Ryan Sager laments the development of what may be the next dominant swing group in the American electorate — the “WalMart voter” — and opines that such a development will be bad for the GOP and for small-government conservatism. Loosely defined, WalMart voters are working-class Middle Americans who like the military, dislike abortion, are ambivalent about taxes, and prefer a government that maintains social programs like education and Social Security. Sager fears that, with both parties trying to woo this government-friendly voting bloc, the incentive to trim government becomes non-existent. The solution, says Sager, is for the GOP to abandon the WalMart types and form a new governing coalition by replacing them with, we can infer, upscale urbanites who would presumably be far more amenable to a small government agenda.

As a twentysomething technocrat myself living in a major urban area, I have no qualms with reaching out to the cubicle-dwellers who are now an instrumental part of the modern post-industrial economy. What I do have a problem with is the notion that the GOP should reject the voting bloc that Sager has defined as the WalMart voters. To find out why, read on.

Sager’s design for a majority coalition of the upscale libertines of the nation ignores a fundamental rule of American politics: the party of Middle America is the country’s majority party. This was true during the 36-year period from 1932-1968, when the party of FDR and JFK dominated the south and midwest, and it was largely true during the subsequent 36-year period of 1968-2004, when Republicans won 7 out of 10 presidential elections against a counter-cultural, anti-military, nanny-state Democratic Party with an affinity for European-style economic policies. In both situations, the party that was able to bring together the broad swaths of voting blocs in the middle of the country dominated the party comprised largely of economic and social elites on the coasts. If Sager has any evidence that dynamic will fundamentally change in the near-future, he should present it.

Further, even if it were possible to cobble together some sort of electoral majority without the WalMart voters, ejecting them from the current center-right coalition that is the Republican Party would not be as easy as Sager suggests. In fact, attempting to do so would probably yield a major political realignment of unpredictable proportions. Today’s majority Republican coalition stands on four legs: 1) traditional, anti-government conservatives, largely based in the west; 2) Main-Street pro-growth, pro-business conservatives in the suburbs and exurbs; 3) middle class social conservatives largely based in the south; and 4) working class populists based in the south and midwest. This coalition is nearly forty years in the making and was initially envisioned by Nixon as the majority party of the future. Nixon was nothing if not prescient; he believed that the future of this country lie in a marriage between the anti-government and pro-business voting blocs of his time (who voted Republican) and the southern evangelicals and midwestern ethnic Catholics (who voted Democrat). It was Nixon’s view that this “Silent Majority” of Americans would eventually come together, jettison the now largely extinct liberal Republicans of the eastern establishment, and form a new independent conservative party to govern America. Four decades later, Nixon has basically been proven right. The precise coalition that he described now comprises the nation’s majority party. And at least one of those four legs — Middle American working class voters — would now be categorized as WalMart voters, 85 percent of whom voted for President Bush in 2004.

The point of all that is simply to illustrate the consequences of eliminating the WalMart voters from the GOP coalition. The effect would be similar to pulling a leg out from under a table; without all four legs, the table crashes to the ground. So too would be the impact of the Sager strategy. A better strategy — and one that keeps both the anti-government leg and the pro-government leg of the GOP table happy — would be to promote and develop policies that empower the WalMart voters to take control of their own lives, and thus no longer need big government. An ideal prototype is the Romney health care plan in Massachusetts. By requiring all citizens to purchase private health insurance and subsidizing that purchase for the very poor, such a policy responds to the WalMart voters’ concerns over health care while doing it in a way that utilizes market principles, involves the private sector, and actually allows individuals to take ownership of their own lives. Another example can be found in the late 1990s, when Newt Gingrich demonstrated that it was possible to balance the federal budget without raising taxes and still maintain the services that were important to the bulk of Middle Americans. Still another example can be found in the education policies of Republicans like Rudy Giuliani, who favor the introduction of market principles in public education in order to benefit working class parents who live in underfunded school districts and can’t afford private eduation for their children. With each of these policies, the goals of fiscal responsibility, proactive government action regarding a common problem, and a market-based, individualized solution are all present. The GOP of the future is not one that rejects either the traditional conservative belief in individualism and autonomy nor the pragmatic Middle American desire for societal services. Instead, the successful center-right majority party is one that empowers Americans to achieve autonomy through market-based solutions that keep the size and scope of the state in check and result in, yes, an ownership society. As such, if 2008 turns out to be the year of the WalMart voter, with the right candidate and platform, it can be a very good year for Republicans and conservatives.