Big Swinging Indies
by digby
Joan Walsh has a great post up about the myth of the vaunted “independent” voter (also known as the magical “center” to the Village idiots) in which she references this important piece by John Judis.
As many of us have intuitively understood (based upon personal knowledge of “independents”) most people who designated themselves that way actually vote for one party exclusively and for a variety of reasons just don’t want to identify with the party. But Walsh cites some fascinating info about the Indies who voted in 2010:
[A]nother interesting footnote is the way the composition of that “independent” vote changed in 2010. Many independents who voted in 2010 didn’t turn out in 2008 or 2006, so pollsters are clearly comparing apples and oranges when looking at these three volatile elections. But a Pew Survey of self-identified independents this year divided them into four groups: Shadow Republicans, Disaffected Republicans, Shadow Democrats and Doubting Democrats. The two “Shadow” groups had much in common — they tended to be white and affluent and unlikely to declare a party affiliation because they think of themselves as, well, independent — and yet they pretty reliably vote with one or the other party. The other two groups, Disaffected Republicans and Doubting Democrats, also have much in common economically — they are overwhelmingly white, not college educated and most make less than $75,000 a year. They tend to swing back and forth to support the party they perceive as helping them economically — or to punish the party that hasn’t.
This year’s independent cohort also included more white working-class men and women, whose allegiance has eluded Obama since the 2008 primaries. Their doubts were too often dismissed as racism two years ago, but there’s always been evidence they’re open to populist appeals — and to real assistance in this economic crisis. Judis concludes:
“Yes, Obama does have to pay attention to those white working-class voters who shift uneasily from one party to the other, but the way to win them over is to get them jobs–and if that fails because of Republican obstructionism, to make sure that these voters blame the Republicans not the Democrats and his administration for the result. If he can’t do that, his only recourse may be to get on his knees and pray that unbeknownst to most voters and many economists, a strong and buoyant recovery is about to begin.”
(A lot of us have been prescribing the prayer strategy.)
I never thought that “Doubting Democrats” didn’t warm to Obama because of race, because racists just don’t ever vote for Democrats for obvious reasons — it’s where all the black and brown people (and women) are who are ruining everything for the Real Americans are. But they were doubtful of his and the Party’s commitment to their well being. (Obama’s inartful comments about guns and religion were an attempt to articulate their feelings, although it’s fairly clear by his subsequent policies that he placed his faith in the idea that helping elite institutions was the way to fix the economy. So in some sense their heuristic impulses were right.)
But judging from what I’m seeing among the beltway political gasbags, it is an article of faith that Obama and the Democrats catered to leftist radicals for the past two years and that he needs to go to the “center” by being more friendly to Big Business and extending tax cuts for the wealthy while demanding “sacrifice” of average Americans — which is actually doubling down on what lost them 60 seats. This is the Village dilemma: they believe themselves to be average Americans and so their concerns are the same as average Americans’ concerns. But they have as much in common with average Americans as Average Americans have with Brangelina.
It remains to be seen if they still believe that if only they can appease the plutocrats all their problems will be solved. The fact is that the plutocrats are just fine and see this as an opportunity to break the welfare state (such as it is) and the unions and ensure cheap labor and low taxes for the foreseeable future so that strategy isn’t working and it’s not magically going to now. They need to either prevail over the obstructionists or bring the rhetorical hammer down in a way that those Swinging Indies will understand that the Republicans are consciously trying to make things worse for them in order to get their votes.
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