Insight ‘o the day
by digby
This piece by Walter Shapiro answers one of the odd conundrums of our political culture: why are we getting so much more socially liberal while at the same time becoming more conservative about economics and national security? I’ve thought about this a lot and have had a lot of theories. But I think Shapiro nails the answer:
A few glib answers leap to mind. There has always been a libertarian streak in American life that places a premium on being left alone by the government – and that covers everything from freedom to smoke marijuana to anger at paying taxes. It can also be argued that Ronald Reagan placed a permanent imprint on American politics by creating a Republican Party united its scorn for government spending for anything other than the Pentagon. Finally, the right has been gradually losing the culture wars since the 1960s – and the arrival of the millennial generation has codified the triumph of tolerance and permissiveness.
I suspect there is also something else at work here, something that I cannot prove empirically, but it makes intuitive sense. The doctrine of social liberalism mixed with economic conservatism mirrors the ideology of neither political party. But it does fit the worldview of many major donors and bundlers who fund the Democratic Party.
The twin pillars of Democratic Party finance are Wall Street and Hollywood. Democrats who toil in the financial services sector tend to be liberal on social issues and simultaneously passionate about prudent economic policies that neither add to the deficit nor upset the bond market. Hollywood, which makes a good chunk of its income by glamorizing sex and often drugs, is on the barricades of cultural permissiveness. But the other political attitudes of the entertainment world tend to reflexively liberal on far-away foreign policy issues and surprisingly conservative on issues relating to, say, their own taxes.
In contrast, Republican high-rollers are predictably right-wing on economics and, with exceptions, go along with the social conservatism that characterizes their party. These donors may personally dissent from the GOP’s hosannas to traditional marriage and moral rectitude, but they are unlikely to withhold their money over issues unrelated to taxes, government regulation and foreign policy.
My overall point is not that Democratic donors have the power to impose their political philosophy on the Obama administration and public opinion. Rather, these donors contribute to a climate of opinion where certain attitudes enter the mainstream and other ideas are consigned to the fringes. When Obama, for example, belatedly announced his support for gay marriage, he knew that it would enhance rather than detract from his fundraising for the 2012 campaign. read on …
At least one of our founding fathers would be proud that his vision has been achieved:
Those who own the country ought to govern it. — John Jay
.