and, at least ever since Nixon, been pissing on them, and telling them it's raining. What's held that coalition together all these decades is that the Repugs have been doing the one thing that works--stoking resentment along racial lines, and creating as many fractures as possible in minority coalitions.
ReplyDeleteWhich is why the freakier, flakier Repugs can rail against "multiculturism" as if that were never a thing in these United States, and have the sentiment resonate among working-class whites.
FDR pretty much zeroed out that Repug advantage by pitting the working class against the wealthy, something the Dems have been loathe to do for decades, in the hope of getting the billionaires' crumbs. That's generally produced a different kind of Dem.
As a white working class man, my "attitude and life position" is that I'm not very likely to ever vote for any Republican.
ReplyDeleteSerious question:
ReplyDeleteDo you think that reforming the way campaigns are financed, thereby removing the necessity for Democrats to chase the billionaire's crumbs, would reform the party itself? Is that all that it would take to make Democrats act more like Democrats?
Is campaign finance the lynchpin of the problem, the keystone... the miniscule air shaft of the Death Star?
I find that strangely easy to imagine for some reason...
ReplyDeleteNO FAIR CHECKING! It's like the first rule of New Journalism.
ReplyDeleteNo, it proves you're a traitor who wants gay cantaloupe-calved illegal immigrants to implant terror babies RIGHT IN OUR ABDOMENS with their ovipositors.
ReplyDeleteI guess it depends on how you look at it...
ReplyDelete"the complex set of attitudes and life positions unhinged racism and xenophobia which … have pushed this group further from the Democratic president"
ReplyDeleteFTFY
Important Gromet trivia: this is the first music video I ever saw and I thought it was super cool.
ReplyDeleteI have a chair that is covered with the same fabric as Aldo's suit.
ReplyDeleteISIS what you're saying, and I eagerly await our ovipositing overlords. Meanwhile, how do I subscribe to your newsletter? And do you have a YouTube channel?
ReplyDeleteThe problem is that 95% of those gains went to the richest people in the country. The poor/lower middle class are now poorer, and less educated people are more likely to blame whomever they are told to blame.
ReplyDeleteThe right knows that their potential for growth is with the poor, uneducated and afraid, and they are doing their best to create more voters. Democrats have abandoned fighting for workers' rights in favor of fighting for civil rights, which is much more lucrative. This has not gone unnoticed. The right will prevail if the left does not become the party of the worker once again.
Contrast this with the Democrats' approach, which is "Let's chase this group of hard-core Republicans who would rather stick their tongues in fire than vote for us--and let's scapegoat our own base 'cause fuck them--where they gonna go?"
ReplyDeleteDemocrats have abandoned fighting for workers' rights in favor of
ReplyDeletefighting for civil rights, which is much more lucrative. This has not
gone unnoticed. The right will prevail if the left does not become the
party of the worker once again.
If they treat the two issues as mutually exclusive.
Aha, the biggest lesson not learned on Ferguson is the economic one. Social unrest accompanies economic unrest. The financial industry complex is probably elated that the entire focus of the media is on the race of the people involved. I read maybe one article discussing how hard Ferguson's homeownership was hit by the 2008 debacle. Minority poverty and suffering is off the charts. But we are racist and therefore easily manipulated.
ReplyDeleteBefore you have rights you need power. To get power you need money.
All of what you write is true, but it overlooks some crucial facts.
ReplyDelete1.) Democrats believe in the positive role regulation can have in saving the greedy from their own avarice. Despite nearly a century of direct experience proving that unbridled greed is its own undoing, the greedy sincerely believe that they can make more money if they can just be allowed to crash the economy periodically. So the greedy always back Republicans.
2.) Democrats believe that government should use its power of taxation to actually pay for things like roads, helping the unfortunate, and regulating industry. The greedy look upon taxation as theft.
The greedy vote Republican because Republicans promise no taxes and no regulations. And an awful lot of working-class and middle-class folks have been persuaded that their interests lie in the same direction.
For further exemplars of this, see Detroit. Or Cleveland. Or certain pockets of Indianapolis. Black communities being denied water and sewer, foreclosed on in wholesale manner, and then bulldozed into vacant lots.
ReplyDeleteBut it's the fault of the moochers and looters who have nothing, not the people who ended up with all the money.
ReplyDeleteMy god can they be dumb.
It makes sense from an authoritarian point of view.
ReplyDeleteBlame always goes down; praise is directed upward.
Yes, exactly.
ReplyDeleteCertainly, the shift in the white working class post-Civil Rights Era was one of the great American realignments. And there's no way to look at that shift without noting the racial element in both state and national elections over the past half-century. What gets me is that when you look at the people who voted for George W. Bush, it's obviously possible for the GOP to win over at least some of the Hispanic vote without alienating their precious white base. So why don't they do that? It's like they don't have a strategy at all. If the modern Democratic party wasn't the most self-defeating group in American political history, the Republicans would be ash by now.
ReplyDeleteOT, but the first rock concert I ever went to was this guy opening for Cheap Trick. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
ReplyDeleteSadly, this may have to be relegated to Haystack's Corollary to the Crazification Factor.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of matters CanadianThis is. the weirdest arse thing I have seen for many a long minute.
ReplyDeleteOh Canada wtf.
