Join In On The Action "Register Here" To View The Forums

Already a Member Login Here

Board index Forum Index
User avatar
Ambassador
 
Posts: 15994
Joined: 15 Apr 2004, 6:29 am

Post 08 Nov 2012, 5:42 pm

It's a pretty orthogonal point. Blacks were going to vote Democrat overwhelmingly anyway (they have been doing it before Obama came along). It wasn't just black voters who voted for Prop 1 in NC, either - NC is over 65% white.

I don't get what that has to do with some Republicans spouting on moral issues, saying offensive stuff and pushing a socially conservative agenda when the real big issues are economic. Of course it made no difference to people who were never going to vote Republican anyway. But the question is whether it put off potential supporters.
User avatar
Ambassador
 
Posts: 21062
Joined: 15 Jun 2002, 6:53 am

Post 08 Nov 2012, 5:54 pm

danivon wrote:It's a pretty orthogonal point. Blacks were going to vote Democrat overwhelmingly anyway (they have been doing it before Obama came along). It wasn't just black voters who voted for Prop 1 in NC, either - NC is over 65% white.

I don't get what that has to do with some Republicans spouting on moral issues, saying offensive stuff and pushing a socially conservative agenda when the real big issues are economic. Of course it made no difference to people who were never going to vote Republican anyway. But the question is whether it put off potential supporters.


Yes, that is your question. Answer it.

When I point out that those who apparently voted "Republican" on a social issue turned right around and voted for Obama, you say that's "orthogonal." No, because it argues against your thesis.

I think Obama won on personality and graft. No, not bribery of officials, but the purchasing of an electorate. He used public money to buy votes for himself and it worked brilliantly.
User avatar
Ambassador
 
Posts: 15994
Joined: 15 Apr 2004, 6:29 am

Post 08 Nov 2012, 6:34 pm

Maybe I don't think that it's as simple as that, DF. My answer to the question is 'yes', but you know that's what I think anyway. It would be interesting to see what you think.

It actually helps my point a little - the Republicans pushed a 'moral' issue. But it didn't win the votes of the people who agreed with them on that issue but were never going to vote for a Republican President. Funny that.

However, at the same time, it may well have cost the votes of other people who could have voted Republican, and may have been receptive to the main selling point in this election, the economic and fiscal argument.

My thesis is that social conservativism, and in particular the more controversial positions and statements by (sometimes fringe) Republican candidates and politicians could have cost Romney the election, and will be a problem if the party does not address it.

And actually, I also think the kind of statement like your last paragraph also doesn't help your side's cause much. The '47%' thing, the suggestion that the electorate are too dumb or greedy to know what's best is actually pretty patronising.

Over here the Conservatives were known as the 'Nasty Party'. One time their national chair addressed it openly at conference. It took them years to 'detoxify' the brand. It's amazing how easily it can lose you votes and how hard it can be to get them back.

When I was a kid, there was a voter who was notorious in the local Labour party for being a fiercely vocal Tory supporter, who'd heckle canvassers.

Until the min-90s that is. When suddenly she said she'd never vote Tory again. Why did she switch? Because she was a single parent (I don't know why she was), and the Tories decided that a great way to appeal to voters was to demonise single mothers as the cause of many social ills.
User avatar
Ambassador
 
Posts: 21062
Joined: 15 Jun 2002, 6:53 am

Post 08 Nov 2012, 7:50 pm

On the other hand, I've just read something that makes me think Romney being a Mormon stopped a couple of million WASPs from voting for him. Instead, they just didn't vote.
User avatar
Adjutant
 
Posts: 217
Joined: 01 Jun 2012, 9:13 am

Post 14 Nov 2012, 7:21 pm

The Future of the GOP

Danny DeVito as 'Lawrence Garfield' in the movie Other People's Money:
And you know the surest way to go broke? Keep getting an increasing share of a shrinking market. Down the tubes. Slow but sure. You know, at one time there must've been dozens of companies making buggy whips. And I'll bet the last company around was the one that made the best goddamn buggy whip you ever saw. Now how would you have liked to have been a stockholder in that company?


I wish to address "the future" of the GOP in the long term - more than a decade or two. So instead of looking at the most recent demographic trends, the latest cycle's polls, decadal redistricting, and the current crop of pols in power, let's look at worldwide trends of significant duration.

Religion: in modern industrialized nations people have been getting less and less religious. The USA has generally bucked this trend when compared to Europe, but has not escaped it entirely. LINK I think the USA will continue to get less religious. Republicans? The party of buggy whips.

Science: to say that science has grown in worldwide popularity over the last century would be an absurd understatement. The GOP is a growing refuge for the minority who see science as dangerous and/or evil.

Tolerance: a worldwide trend since the enlightenment, accelerating constantly almost everywhere. The GOP displays intolerance in a hundred different subtle ways, while of course trying not to adopt grossly and obviously intolerant official policies. They're not fooling enough of the electorate. The USA is becoming an increasingly tolerant society; the GOP is not.

