GOP Nominee
Former Candidates
Republicans have long appealed to blue collar voters with populism and social issues.
How do Republicans use populism?
It’s not the workers of the world UNITE!!!!! sort we see on the left. No, we tell voters the Democrat thinks they’re better than us. Oddly enough Democrats seem to play along. Gore, Kerry, and now Obama all seem open to the charge “You think you’re better than me?”
Social issues appeal as a counter weight to Democrats’ cultural liberalism. Social issues shift focus off something unpopular with blue collar voters (sometimes our economic policies, this time the war) and onto something working class voter agree with. Working class voters mostly aren’t committed pro-life activists. Practicing Catholics are but we’re appealing to a larger group with understated social issues. We’re appealing to voters who see a rapidly changing, insecure world and want things to slow down. They don’t feel strongly about abortion or gay marriage but the Democrat’s support of these things make working class voters uncomfortable.
In this year many working class voters are focused on personal economic disasters. Their food costs twice as much as before Bush was elected. They spend more of their shrinking paychecks on gas, rent, mortgages and healthcare. In short they’re being squeezed as bad as 1991.
Republicans can not win blue collar voters this year with populism or social issues alone. Both of those tools are vital but not enough. Republicans need to find something else to connect with the 45% of voters who earn less than $50,000.
So I want to ask you to do a little exercise. Imagine for a moment you’re not an online activist. Try thinking what would appeal to these culturally conservative working class voters besides the populism and social issues we’ll use anyway. What themes or policies do you think will win over these voter McCain is depending on?
May 10th, 2008 at 9:07 am
The problem is that the Republicans in 1994 should have looked at the difference between white birthrates and the black and hispanic birthrates and realize that the only way to maintain in form of conservative party in the U.S. is to dominate the white vote. Then maybe they would have cut out the pork spending, the earmarks, the speical tax breaks, and the special benefits. Maybe they would have realize that the best way to cut spending is to use Congressional hearings to hound every administrator in the government and force them to cut their budgets.
But the Reublicans were too stupid to understanding demographic trends and too short sighted to do anything about them. I guess getting political appointments for idiot children and friends was more important.
It is too late to try to remake the Republican Party. People are just going to have to get used to the idea that the Republican Party has made itself irrelevant in politics and that the U.S. is a one party state where the Democrats get to call all of the shots.
May 10th, 2008 at 9:11 am
Free Pr0n.
May 10th, 2008 at 9:13 am
Find some way - any way to get gasoline prices below $2.80 a gallon. If McCain doesn’t want to drill in ANWR fine - then talk about opening up places like ND for drilling. Oil reserves have been found there and I have to believe that a Republican governor would be open to drilling. Go after the oil companies. I’m all for capitalism but there is no excuse for record profits from these guys. They ARE gouging. Despite what Limbaugh says. The other day I heard Sean Hannity defend the oil companies saying that they only make 9 percent profit and that it’s no different than what profit levels are in the fast food industry. Regular folks don’t care. Record profit is record profit. And if you don’t like what McDonalds charges for a hamburger then go to Wal-Mart buy the food and make it yourself. Consumers don’t have that option with gasoline. So when GOP sympathisers side with the oil companies our candidates our doomed to failure. McCain needs to do something. Maybe we ought to take some oil from Iraq. Why the hell not? If our country is good enough to try to liberate Iraq then their oil is good enough to repay what we’re sacrificing in blood.
THAT is the issue. Gasoline prices. Everyone is feeling it. If McCain can demonstrate something on this issue that could work, he’ll win.
May 10th, 2008 at 9:54 am
#2 That’s funny (but I assure you its already available)
Adam, wow we mostly agree. There are two issues that are the face of our economic troubles, housing and oil. The housing market is in the midst of a correction and I am in favor of mostly letting the market fix itself. Some homeowners (who can pay their current mortgage) should get help but speculators should get burned.
On oil, I am not in favor of punishing oil companies (although the pay packages of some of the execs are insulting). I don’t think there is gauging. What I would favor is an end to oil companies tax breaks and a mandate to invest/explore alternatives.
The silliest idea is the gas tax holiday and I was shocked to hear that republicans in the House are going to push it. The GOP could get killed on this one issue because it not only is an ineffective way to lower prices but also deprives our crumbling infrastructure of needed funding.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:01 am
I don’t know how I feel about the gas tax holiday. I’m not opposed to it. Every little bit helps. But I don’t think the GOP will get clobbered for it if it’s sold as temporary for the summer or shown that the revenue can be made up elsewhere from cutting spending elsewhere.