FDR pretty much zeroed out that Repug advantage by pitting the working
ReplyDeleteclass against the wealthy, something the Dems have been loathe to do for
decades, in the hope of getting the billionaires' crumbs.
Yeah, there's that for sure, thanks to the need for campaign millions (as Buddy points out) but also there is just something very different in American culture since the advent of TV, I think. Mass media erases the division between rich and poor -- or seems to; actually what it does is create an illusion that all the rich-folks stuff is ultimately going to be accessible to you unless someone fucks that up. The someone might be you for not working hard enough -- or it might be the government for "redistributing" wealth that should have been yours, "regulating" too much, etc.
The point being, wealth in the Victorian Age set the rich apart, made their daily reality invisible, made them easier to resent because quite alien; wealth today makes them shockingly familiar. We've all seen Beyonce's vacation snapshots and been in Paris Hilton's bedroom without even trying, and a walking tour of Bill Gates' house is one Google search away. Plus they all ghost-write mass-market books about how they're ordinary people and/or hardworking geniuses -- Pierpont never tried that. The model for wealth is fully aspirational now, and as long as there's wall-to-wall media that won't change.
Plus the fact is, almost everything IS available, now, and that changes how people see their own money. Only make $17k/yr? You can still get an iPad just like Jay Z, and get all the instant gratification it comes with. If you had the Taft-era equivalent of $17k, you were maybe walking a mile to the public library during your lean spare time. In the Harding years if you didn't have a summer home someplace warm, you weren't getting a tomato on your sandwich in January; now any asshole can buy em by the pound anywhere, any minute of any day. Everything appears to be within reach.
So thanks to refrigeration, TV, the internet, you name it -- the Democrats really cannot run on FDR's ideals. The reality is different, and the perception of wealth and its attainability is problematic. That perception is one of the main issues complicating politics in the US right now (I think) and our system is not well suited to address it. I don't have a great solution right now, but it is not so simple to say "I wish Democrats would be real Democrats -- that would really appeal to white working class dudes." tl;dr, Lorde for President.
Well, it makes sense, as their view of the US and immigration seems to be that we are headed toward a "Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded" situation.
ReplyDeleteThey can and should run on opportunity, not consumer goods.
ReplyDeleteM. Dork has revealed that the Republicans can take utterly destroy the functioning of the administrative
ReplyDeleteand legislative branches (and from there t'would be a swift march into Poland consolidating their overrepresentation in the judiciary) if they focus all of their efforts on the people who still buy their bullshit and are so afraid of blackity blackness that they'll vote against a man who isn't running for office.
Certainly, that's a healthy part of it. But, the other part of it goes back to something like 1929, when the total number of representatives was fixed at 435. The Constitution put a limit on representation--"no more than one per thirty thousand"--but that's a lower bound, not an upper one. The reason why money is so important today is that no one can campaign without money for radio and television advertising, because each representative has to reach roughly 600,000 constituents of voting age. Drastically increasing the number of representatives to something closer to what it was at the beginning of the country (~ 40,000 per rep) would radically change the electoral maps, if only because serious and dedicated candidates could once again campaign on shoe leather and with just a few volunteers, could conceivably reach each and every one of his or her constituents individually. Doing so would also make fudging elections wholesale with big money a lot more difficult, and, as one can imagine, gerrymandering would be more difficult, as well. (Hell, we could just have law that divides districts by population within latitudinal or longitudinal lines of each state and be done with the endless jockeying for advantage that is redistricting.)
ReplyDeleteCampaigns are far too long in this country. In most places in Europe, they last a few weeks. We start the next election cycle (with concomitant demands for money) the moment the last election is over. We make no restrictions on advertising, while many other countries put a ban on television/radio ads for the last couple of weeks of the campaign.
Still, I think the answer is more representation, rather than less. Getting politicians closer to their real constituents--with money less an issue--means they're more likely to vote with their constituents, or they're out the next election.
More representation, I think, would also blunt some of the negative effects of a two-party system, particularly in the way that coalitions are formed within Congress. And, with small districts, radio and television broadcast advertising becomes much less cost-effective, and therefore, its dollar value goes down.
In this country, it sounds silly. We've become accustomed to a fixed number of representatives, but, hell, even the UK House of Commons has almost 600 members for a voting public of about 45 million. France has a total population of 65 million (about 50 million of voting age), and there are 577 seats in the Assemblee Nationale.
In a way, money is a symptom of systemic problems that has always had the potential to become a systemic problem itself. The Supreme Court has been contributing to that ever since Buckley v. Valeo, but there are other ways to short-circuit the need for money. And, as is so often the case, the answer is more democracy, not less. Unfortunately, the people who currently benefit from the status quo are also the only ones able to change it, and that means money will figure ever more prominently in American politics.
I'm going to say the Ferguson chapter is not closed.
ReplyDeleteI'll also get radical and that even if every African-American was financially well off, being subjected to constant harassment and murder by the police would make people protest. (There's another discussion to be had about the difference between protest and unrest both of which are happening, but leave that for now).
But no money = no power would also screw working class whites, yes?
And has. The trick is getting them angry at the right people.
ReplyDeleteI agree re money but the protests would not be spreading like this, I think, if times were better.