Sexual and Reproductive Freedoms: related to most of the above. No real need for me to elaborate.

Environmentalism: not a big subject in the USA today compared to, say, 1972, but bound to grow in importance. World population continues to grow and food and water scarcity is already a looming world problem. When concern for environmental sustainability becomes a major election issue the GOP will not be leading the way.

The Shrinking Globe: a trend since Roman times, interrupted by the dark ages. The world is becoming more interdependent and interrelated. There's more need than ever for intergovernmental cooperation. The GOP sees this as "world governance" or "one-worldism" and wants instead to produce better buggy whips.

The Role of the USA in World Affairs: since peaking in the early 1950's or thereabouts, the USA has slowly been becoming less and less essential in its role as "leader of the free world". We still are that but... the role evolves, and generally gets diminished over time. There are two ways to deal with that: go with the flow and evolve as needed or fight the trend and insist upon being forever a 1950's-type USA. Americans are still very patriotic and the GOP can still win lots of votes by refusing to admit that the USA is only primus inter pares. But...

Patriotism: losing ground hand-in-hand with jingoistic nationalism. It's just part of modern life. Why should one country deserve more of our emotional attachment than the (shrinking) world at large? As I sense things, the world is becoming less and less nationalistic and patriotic. Slowly. The USA certainly hasn't led this charge; far from it, but I sense a very slight lessening even here. If this trend accelerates, as I think likely, the GOP will certainly be the party trying hardest to sell more buggy whips.

Maybe our GOP loyalists here can point to some significant long-term worldwide trends that favor the GOP's brand and will counteract some of the above. Undoubtedly they won't see things as I do regarding the above, but I'm here only present a thesis, not to debate. My thesis is that trends like the above doom the GOP, decade by decade, to increasing marginality. Of course, my thesis falls apart with the simple suggestion that while the GOP may be on the wrong side of these trends today, it will change its stripes. Can it? That's a subject for another time.
User avatar
Dignitary
 
Posts: 3486
Joined: 02 Oct 2000, 9:01 am

Post 15 Nov 2012, 6:57 am

Purple wrote: Of course, my thesis falls apart with the simple suggestion that while the GOP may be on the wrong side of these trends today, it will change its stripes. Can it? That's a subject for another time.


Nice post. I would say, however, that most trends don't continue ad infinitum. Yes, the GOP is on the wrong side of many trends now, but those trends may change and the GOP will be there to welcome the lost back into the fold.
User avatar
Adjutant
 
Posts: 217
Joined: 01 Jun 2012, 9:13 am

Post 15 Nov 2012, 8:48 am

geojanes wrote:...most trends don't continue ad infinitum.

That's certainly true of the universe of trends, but I discussed trends with a super-long heritage. Except for "Environmentalism" and "The USA in World Affairs" these trends have been pretty consistent since the Renaissance. Buggy whips never did make a comeback.
User avatar
Statesman
 
Posts: 11324
Joined: 15 Aug 2000, 8:59 am

Post 15 Nov 2012, 9:19 am

Purple you can add "democratization" to the list as well.
Once countries set off on a path of demcracy they include more and more of society . As more and more of society is included they begin to flex their demographic power electorally.

In the US, once the franchise grew the minorities that gained the vote had to be responded to with policies that met the expressed needs and wishes of that electorate. Its true that Jim Crow laws, voter suppression and gerrymandering can serve to delay this effect....but eventually opposition to universal sufferage is overcome, and the expression of power it represents wins out. republicans now complain that they lost the election because Obama pandered to the minorities. And somehow thats wrong.
What he did was better meet their needs in terms of policy.

When we've had discussion about the ever evolving and expanding of rights like gay marriage in the USA I can't count the number of repsondents who said that gay marriage would never be accepted by the majority of Americans. And yet three states voted to approve it just this election, and another voted against banning such.
I point to this simply to illustrate that change in a democracy moves in only one direction.I doubt Geo, you can point to areas where the direction of any of the trends Purple noted have moved backwards and stayed moving in that direction. There have been periods of resistacne to change where significant change seemed to have stopped. But eventually the evolution continues..
User avatar
Dignitary
 
Posts: 1573
Joined: 19 Dec 2000, 4:40 pm

Post 15 Nov 2012, 10:15 am

One thing that has gotten less attention than it deserves is that Obama handily won the Asian vote. That is more of a natural constituency for Republicans, both for economic and cultural reasons. Republicans may have a difficult time getting a majority of the Hispanic vote, Hispanics as a a group are struggling economically in this country, but such is not the case with Asians who are doing quite well.
User avatar
Ambassador
 
