> On Tue, 2007-10-02 at 16:27 -0400, Doug Henwood wrote:
>> And outside the south, there was
>> no correlation between income and party vote. Now, income correlates
>> closely with party vote.
>
> Doug, perhaps I'm missing your point here, but doesn't the
> correlation you cite demonstrate only that people *think* there's
> a difference -- it doesn't really imply anything about the
> veracity or well-foundedness of that belief. Or am I
> missing something?
Stonecash also cites analyses of Congressional votes. That's not perception.
>> Yes the Dems have moved to the right
>> compared to the New Deal/Great Society days, but nothing like the
>> Republicans have moved to the right.
>
> Even if we grant arguendo that there might be real differences
> on particular issues -- I think they're more verbal than real,
> myself, but let's leave that aside for a moment -- isn't the fact
> of their agreement about the country's direction more important
> than anything else? If they're both marching over the cliff,
> does it really matter that the Dems are marching in second place?
I'm not about to embrace the Dems. But it's just not true to say there's no difference between the parties, and that there used to be more of one. Both those things are empirically wrong.
And how do you explain the contrast in economic performance? Growth in GDP and employment is stronger under Dems. Ditto growth in incomes at the 20th percentile. Dems are more inflationary and Reps disinflationary. The stock market does better under Dems, the bond market under Reps. Yeah, it's still capitalism, and a sucky version of capitalism, but these are real differences.