What gets me is that when you look at the people who voted for George W.
ReplyDeleteBush, it's obviously possible for the GOP to win over at least some of
the Hispanic vote without alienating their precious white base.
I'm not sure that is still the case, given that the GOP has spent the last eight years lavishing a lot of sexual attention on the xenophobia and white resentment pullets.
Yes, much of that is true, but, it's still a superficial argument for the guy making $7.25/hr and has to depend on food stamps to eat and public transport to get to the job at the fast food joint. There are lots of people who've been pretty much bounced out of the middle-class and the lower middle-class precisely because some billionaire hedge fund manager (and his ilk) exploded the economy, which wrecked their livelihoods and cost them their savings and their houses.
ReplyDeleteIt's not exactly as if the divide isn't there to be exploited--there's just damned few Democratic politicians doing it.
Good point. Oof, but I know how it would play with the conservatives I know if they read an article about Ferguson's economy; they'd say "There's plenty of white towns that got hit hard too... If I lost my home, I'd work hard to get another, not riot..."
ReplyDeleteIt is not racism in every case, but it is always a failure of imagination. By which I just mean basic human empathy. By which I mean an appreciation of contingency. Just suppose you grew up under different pressures -- do you really believe you'd be the same person? Usually you get a concession that you'd be different "but that doesn't change the facts of right and wrong." Which is insane -- you just admitted it would, and then you declare it doesn't? Of course the conservative's upbringing has gifted him with a superior vantage on right and wrong, one that is the True Set of Opinions.
It is not racism exactly, because there is no explicit "they are genetically inferior" angle. But it is de facto racist in all results, and if you point that out you get a bitter "I'd be against rioters if they were white instead" deflection. It is just a refusal to think more about it, and a preference for self-justification because self-examination might open a can of worms that might lead to revising too many opinions about heroes like Reagan and villains like Obama. We have believed these things for too long and can't imagine who we'd be if we had to believe differently.
Only then can you expect to get the women.
ReplyDeleteBut protest aren't spreading just because Michael Brown was killed. They're out because the city of Ferguson responded by going full Tienanmen Square when people dared to say things like "Where's the police officer?" or "Why did you leave his body in the street for hours?" (As an aside, I'd be interested to know the last time someone stopped flights over a city to keep the press from seeing what's going on, that was alarming.)
ReplyDeleteThey're out because we're up to four (at least) police shootings of unarmed black men and boys since August and the official response ranges from "WAAAH HE WAS SCARED!!!" to "Yeah? So?"
And when they read the paper or turn on the TV they're treated to dumbfucks pointing out that Michael Brown was no angel or Rudy 911iani claiming that blacks need to be patrolled by white cops because black people tend to commit crimes against people they know, which is totally unlike whites. And then they see that the police managed to take alive a white man who shot two police officers, killed one and then eluded capture for at least a month. And let's not even get into the toxic bullshit that's cluttering up the internet.
tl;dr - People aren't lying down on streets in December because one man was killed in the suburbs of St. Louis.
Smart, but not ... intellectual. (Makes limp wrist motions)
ReplyDeletePeople have a surprisingly difficult time empathizing with people in different circumstances. We just have too many biases. It's hard to put yourself in the shoes of, in this case, a person of another race and not view their problems through the lens of your own experience, even if you're consciously trying not to. Simply put, I can't stop being me just for the sake of argument.
ReplyDeleteThere is this strange post-modernist, Orwellian phenomenon going on around us. People keep talking over and over about Obama's "failed presidency" and his "unpopular agenda" and his "ruined economy" and so on and on and on.
ReplyDeleteI hear this stuff, and honestly I'm starting to feel like the only sane patient in Bedlam. "Ruined economy"? Five+plus years of economic growth? Five+plus years of job growth? A catastrophic slide that ended JUST ABOUT EXACTLY ON THE DAY OF HIS INAUGURATION and has led to consistent expansion ever since? Dow Jones having MORE THAN DOUBLED IN SIX YEARS???? I mean, no lie, things suck for a lot of people, but if this is a ruined economy, then Bush presided over a nuked economy.
"Unpopular agenda"? Re-elected in a landslide? OK, heis party lost some seats in the midterms, which as I understand it, always happens. And OK, his popularity numbers are...what, low forties? But Congress has popularity numbers lower than fucking syphilis. You could probably find more Americans who agreed with the statement "The Loch Ness monster is real" than the statement "John Boehner has been an effective congressional leader". But OBAMA's unpopular?
"Failed presidency"? Except for how he did just about exactly everything he said he would do AND fixed Bush's mess? Again, yes, we can quibble about whether ACA was the best it could have been, and he keeps droning people to death, but he hasn't started any wars and he scaled back the ones he was handed. And the "scandals" they keep reporting are all fake.
I sort of wish I could live another hundred years to see how the history books record this time. The wingnuts are doing their level best to make him the worst president on record, with NO EVIDENCE to support it except their own bitching. AND IT'S WORKING. I just don't get it at all.
...but his column suggests he's at least dimly aware that the most
ReplyDeleteeffective thing conservatives can communicate to white people males is that
they are to be taken more seriously than anyone else.
