>The question for supporters of the Democratic Party is this: why do
>middle-income white workers vote Republican rather than Democratic?
>Which is to blame: middle-income white workers or the Democratic
>Party? Are middle-income white workers voting against their
>economic interests (since, as Larry M. Bartels shows, the higher
>their income, the more likely questions such as abortion and
>religion matter to them) or has the Democratic Party's economic
>policy (on the wages and employment, trade and investment, taxation,
>and social spending fronts) failed them? Both?
I've gotta say that after reading Bartels stuff I've had to revise my thinking about the DLC strategy. I used to think, like many others, that a full-throated populist appeal might reverse their electoral decline, and that it was suicidal to go after upscale voters. But if middle-income whites don't respond to the populism, and upper-income whites do respond to the social liberalism, then maybe it makes electoral sense after all. Esp given all the absention at the low end. Mobilizing nonvoters is very hard work; luring middle- and upper-income voters may be a lot easier.
It doesn't make me happy to say this.
Doug