It’s just posturing though. The Democrats will never let it pass and the Republicans know it. The GOP is just looking for ways to embarrass the Democrats. Typical tit for tat stuff that happens every election year.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:03 am
Whether we win this voting bloc, and this election, for that matter, depends on how successful we are at defining Obama. That means challenging his qualifications, his voting record, his past associations, and his entire world view. “Would we be safe with Obama in the presidency?” That is the question we need working class whites to ask. That, and, “who is this guy, really?”
May 10th, 2008 at 10:12 am
Well, being McCain feels more strongly about helping wild animals than the American consumer…don’t count on it. Then again, McCain anti-business feeling might lend themselves well to a witch hunt of big corporations.
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Anyway, out of curiosity, Superdestroyer, how old are you? I’m just asking because it seems like you think one or two big electoral defeats qualify as making this country a “one party state”.
There have been many major electoral landslides in both directions, either in congress, or in the white house, and none of them have ever created a one party state. Even after the mess of watergate, or the Reagan landslides, or the 1994 congressional route, or the 2002 elections, or Bush’s 2004 win, America remained a two party state.
In reality, Republicans are probably in trouble because its been 28 years since the Democrats really had a major screw up. The generation that remembers the Iran hostage crises, the energy crisis, and the optomism of Reagan is being replaced by the generation who has no recollection of the failures of Democratic policy, or the disaster of liberal cultural values. The moment we see a major democratic scandal, or a failed policy of a DNC President, we’ll see a reversal of fortunes.
The voting public simply has no reason to be angry at the DNC.
Even if McCain loses, the Iraq war will draw to a close, the troops will come home, and focus will then turn to other issues - which is another good reason why we should have choosen a nominee with some experience on domestic policy, but, oh well, I guess we wait until 2012.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:22 am
Why not look to have the price of oil brought back under the control of OPEC? Right now, the speculators are driving the price - not supply and demand, not a shortage, but speculators - people who are driving the price up in the name of making a buck, now, is a bubble, and its one that has already progressed to the point where it throws logic to the wind and keeps going - and that suggests to me that it could soon pop. But in the meantime, why not study the possibility of giving the price control back to the producers?
I think the other possibility is to challenge Democrats on their windfall tax idea - punishing the oil companies isn’t going to make the price lower, but I suggest challenging the Democrats to agree to returning the income from such a tax to the people, in the form of a $1,000 - $2,000 gas refund. If they don’t agree, well, good - success isn’t punnished, and we get to point out that they just want more power for the govt. If they agree, well, then at least we get to claim credit for the idea.
Also, on alternatives. Yes, we need to look for more sources of oil, but there is really no need to rush to get to hydrogen cars, or similar. Firstly, there is probably so much oil under the ground that we haven’t even found yet that would blow people’s minds. In addition, there are experiments ongoing that would allow us to grow oil - not in the form of ethanol, but in the form of alge, which is supposedly able to produce 2,000+ units per acre (compare to 17 for corn). Google “alge” and “oil” - its interesting. They think they could get the cost below $2.00 per gallon. Might take a few years, but right now, we’re probably chasing the wrong alternatives.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:31 am
I think McCain should continue to contrast his record of compromise and working across party lines with Obama’s single-minded, reliable partisan loyalty. If folks were put off by the perception that Dubya was only willing to work with Republicans in Congress, Obama would actually represent “more of the same” in the context of a Democratic Congressional majority. McCain, on the other hand, would promise to return to the tradition established by Washington: that the President is supposed to represent all Americans, and not just the members of his own political tribe.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:33 am
Eh…
I don’t know. As much as Americans seem to like bipartisanship - they always seem awfully unhappy with the results. You probably can’t get more bipartisan than the imigration proposal that Bush/McCain/Lieberman/Kennedy put forward, but that was opposed by more than 60% of the public.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:37 am
From what I have read and heard the price of oil is being driven up mostly by demand and also because oil is priced in US dollars and the weak dollar has made oil more expensive for us.
Regarding exploration, I agree that there are still some big finds to be made (Brazil made a huge find recently but it will cost a fortune to get to it). Also, Iraq supposedly has large reserves, but there is no infrastructure. But more importantly, exploration and alternatives will not lower the price by November.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:46 am
Act, I admit it has it’s problems. But what scares the bejazzus out of me is the idea of the smooth functioning of an executive branch working in harmony with a legislative branch under the same party’s control. Divided government (putting talk of bipartisanship aside as more wind than rain) at least slows down some of the more radical, expansive federal bloat.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:51 am
“From what I have read and heard the price of oil is being driven up mostly by demand and also because oil is priced in US dollars and the weak dollar has made oil more expensive for us.”
Yes and no. Oil is being driven up by the dollar, and by demand, but the primary driving factor is speculation. The price has now started moving up even when the dollar gets stronger, or when supply increases, or when demand drops. Its become a bull market that feels invincible.
Basically, its a bubble, and bubbles pop, Oil might never be $20 a bbl again, but $50-$75 is probably not our of the question.