Yeah, true. Man, I go back and forth on racism -- I just wrote a post below where I don't think it's a driving force for many people, but 5 minutes later, here I am thinking it is. I've met few real racists -- by which I mean people who think "the other is inferior." But sometimes I think about half the country is just plain resentful that some Other is getting their money and running riot, and funny how that breaks along race lines. Anyway, the right has been monstrously skilled at insinuating to the $7.25 guy that all the programs he could use are bad news because they encourage Those People to be lazy. The Dems can counter with data and anecdote for miles but that ooga booga branding barely takes a ding.
ReplyDelete"the complex set of attitudes and life positions which … have pushed this group further from the Democratic president over the past six years"
ReplyDeleteRacist resentment is a "complex set of attitudes" like Thunderbird is a "high-quality fine wine".
I don't find it impossible to get at least some empathy.
ReplyDeleteImagination might be part of where the Dem/Repub break occurs, and it could explain why most artists go Dem and most Repub suggestions for How to Win the Culture by Seizing Control of the Arts are so laughably tone-deaf. You can't write or act without finding enough empathy to make a different point of view credible. Unless you want to Mary-Sue your way through 1,000 pages like Ayn Rand regularly did or grow up to be Kirk Cameron.
"What's the word? Thunderbird! What's the price? Forty-five twice."
ReplyDeleteCool chair.
ReplyDeleteNatch, you've seen the movie.
ReplyDeleteI don't think it can be discounted. Underlying it all is fear--fear of further loss of status/economic position/job/etc., and fear is a pretty powerful motivator. And, the Repugs do yeoman work stoking those fears and then letting ordinary people's tribal instincts fill in the blanks. It's very effective at creating those essential fractures that divert attention from the real culprits, I think. Just one example--the NRA and the gun manufacturers have been doing a bang-up business for decades and it's not because everyone is afraid of Middle Eastern terrorists.
ReplyDeleteThe great thing about Good Old Fashioned Common Sense(tm) is that little thinking is required.
ReplyDeleteOne argument I've heard is that "the base" hates the idea. Just accepting that they need the stinky non-Nordic peoples' support runs into their delusion that they're God's chosen and shouldn't have to debase themselves like that.
ReplyDeleteLipitor? Cialis? Wouldn't access to those drugs imply that they had access to health care? I think what the Pugs should do after they completely wreck the ACA is to totally deregulate the prescription drug market and just let folks buy anything they want over the counter. Then move on to removing the necessity of medical licensing altogether. Hell, I can't wait till I can buy replacement bearings for my knee replacements from Ace Hardware. FREEDOM, baby!
ReplyDeletemost effective thing conservatives can communicate to white people MEN is that they are to be taken more seriously than anyone else.
ReplyDeleteFixed.
Except that Hanson is not the only one saying those things. When you've got every wingnut congressvermin, talking head, and newspaper opiner yammering "Catastrophic", "Failed", "Lawless", and "Feckless", what you've got, my friends, is Message Discipline.
ReplyDeleteI of course agree with everything you just said. My specific point was that the "failed presidency" theme is just bullshit. (They stole it from us; remember the google bomb "miserable failure?)
ReplyDeleteFirst time I read this, it came through as "K-Lotion."
ReplyDeleteBush was a failure, and we were miserable.
ReplyDeleteI really like this comment. I think the main reason the rich present themselves as ordinary folks is also TV. On TV, practically everyone is well off, if not rich. If you see the apartment on Friends and say "yeah, that looks like my NYC apartment" then you really have a lot of money. I think wealthy people are subtly influenced by this. People like Gates, rising from the upper middle class to the stratosphere of wealth see their childhood as normal compared to those presented TV sitcoms.
ReplyDeleteI keep trying to get the wingnuts on my Facebook feed to understand that Brown's death was a catalyst, that it doesn't matter if he did everything Wilson said, his death was the spark.
ReplyDeleteBut no, all is here is "Your hero was a thug who got what he deserved!"
Thanks to the bought-and-paid-for referees... er... Supreme Court, campaign finance reform is dead until the ideological balance of the court changes.
ReplyDeleteHere in Northern Kentucky, an entire public housing complex, comprised of hundreds of homes, almost all Black occupied, was razed for a luxury condo development.
ReplyDeleteFive years later? Still a giant vacant lot.
"The Obama presidency has been a success for the rich" is not the meme we want to spread. I apologize for the bluntness but the president had the chance to help his fellow citizens by punishing the banksters, taking over the banks, and helping the homeowners, and he didn't. The fact that we have African-Americans rioting against official oppression and economic strangulation under an African-American president might shock later generations.
ReplyDeleteBut the talk of a failed presidency is baloney any way; we act as if the office of the president exists to exalt the superior over the inferior, instead of being a public service job.
Look, if you had to come up with some kind of right-wing propaganda, and the material you had to work with was the record of George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Nixon, McCain, and Romney, you'd make up the most insane bullshit about Obama too. 27% of the population is going to run with it no matter how fucking stupid it is (death panels, Benghazi!, the war on coal, long-form birth certificate) and a good chunk of the rest will look at all the mud in the water and mumble, "Never mind, both sides do it."
ReplyDeleteBut they never learn. Eg, Alison Grimes trying to out-teabag Sen. Yertle.
ReplyDeleteThat doesn't sound so bad. My first concert was Rush (Moving Pictures tour) with Rory Gallagher opening, I think?
