"The Democrats and Working Class Whites"

Lane Kenworthy on the reasons for the "defection of whites, especially working-class whites, from the Democrats." The argument is that the defection has not been confined to the south as many claim, it is a general trend, and that economic factors are a large part of the explanation. If that is true (though I'd like to hear the response of Bartels, Schaller, Krugman, and others before coming to that conclusion), if it is the case that Democrats are losing working class voters, what do Democrats need to do to reverse the trend? To relate this to the post below this one, is a populist message such as Edwards is delivering the key to turning the defection around, or is some other strategy needed? Does invoking FDR help or hurt the Democrat's efforts?

This reminds me of something Brad DeLong said:

But when I read Paul [Krugman]'s call for "smart, bold populism," I am reminded of earlier calls a couple of decades ago by Milton Friedman, Marty Feldstein, and their ilk for smart, bold conservatism or smart, bold libertarianism. But they did not get what they ordered: on the economic policy front the policies of Reagan and of Bush II have been a horrible botch. What populist policies that we can think of would be smart? And how can we make our high politicians allergic to populist policies that are stupid?

Lyndon Johnson, yes. William Jennings Bryan, no.

A populist tide makes me wary, probably for the reasons Brad suggests, but smart populism I can embrace. Now I just need to figure out exactly what that is. Here's Lane Kenworthy:

How the Democrats Lost Their Class, by Lane Kenworthy: The notion that the Democrats’ electoral troubles since the 1960s are mainly a function of southern whites turning Republican is quickly becoming conventional wisdom. Thomas Schaller offers a version of this story in his book Whistling Past Dixie. In an article titled “What’s the Matter with What’s the Matter with Kansas?“, Larry Bartels concludes that the entire Democrat-to-Republican shift in presidential voting among working-class whites occurred in the south. Paul Krugman embraces Bartels’ findings in The Conscience of a Liberal. Here’s how Krugman puts it:

“The overwhelming importance of the Southern switch suggests an almost embarrassingly simple story about the political success of movement conservatism. It goes like this: Thanks to their organization … movement conservatives were able to take over the Republican party, and move its policies sharply to the right. In most of the country this rightward shift alienated voters, who gradually moved toward the Democrats. But Republicans were nevertheless able to win presidential elections, and eventually gain control of Congress, because they were able to exploit the race issue to win political dominance of the South.” (p. 182)

This view of developments contains an important truth: Southern whites were heavily Democratic until the mid-sixties. Now they are less so, and today the south is the easily the most Republican region of the country.

Yet the notion that the defection of whites, especially working-class whites, from the Democrats has been largely confined to the south paints too simple a portrait.

Since 1972 the General Social Survey has asked American adults about their “party identification,” along with a battery of other questions. People’s political preferences ultimately matter to the extent they influence actual voting choices. But analyzing presidential voting alone, as Bartels does, can miss part of the story. Presidential voting is heavily influenced by the particular candidates the two parties nominate. Arguably, people’s underlying preferences and beliefs are better understood by looking at their party identification. The following chart shows the share of working-class whites identifying as strong-Democrat, moderately-strong-Democrat, or independent-leaning-Democrat since the early 1970s.

The country is split here into three regions: the south, the midwest and plains states, and the east and west coasts. In the south, identification with the Democrats fell roughly 20 percentage points — from 60% to 40% — between the mid-1970s and the early 1990s and has held steady since then. This is consistent with the picture offered by Bartels and Krugman.

Yet the same thing happened in the other two regions — even on the coasts, where the most solidly “blue” states are located.

With several graduate students at the University of Arizona, I have been examining this development (“The Democrats and Working-Class Whites”). It turns out not to be a function of our measure of party identification or of the working class. Nor is it specific to men or to the most religious. And most of those who left the Democrats didn’t become “independents.” In fact, since the early 1990s approximately 40% of working-class whites have identified as Republican — the same as the share that identifies as Democrat.

What caused this development? We conclude that it was due in large part to the crisis of the late 1970s. The economy fell apart under a Democratic president and Democrat-controlled Congress, leading many in the working class to question whether the party was still the better of the two at securing their material well-being. Ronald Reagan offered a simple and seemingly plausible solution — less government — which also tapped into desire for tax relief. The Democrats’ economic woes were compounded by the twin foreign policy disasters of 1979 (the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian hostage crisis), rising crime, forced busing, and affirmative action.

The deep recession of the early 1980s brought a temporary halt to the white working-class defection. But as the economy recovered in the mid-to-late eighties, as Reagan’s actual policy shifts proved less radical than his rhetoric, and as the Soviet bloc crumbled beginning in 1989, the defection resumed.

As the chart above reveals, little has changed since the early 1990s. This is puzzling. After all, Republican presidents presided over the two most recent economic recessions (early 1990s and early 2000s), and far and away the healthiest economic period for workers in the past generation was the Clinton years of the late nineties. We find, consistent with Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter with Kansas? argument, that this is due partly to heightened importance of social issues such as homosexuality and abortion to working-class whites. Another key factor is that the cohort of working-class whites who turned 20 since the mid-1970s, when the defection from the Democrats began, has always been less pro-Democrat. They have been gradually replacing the much more pro-Democrat cohort that came of age during the Roosevelt and Truman years.

This does not mean Democrats don’t, or won’t, win elections. They still get the votes of many working-class whites. And as John Judis and Ruy Teixeira ably document in The Emerging Democratic Majority, they now tend to win a sizable majority of the votes of urban professionals, as well as African Americans, Latinos, and women.