May 10th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
I’ve heard speculation only raises oil prices by about $20 a barrel. Instability in oil regions (Nigeria, Venezuela, Iraq) adds about another $15-$20.
Oddly enough the way to cool off speculators is to raise capital gains taxes on short-term positions. That removes the incentive to manipulate the market.
May 10th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
The most glaring fact about the rise in oil prices is the fact that it didn’t have to happen. We have had a moritorium on drilling for oil for 25 years. Our domestic oil production has been cut in half since then. In the meantime, the demand for oil has gone up as nations like China and India industrialize. Oil prices are determined by nothing more than supply and demand.
May 10th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
Interestingly, Democrats are having this same discussion regarding blue collar versus minority voters, although it’s not quite as constructive as we have here. In fact, dare I say, Hillary’s people are exactly right when they claim to be in a better position among blue collar voters than anyone else running, and yet she is attacked even for that by the Obama-worshiping left. I fear the GOP will never learn from history, but I feel better knowing the Dems are just as ignorant as we are. Read:
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/05/10/clintons_diminishing_of_black_voters/
May 10th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
We could convert all of their money into Lioncash, give out free copies of Battletoads, or promise a lieked Mudkipz in every household.
Oh, please, someone, get this joke…
May 10th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
TMNT?
May 10th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
The way Republicans ought to appeal to the lower class is by offering upward mobility for their children. The American Dream.
Why do we talk about Reagan so much, but act as if we learned nothing from him?
May 10th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Way, way, off-topic, but no place to put this. . .
For those political history buffs like myself out there, this pic of a gathering of seven living Alaskan governors was in today’s Anchorage Daily News:
http://www.adn.com/photos/story/401441.html?/1521/gallery/401442-a401521-t3.html
A lot of Alaska’s former governors still live and work in Anchorage, so they’re often seen walking around downtown. Former Gov. Stepovich (the guy in the middle of the bottom row in the pic), who is 89 years old, was a territorial governor who served in 1958, six years before Gov. Sarah Palin was born.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
“It is too late to try to remake the Republican Party. People are just going to have to get used to the idea that the Republican Party has made itself irrelevant in politics and that the U.S. is a one party state where the Democrats get to call all of the shots.”
Oh, please. That’s absolutely absurd.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
metrorepublican,
It is hard for the Republicans to talk about hard work and upward mobility when it seems that all of the political appointtes are the idiot children of the rich. Maybe in President Bush had apponte up and coming hard workers instead of Patrick Henry college graduates and quota blacks, the Republicans would have a littel more crediblity.
Also, when the Republican President wants open borders and unlimited immigration, it is hard for the Republicans to talk about improving education and occupational opprotunities for blue collar whites.
Hunter,
The Republican Party has made itself irreelvant in states like California already. As the demographics of the U.S. become more like California, does anyone really believe that the Republcians/conservatives can keep themselves relevant?
May 10th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Condi Rice is a “quota black?” Was Colin Powell who served three presidents? Wow, how insultingly racist.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
The GOP can accomodate changing demographics without giving up its core beliefs of individual freedom and less government intrusion. I think the primary cause of the party’s diminished power over the past years is that the GOP has come to expect that voters will just see the light and vote Republican with little encouragement needed to vote that way. We’ve become complacent in voter recruitment, we’ve become complete morons in communication of our values and true philosophy, and we’ve become useless in our PR/marketing efforts both in the media and in the public domain. Just because we believe we are the better party doesn’t mean everyone else will just come along for the ride. We cannot expect minorities to hop on board without showing them why they’d be better off for doing so.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
I don’t hear Republican talking about cutting taxes that blue collar voters pay.
70% of voters pay more in FICA taxes than in income taxes. Income tax cuts have little political appeal because they’re only the largest tax for well-off families. Everyone else pays more in other taxes.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Alphonso R. Jackson is a textbook definition of a quota black. Carlos Gutierrez is so stupid and dense that he is obviously a quota hire. There are many more further down the political appointee list. Why would anyone believe that the Republicans are the party of upward mobility when the current Republican President is a trustfund baby?
The Republicans have been unable to allow for changing demographics for at least 20 years. Every appeal to blacks and Hispanics has ended as a massive failure. Just look at the immigration reform bill that was meant to get more Hispanics to like Republicans.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
alaska jake makes good points. The dems are also not just more energized this year but also better organized. Obama is doing a 50 state voter registration drive tomorrow. I don’t know if they have a number, but a campaign with 1.5 million donors probably has an ambitious target.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:37 pm
Brownie is white and about as slow and dense as any appointee in modern history. Former White House Counsel Harriet Myers is white and she made grammatical and spelling errors on her application related to her app’t to the Supreme Court!!! Frankly, being stupid is not a sufficient criteria for separating Bush appointees.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
28. . . hahaha so true
May 10th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Brownie is white and about as slow and dense as any appointee in modern history. Former White House Counsel Harriet Myers is white and she made grammatical and spelling errors on her application related to her app’t to the Supreme Court!!! Frankly, being stupid is not a sufficient criteria for separating Bush appointees.