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, this has been the DLC/New Dem strategy ever since the 1984 Reagan landslide. That faction always points to the fact that Clinton won twice following their policy prescriptions, but, rarely admits that both terms were won with pluralities, not majorities. Both terms were pretty destructive to the country, as well, in the long term and in predictable ways.
ReplyDeleteWhat's interesting in this context is some of the film and interviews in Adam Curtis' "Century of the Self" which, in its last episode, details the ways in which the Clinton administration tailored its messaging and policy proposals to swing voters and the ways in which "New" Labour emulated the tactics of the "New" Dems. There's one particularly acidic former Labour advisor who said, in essence, 'you place all your attention on the most fickle segment of the voting public, and you do what they want. They don't like the tax cost of trains, so you ruin public transport with privatization. Then, the next election, they're screaming at you because train travel has become even more expensive and less reliable. That's no way to make public policy.'
I don't think the Dems are trying to get the votes of the hard-core righty-tighty-whiteys so much as they are trying to appease and cajole the 3-4% that swing elections, the flibbertigibbets that don't know fuck-all and are easily confused and swayed by their emotions. The problem is that the Dem base is given short shrift because of that, and if they also think they've been lied to or had their demands ignored, they don't come out to vote, and they can't really be blamed for that. It's a function of having only two parties. One party is full of screaming, out-of-their-skulls zonkers and the other, once in office, seems to be an apologist for everything antithetical to the most loyal parts of the Dem base, so it seems to them to be a no-win situation.
When the rich became tired of commuting from all-white suburbs they razed an historic Black neighborhood near downtown and put up townhouses, bars and restaurants.
ReplyDeleteAnd come election time we are told to vote for the apologist because he is the only one who can win. That's true but it's not exactly inspiring and it won't work forever.
ReplyDeleteOh, I don't think the poor will have to spend too much time talking to each other before the Masters of the Universe realize they were a lot better off giving the TV signals away. I also expect they'll be so unwilling to give up a new revenue stream (having already sold off the theoretical future profits as collateralized obligation derivatives) that it will be easy to barbeque them alive in their Gulfstreams, sitting on the taxiway at the Westchester County airport.
ReplyDeleteThe Tubes! Gawd, I'm old.
ReplyDeleteI guess the Canadian rednecks got their own cry: "Canada, fuck yeah, eh. Sorry, I know it's not polite to say 'fuck.'"
ReplyDeleteWe ought to be making life extremely uncomfortable for the rich right now.
ReplyDeleteWhat public acts of political theater will it take to get this class war started? I ask for a friend.
Since Clinton, it seems like almost every Democrat is just waiting for that Sistah Souljah moment. And if they're not telling the base to go screw, they're running away from their own records and core beliefs.
ReplyDeleteA prime example is Landrieu and her "I don't advocate for abortion" bullshit. I guess she can't come out and say "Every woman has an absolute right to decide what to do with her very own body" because then the strident anti-abortion people won't vote for her, or something. But the anti-abortion people would never vote for her under any conceivable circumstances, and all her statement does is make her pro-choice supporters say "WTF?!?!?!" and maybe decide to stay home come run-off day.
Wait--I've definitely heard of minority plague rats but I'm unclear on that other thing. Are you sure they can have values?
ReplyDelete"...and a baby's arm holding an apple."
ReplyDeleteYou have to understand the power of conservative bullshit. Back when I ran the local radio station, I had two employees who lived in trailers and survived on the slightly better than minimum wage I could pay them. They each had a net worth of maybe $5,000.
ReplyDeleteBut both of these guys were absolutely convinced that when they died, the government was going to take most of what they owned and dispossess their widows. So they were both adamant that the Estate Tax be repealed.
This sort of thing goes hand-in-hand with the idea that half the Federal budget goes to welfare, half goes to foreign aid, half goes to weird art projects, and another half goes to "entitlements." It's all part of the rightwing messaging machine, and it's convinced vast swaths of the citizenry that their interests lie with giving the wealthy everything--and that their own government should be demolished.
At least there's something for the former residents to come picket.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure that political theater is going to do it. Even Occupy, with a lot of initial support from the public, didn't endure beatings and arrests. These days, as in the past, putting people in the streets means getting people hurt, but today, such protests are seen as ephemeral and transitory--part of the news cycle. What might work, though, is to hit the fatcats where it really hurts--in the wallet. We could probably get an entirely new Constitution, with considerable restraints on the obscenely rich (corporate and individual), if we could sustain a national strike for just one month. But, in order for that to happen, there would have to be a whole lot more distress in the general population than there is now, and a lot more willingness, community by community, to help those in real need get through that month. At least, in that scenario, it's harder for the police to crack heads when everyone's at home watching daytime tv.
ReplyDeletePeople don't protest much here. Sticking your neck out traditionally wasn't very safe.
ReplyDeleteI agree that it will take a while before the hurt is enough to spark lots more protests.
ReplyDeleteBy political theater I mean we hand out popcorn while the mansions burn.
Yeah, that's something we can't do much about at this point.
ReplyDeleteI sort of wish I could live another hundred years to see how the history books record this time.