Posts: 15994
Joined: 15 Apr 2004, 6:29 am

Post 15 Nov 2012, 10:47 am

Which 'asian vote' do you mean? East Asians (Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Vietnamese etc), South Asians (Indians, Sri Lankans, Pakistanis etc), Middle Eastern Asians (Iranians, Lebanese, Turks, etc) or all Asians? I'm going to guess that Central Asians like Uzbekhs and Khazakhs are not a significant population in the US so didn't include them.
User avatar
Dignitary
 
Posts: 1573
Joined: 19 Dec 2000, 4:40 pm

Post 15 Nov 2012, 11:13 am

Good questions Danivon , though I note that no one here has attempted to divvy up different parts of the Hispanic vote, white vote, or African-American vote. Obviously, you have to make generalizations when you are talking about groups. I strongly suspect that I, living in the Los Angeles area, encounter all of the groups you referenced a good deal more frequently than you do. I worked in Korea Town for ten years for firms with mostly Korean employees and clients, so I think I understand very well that the Asian community is not monolithic. I also understand that certain Asian communities have not done very well economically. While there was nothing wrong with the points you made, I could do without the tone (as if I am some idiot who doesn't understand that the Asian community cannot be reduced to a certain set of values and beliefs)

I still find that it is an interesting question as to why the Asian community as a whole voted for Obama and that the Asian community as a whole looks to be a constituency that Republicans could appeal to, yet the focus has been entirely on the Hispanic vote.
User avatar
Adjutant
 
Posts: 217
Joined: 01 Jun 2012, 9:13 am

Post 15 Nov 2012, 11:50 am

I gladly add Rickyp's "democratization" to the list, though I might finagle the semantics a bit. His second sentence uses the word "include" and I think he may be talking more about inclusiveness. When it comes to the GOP's attitude toward democracy, there's no real sense that they'd prefer aristocracy or any other system, but there's certainly some issues regarding inclusiveness.

freeman2 wrote:I still find that it is an interesting question as to why the Asian community as a whole voted for Obama...

Inclusiveness. Asians are a minority - racial and ethnic. (A collection of various minorities in fact.) They can see that the GOP, though perhaps embracing certain economic principles that comport with the philosophy of hard-working legal immigrants (please excuse my use of stereotypes), and perhaps even being in tune on "traditional family values", is not a minority-friendly party. This is basically the same reason Jews vote overwhelmingly Dem despite the GOP being more supportive of Israel and of the affluent.

Inclusiveness: the historical trend in play here is the increasing regard for minority rights. Generally speaking, throughout modern history, minorities have had to struggle against majorities. As those majorities become more secure in their own civil liberties, and enjoy greater security, they become increasingly willing to grant minorities a real voice and the right to exercise political power. As trends go, this is one that's seen severe setbacks at times, but it is very strong overall. Between the two USA political parties, the difference in attitudes towards minorities has been developing and hardening since the days of Eleanor Roosevelt. Voters in all minority groups, including Asians, are aware of this.
User avatar
Dignitary
 
Posts: 1573
Joined: 19 Dec 2000, 4:40 pm

Post 15 Nov 2012, 12:13 pm

I think you're right Purple--while the GOP's poor performance among Hispanics could in theory be explained as a result of certain policies that in theory could be reversed, there is not one thing that you could point to with regard to Asians (unless you subscribe to the cult of Obama theory put forth by DF). But a perceived hostility to minorities would explain why Asians voted for Obama, even if they might otherwise might be inclined to vote Republican. But I think this perception of the GOP as not being inclusive is of much more recent origin (well at least recently the perception has strengthened)
User avatar
Statesman
 
Posts: 11324
Joined: 15 Aug 2000, 8:59 am

Post 15 Nov 2012, 1:19 pm

freeman
But I think this perception of the GOP as not being inclusive is of much more recent origin (well at least recently the perception has strengthened)

Perhaps the "Southern strategy" was the significant beginning?
The conscious calculation to use the resentment towards the civil rights battles of the sixties to create a solid block of vote in the south .... Then the subsequent embrace of the religious right (fundamentalists) cemented the republican party into that of very social conservatism.....
Short term these were effective electoral strategies. Long term, demographics and societal trends were against them,.
Then, while pursuing this, true fiscal conservatism was abandoned at the same time as these strategies were adopted.... (By that I mean, the era of deficits in the federal government began in the early 80s.) And voila, you have the altered version of the republican party licking its wounds today.
User avatar
Truck Series Driver (Pro II)
 
Posts: 895
Joined: 29 Dec 2010, 1:02 pm

Post 15 Nov 2012, 4:58 pm

I think a lot of it was circumstantial. The Republicans beat themselves up getting through the primaries, the Democrats didn't have one. And I think this group of candidates was one of the most sub par I can recall.

Someone like Christie would have the bravado to please evangelical whites and the sensible moderation to bring back in a goodly number of Hispanics. And he'd have zero problem declaratively telling the party rapists to jump off a cliff.