It is true that when blacks are stupid, they’re assumed to be there for affirmative action-related reasons. However, when whites are stupid, they’re just said to be stupid and no one looks for ulterior motives.
It really could just be that some blacks that get hired are stupid, just as some whites that get hired are stupid.
Imagine that.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
I think one of the things we have to do is start pushing our issues in the media year round. Republicans have a habit of allowing liberals to dominate the media race for three years, and then only putting in their say during the actual campaign - when many try to tune out campaign ads in the first place.
A good example of this is Global Warming - the Democrats have successfully made every american concerned about a +1 temp. increase. They’ve made oil the enemy, and have gotten the support for all kinds of environmental protections which, although they won’t tell people, drive up energy prices.
Instead of just trying to get to people who agree with out position from Aug.-Nov. every other year, why not run ads on the sanctity of life, or the importance of free markets, or the value of traditional families, or the dangers of Islamic terrorists in Iraq?
We are losing the propaganda war, and we’re starting to see the effects of that in elections.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:51 pm
We also need to quit allowing every morally bankrupt member of our party who can’t keep their pants zipped up when the wife isn’t around - from Newt Gingrich in the 90’s to Vito Fosella last week - to tell the rest of America how to live a moral wholesome life. Yes, child molestation is wrong. Yes, adultry is wrong. Yes, prostitution is wrong. Yes, sexual harassment is wrong. Yes, bribery is wrong. I don’t need Newt and Larry Craig and Mark Foley and David Ritter and Bob Packwood and Bob Livingston and Duke Cunningham (need I go on) to tell me what’s right and what’s wrong for us ignorant voters.
May 10th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
People should pray its speculation because if this run up is 100% supply and demand then the standards of living and the economy of this country is screwed.
Point A: Given the demand increase with many individuals in China and India getting vehicles and moving into the middle class for the first time, it will be nearly impossible for a demand decrease/conservation from their standpoint as conservation means going back to living without a car. Therefore, that means all demand decreases must come in this country which is possible (not without a cost) however all the new individuals getting their first car thereby increasing demand will outstrip any demand contraction in the U.S. This is not helped by the fact that gasoline prices are controlled in China, and therefore less incentives for demand decrease.
Point B: Everyone going on and on about drilling in anwar needs to also realize even if this new oil is brought into the market, the new refining capacity is minimal. Therefore, any new oil would have very little impact on price.
I’m on the more pessimistic sense about this, but if its not speculation, $150 a barrel is not out of the question, which will mean minimal or possible negative growth and the beginning of a downscale in living standards.
May 10th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
I just listened to a Q&A with George Soros. Whatever elese you think the man knows markets. He said there is speculation and even a bubble in oil prices and he attributed it in part to our falling currency. That is actually good news because it suggests the price could fall precipitously.
May 10th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
#32
Hear, hear!
May 10th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
…which is exactly what I suggested.
There is a bubble not just in oil, but in commodities in general. The stock market peaked at 14,000; currencies are risky at best, and the lack of credit available has helped to blow the housing bubble.
people are rushing into things like gold, oil, and silver to try and make a buck, and, like all other bubbles, this one will pop.
May 10th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
#25
In order to cut payroll taxes on blue collar workers (and everyone else), they’d have to cut social security, medicare and unemployment benefits. I wouldn’t mind, but it seems like a political pariah at the moment. It would take a whole lot of political will/capital to get something like that done because senior citizens living on social security would have multiple-headed cows.
Instead of reining in entitlements, our President and Congress have increased them with the latest expansion of Medicare to include more pharmaceutical benefits.
May 10th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
Ogrepete, you’re not a supply sider then right?
I thought cutting taxes led to greater revenues?
May 10th, 2008 at 9:56 pm
We waste a huge amount of money. On the wall of a junior high school yesterday was a huge sign asking if anyone wanted a free trip to Six flags. All the had to do is have no failing grade at mid term or on the final semester grade, and not have more than 3 unexcused absences. So, there’s another 50 bucks for 95% of the student body. What good did it do? Did it keep another single student from dropping out? Probably not. If just this one thing was offered to 50 million students, we’d be paying another 2.5 billion bucks in taxes for absolutely nothing.
May 12th, 2008 at 1:09 am
Illguy, schools tend to pay for stuff like that out of student body funds and booster money - i.e. donations and taxes on the students of just that school.
May 12th, 2008 at 9:11 am
Increased child tax credit that applies to payroll taxes.
May 12th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Henry that’s a wonderful idea.