ReplyDeleteWell, the ones in college will rank him about #20 out of the 60-ish presidents we'll have had by then. The ones in Texas public schools will dedicate the chapter mainly to Benghazi, Obama taking Trayvon Martin's "side," and how his failure to act properly in Syria or Ferguson or Outer Space led directly to [insert name of disaster to occur during subsequent and blameless Republican president].
I got out of the boat to read York's column. Almost immediately a popup ad appeared for Bill Kristol's newsletter. On reflection this is a better comment than any I could make.
ReplyDeleteThat's Keith Ablow's entire job at Fox too. He might have the world's most ornamental doctorate.
ReplyDeleteWhite boys are all unique, but they all agree with ME! York has a firm grasp on diversity, Washington Examiner style.
ReplyDeleteDeregulate the prescription drug market? The whole point of the so-called "free market" is to make sure that rich white guys keep getting richer, and there is no way in hell they'll kick the props out from underneath Big Pharma.
ReplyDeleteThis would be borne out by the number of Tea Party candidates successfully challenging long-time incumbents in Repug primaries who are perceived to be insufficiently ardent on the Tea Party's purity scale.
ReplyDeleteOf course, that drives the party ever rightward, and even the slightly less batshit-insane Repug candidates are swept up in the bandwagon effect. It's the political equivalent of a positive feedback loop, and is a considerable feature of the general institutional insanity we are experiencing in these United States today.
There's conscious racism and unconscious. The Klan will never again be as powerful as it was in the 20s, and the American Nazi Party will always be a mildly disturbing oddity in the national life. Even among older white people I think a majority can say "I always say good morning to the black greeter at Wal-Mart" or "I once dated a girl who was Mexican on her mother's side" or something equally anodyne.
ReplyDeleteUnconscious racism is alive and well, though. This can be seen in the number of people who assume that Michael Brown must have been doing something just terrible to make that nice Officer Wilson shoot him, something so heinous they didn't even dare to move or cover the body for several hours after he died, because you just can't be sure. More flagrant,but just as unconscious, is the belief that Presidents Washington through Bush II were motivated by a love of America, a quality that somehow can't be detected in the current CIC.
"Bush had swept into office on the backs of values voters. But the gathering wasn't catering to evangelical Christians; the purpose was to discuss a variety of issues of concern to American Muslims—everything from political appointments, to civil liberties, to a Ramadan postage stamp. It was organized by the Islamic Institute, a think tank founded by Norquist, the conservative anti-tax crusader, and the guest list was culled from the ranks of Muslim–American organizations and community leaders. By some estimates, Muslims had turned out in huge numbers for Bush; at least one prominent Republican credited them with making the difference in Florida."
ReplyDeletehttp://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/05/gop-muslim-vote-2012
How'd that work out for you Karl?
"And if they're not telling the base to go screw, they're running away from their own records and core beliefs."
ReplyDeleteThis in particular really pissed me off about the Kerry campaign, where he was shut down by the flip-flopper argument. It wasn't like it was so difficult to articulate the message that he changed his opinion on the Iraq War after it turned out the WMD evidence was bogus.
Black communities being denied water and sewer, foreclosed on in wholesale manner, and then bulldozed into vacant lots.
ReplyDeleteObviously they're the problem when they don't bend over and take it.
Speaking of demon worshippers, I heard a rumor the other day that Carly Fiorina is considering a Presidential run. Dare we hope that the famous Demon Sheep will once again ride forth across our televisions?
ReplyDeleteDoesn't everyone on welfare get free cable with HBO? We set that up so we could funnel propaganda to them via the liberal media.
ReplyDeleteWaddya want from life?
ReplyDeleteAnd for Blacks, sticking your neck out was a good way to get it stretched.
ReplyDelete"Let Carly do for America what she's done for HP!"
ReplyDeleteWorking class people need some kind of motivation to engage in the political process. What are we supposed to believe in, the American Dream?
ReplyDeleteIt's kind of hard to expect people to believe in working your way up the ladder when upward mobility has been stagnant for so long. When we look up to our "betters" and see that they really aren't "better" in any real way.
Darn, that GIF isn't animated like it should be. The little character is supposed to be trying to jump up to the block and failing.
ReplyDelete"A verbose way to write 'racism'" is NRO's motto.
ReplyDeleteI thought their motto was There Is No Bottom On Our Barrel
ReplyDeleteSo when do I get to shoot fireballs at people?
ReplyDelete"Unusual"ly Revoolant:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xY7mBQrzXU
Actually Obama will be described as having taken the side of Trayvon Brown, the nine foot tall brute who singlehandedly destroyed the entire city of Ferguson before the brave Officer Wilson shot him down with a single bullet to the temple.
ReplyDelete"Here, have a couple Viagra and wash 'em down with some grapefruit juice. Don't worry about that headache, that'll go away soon enough..."
ReplyDeleteAnd the world's greatest Fox surname, too. Roll over Steve Doocy and give David Asman the news.
ReplyDeleteAnd what about people without mustaches?
ReplyDeleteShakezula, you would LOVE my favorite books by Wen Spencer, Alien Taste etc... about a character who was, in fact, created by an Alien Ovipositor. You should check them out. But if you don't like them, forget I ever mentioned it.
ReplyDeleteThe new GOP Mustache Voucher Program (aka "Stossel's Law") will cover you.
ReplyDeleteBigger balls and a longer field - plus a beaver shot? If Aaron Copeland had made vids like that, he'd a had a lotta hits.
ReplyDeleteA bit off-topic, but since you linked to Hanson, this has to be the most ignorant, stupid and/or mendacious proposition I've ever read even from that pompous fraud:
ReplyDelete"So, in the end, what was global warming? It seems to have grown up largely as a late-20th-century critique of global-market capitalism by elites who had done so well by it that they had won the luxury of caricaturing the very source of their privilege."
It won't be long before professors have the same level of community respect as used car salesmen and politicians.
man what
ReplyDeleteIKR, it's like (classy)2
ReplyDeleteAhh! Hudson's Bay blanket coat! Want!!
ReplyDelete*monotone* the mustache only needs to cover you for long enough to... merge
ReplyDeletethen you will see the truth
little My, to be covered by Stossel's mustache
ReplyDeleteHow much will you pay me not to animate that?
So, in the end, what was mendacious shilling for the oil industry? It seems to have grown up largely as a late 20th Century critique of science by talentless hacks and gold digging scientists who felt that there was money to be made whoring for rich folks. AND THERE WAS!!
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of dumbfucks, Sean Hannity had Bo "The Turd That Walks Like A Man" Dietl and Mark "They're German Heroism Symbols" Fuhrman on tonight to talk about how poor Offissa Pudd never had a chance and had to shoot Mike Brown to save his life.
ReplyDeleteBoth sides are guilty in this. They both do it.
ReplyDeleteWhat, are you kidding? My first was the Strawberry Alarm Clock!
ReplyDeleteAnd don't forget Sherri S. Tepper's "The Fresco," in which aliens impregnate all the members of the all-male committee running the anti-abortion organization.
ReplyDeleteO filio: ignorant, mendax, et stultus non vita per quam viam ingrediamini est. \Dean Wormer
ReplyDelete[I'm no Latinist, I'm afraid, so if this is no good, blame Google Translate].
Sometimes I picture what it would look like if the corporate offices didn't get vacuumed for a month, or the trash taken out, or their restrooms cleaned, or if they went to the supply cabinet (once they figured out where it was) and found that somehow there were no inkjet or toner cartridges because nobody ordered any, and then the copiers jam and they yell but no secretary or assistant comes to fix it for them.
ReplyDeleteThen they get home, assuming the traffic lights still work properly, and find that the dog pooped on the carpet because the walker didn't show up, but the house is messy anyway because the housekeeper didn't show up either, plus their Amazon order still hasn't arrived because it's only supervisors running around trying to fill orders.
So they go to the actual store, but they can't find what they need because the shelves aren't stocked, and anyway, there are only two assistant managers at the checkout stands. And then they can't even console themselves with a latte because even though there's a barista (maybe) the espresso machine is broken and no one knows if or when anyone will be out to fix it.
We don't need zombies for an apocalypse. A general strike would work pretty well. But when you've got something to lose - especially if it's only a little bitty bit - it's a lot to ask. It would take, as you noted, a "...willingness, community by community, to help those in real need get through that month...." And we're not able to do that yet.
I would hope to never even brush against that moustache, much less be covered by it. Ewww!
ReplyDeleteYou make fun of Byron York, but this is basically the same bullshit Thomas Frank has been peddling for 10 years and everyone seems content to just look the other way.
ReplyDeleteI think the idea is that Hispanics should support them rather than the other way around. After all, most of the GOP white base is already voting against their own interests, so why should Those People get special treatment?
ReplyDeleteIt won't be long before professors have the same level of community respect as used car salesmen and politicians.
ReplyDeleteThough for Fresno State, that's still doing pretty well:
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Ewe-Fresno-State-student-arrested-in-sheep-5894892.php
You bald fookin pussy. Bring it pussy
ReplyDeleteFook you
ReplyDeleteHey Pere. You get a job yet, you fookin loser?
ReplyDeleteShut the Fook up
ReplyDeleteThe effect? 2 queers banging each other. Completely wrong
ReplyDeleteOh I bet it, you tit sucking obola ite. Go Fook yourself you piece of shite
ReplyDeleteBecause it's only right to be WHITE. THATS WHY
ReplyDeleteJust shut the Fook up
ReplyDeleteJust sHut the Fook up you dirty fookin libtard pussy
ReplyDeletejust shut the Fook up
ReplyDeleteYou want that hairy bush in your face
ReplyDeleteWhile it's unfortunately true that Tourette syndrome is incurable, its effects can still be mitigated through a course of therapy and medication. You might want to check to see if your Obamacare covers this.
ReplyDelete... and Democrats that don't understand how to properly counter it....
ReplyDeleteNo, I think not. Show your work.
ReplyDeleteIt's weird that there's a random belligerent twelve-year-old stomping through the comments. It creates a certain je ne sais quoi.
ReplyDeleteIt's a function of the human condition, JP. It's not a right or left thing.
ReplyDeleteIt's been that way for eons.
If you want blogposts on Thomas Frank, here's a good one: http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2014/07/teleological-fallacy
ReplyDeleteWe as a society were making great strides in making open racism unacceptable. Sadly, Obama's election has actually reversed that. From the time he started running, Republicans began circulating all kinds of racist stuff--from his face Photoshopped onto a witch doctor to watermelons on the White House lawn to "jokes" about serving fried chicken and chitlins at state dinners. Today, we have people in public positions unafraid to make racist remarks, and I overhear conversations laced with racial epithets that I thought had vanished long ago.
ReplyDeleteI fear America is only "beyond" its racism when Those People stay in their place and don't rise above their stations.
I'm not sure it's a bandwagon effect as much as it is a filtering effect. Nobody survives the primary who doesn't come out echoing the most insane extreme-right positions. Initially, you might have had "sane" Republicans who only mouthed the words. But eventually you get True Believers running, and the sane ones either lose or go over the edge themselves.
ReplyDeleteI'm racking my brain to remember anything they did beyond Incense and Peppermints. The band does have a Web site, though:
ReplyDeletehttp://strawberryalarmclock.com/
growing ranks of alienated white voters
ReplyDeleteI'll just leave this here . . .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoP7epAb1h4
Ix-nay on the esponses-ay to the oll-tray.
ReplyDeleteThat pretty much describes what she would if she had the power.
ReplyDeleteThere's certainly unconscious racism, but one thing you don't want to discount is sneaky racism. The smarter racists know their beliefs aren't suitable to be said in public. So they find clever or passive-agressive ways to be racist. That type of person is the "good cop" to the KKK-types' "bad cop". Racism isn't just a self-replicating system. It's also adaptable and opportunistic.
ReplyDeleteI need to find the proper perch for york's voluminous mane.
ReplyDeleteWhy is it that some people choose to stick with the least attractive hairstyle of their twenties, like it is some kind of safety blanket, or a vindictive S.O. told them that it looked "fabulous" and that is what they held onto.
The mysteries never cease...There are things in heaven and earth, Horatio...
...
Ah, yesss... "We've got to run America like a business..."
ReplyDeleteI'm very pleased to see the new troll policy both in effect and being effective. Thanks, Roy!
ReplyDeleteGiven the amount of ridicule they eagerly court, it could be "Put us over a barrel and spank our bottoms."
ReplyDeleteApologies to anyone who was NOT planning to give the little grey cells a bleach bath today.
Gov. Voldemort Scott would have be somewhere near the front of the museum.
ReplyDeleteMy takeaway from this article is that Byron York is somewhat "dim." Did I do it right?
ReplyDeleteMy variant on Shakes's take: "We're All Bottoms in this Barrel!"
ReplyDeleteYork and his compadres are whistling past the graveyard. That big demographic wave they hear in the close proximity of their balding heads is about to smash their preconceptions of what race baiting has wrought.
ReplyDeleteDrowned in a tsunami of stupid?
ReplyDeleteWe need "better Democrats," but that's a generational effort.
ReplyDeleteAh, the debasing! Yes, every time a politician "openly appeals" to blacks, it debases our system. And I suspect it is part of why they freaked out about the new AP History standards. The new standards view history as the product of competing interests; the cons prefer we adhere to a grand narrative of increasing greatness. (In the narrative, the Civil War is a heroic trial by fire instead of a complete breakdown instigated by racist assholes; you can see their investment.) Of course, a narrative has to have clear, above-the-fray heroes, it can't be driven by grubby mobs who actually want something. Really, they want history to be the unfunny version of a book Dave Barry wrote about 25 years ago, a mock history of the US that kept repeating a tiny footnote, "And of course women and minorities continued to make valuable contributions." To conservatives, this is not a joke -- adding the footnote is already a ridiculous caving in to the crazy libs.
ReplyDeleteLGM has really been giving it to Frank, especially since he started writing for Salon.
ReplyDeleteThe National Review: It's Huddled Beneath The Bottom of the Barrel, Shouting "Stop"
ReplyDeleteLGM has really been giving it to Frank, especially since he started criticizing the democrats.
ReplyDeletefixed your typo
Also, they seem to have misstated Frank's argument.
No indictment in NY. Cue shouts of "If only Garner hadn't thuggishly sold untaxed cigarettes, he would still be alive."
ReplyDeleteUpvoted for "gitterati".
ReplyDeleteCan we call it fascism yet?
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/ryanjreilly/status/540259820826558465/photo/1
Nah, not until a reactionary white supremacist opposition party uses total governmental obstruction and the escalating threat of violence from its followers to leverage itself into political control, despite lacking an electoral majority.
ReplyDeletehttps://pbs.twimg.com/media/B3-I0xpCQAAp1M7.png:large
ReplyDeleteIt's only fascism if an open carry ammosexual is asked to produce an ID. That's where the line is.
ReplyDeleteI find this to be almost incredulous, but then I realize, both sides do it. We're both guilty.
ReplyDeletegogurt,
ReplyDeleteYou're doing nothing with your rapid fire blog posts. Go out and protest. Go do something productive. Yours an online skacktivist.
In GOP's America, mustache rides you.
ReplyDeleteHe didn't resist, the chokehold was banned by the NYPD, and even the damn medial examiner said the chokehold was a factor in Gardner's death and fucking ruled it "homicide".
ReplyDeleteI can't find anything about why the GJ ruled as it did, but they owe a goddamn good explanation to the public.