But regaining the consistent support of a majority of working-class whites would certainly help. Depending on the definition, this group constitutes roughly a third to half of the voting-age population.

Comments

[kthomas]

Great stuff, Prof. Thoma! Can't wait to read anne's take on this.

[Denis Drew]

Want to get working class any color back behind the Democratic party? Re-balance the labor market for them with a modern version of re-unionization -- so they can make a living while their political arms (their unions) keep the government working for the majority again. Here's how:

Upon learning, a few years back, of the regular OECD practice of "collective-collective" bargaining, I have done what I can to spread the word here (mostly via emailing every media and pol web address I could dig up). It, now occurs to me that the French-French/Canadian practice of "virtual" sector-wide agreements -- merely requiring non-union firms to work under agreements negotiated by unionized firms -- could make for a much smoother transition to sector-wide contracts in the USA.

No need to -- on the run -- build a wider union presence than we ever had before (as installing a fully unionized, German style bargaining network could require).

Easing French style sector-wide into our labor market with any unionized or partly organized labor segment that wanted to give it a try it should cause minimal if any disruption. Airline employees might make logical candidates for a beginning -- given their consistent inability to exit their industry's wage and benefit tail spin --and their nationwide footprint made them an excellent model for others (sector-wide agreements usually are limited to all similar jobs in one geographical locality). We can be sure that America's supermarket workers would salivate at the chance to go sector-wide.

The French Canadian example will always be right next store for our convenient examination -- not overseas in economies that remain more than a little mysterious to most of us.
****************************
The "race to the wage and benefit bottom" hit American labor only sporadically at the onset of our industrialization (American factory hands had settlers' opportunities to choose from) but since the early seventies has been hitting Americans unrelentingly (sea to shining sea industrialization + deunionization = no place to hide?).

European factory workers were Shanghaied onto the slippery slide from the industrialization word and for a century or more were hit heavier than we ever were. All of which forced Europeans to evolve a common sense bargaining counter (to what Americans still don't know has hit them): legally mandated, sector-wide labor agreements (or some equivalent, like the French/French-Canadian practice of mandating non-union firms to work under contract conditions worked out by unionized businesses).

While checking out in my national-chain supermarket in Illinois the other night, the bagger repeatedly ignored my requests to double bag heavy items and not to put heavy 12-packs on the bottom under the cart basket. A young employee informed me that the bagger could not speak a word of English.

Wal-Mart's entrance into the retail food business has forced unions across America (not Europe) to accept two-tiered contracts under which new employees will be paid a lower scale. The $5.15/hr minimum wage previously chased most American born labor out of fast food; the race to the bottom now seems to be deterring some Americans from showing up for what, only a short time ago, were solidly middle-class supermarket careers.

Oceans of space as well as time shield today's Americans' eyes from alternate labor market comparisons leaving American labor slow to sense the shape or even the presence of their pay and benefit enemy -- the inexorable market process that accompanies one side becoming organized while the other fails to match that in any market -- least of all to sense what to do about it.

Wal-Mart is pulling 88 big boxes out of (land of the full-unionization, sector-wide contracts) Germany where its business model cannot survive paying comparable salaries.

[TigerPaw]

At a superficial level it sounds like perhaps the regime-style that one grew up under and/or were educated under is the one that people will associate themselves with. Since the right has been on the upswing for 20+ years, the young people that came of voting age while those messages were being shoved out the TV set at them would likely have internalized them.

Same reason why it's "important" to push religion on the young. Once you get older and can think for yourself you're not quite as likely to be a sheep and just follow along the pre-programmed path.

If this is true, the way for the left to get voters back on their side may be to educate the young. The older people they may or may not be able to convince, but they may need to aim their sights lower down the age scale perhaps.

[pgl]

The GOP has fed working class whites a steady diet that the main reason they pay taxes to support someone else and that the GOP will change all that. Of course, the GOP never does bother to fess up that the only Federal spending they truly intend to cut are the future Social Security benefits that these same working class whites are banking on for part of their retirement income. Hey - we all hate pay taxes. But if working class whites think the GOP is on their side in this fiscal debate, maybe it's because they have been suckered by the slick GOP spin machine.

[Patricia Shannon]

Get out and talk to the working class. They get much of their info from slime like Rash Limburger. The right has used known PR methods to indoctrinate people with lies. The Dems need to be serious about using known PR methods to get the truth out.

[Patricia Shannon]

Also, if people of all classes say the same thing as some commenters here, that there is no difference between the parties. Of course, that is not true (eg., Supreme Court), but it is also closer to the truth than I would like. The majority of the population believes/knows we are already in a recession. Now is not the time for the Dems to be namby-pamby.

[robertdfeinman]

The data shows an incomplete picture. Here's another source:
http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=548

It is also a mistake to lump the Dixiecrats into the Democratic Party. They were a party within a party and only worked with the labor/Northern sector on things like foreign policy.

They are now "values voters" in the South and part of the midwest. It's not clear if they are still a party within a party, but they certainly get pandered to by the current crop of GOP hopefuls.

Could we see some statistics which treat the Dixiecrats as a distinct group? Using the "south" as a sector is misleading because it lumps the Dixiecrats with Southern blacks.

[calmo]

great stuff kt. I can't wait to hear Icarus's your expanded view on "great".
Don't forget that you, too, have a voice, no matter how modest, self-effacing, and dainty.
We can take it.
Belt it out! Sock it to us, baby.

[Things Got Worse for the Working Class Under Democrat Policies]

Under Democrat policies the cities became so crime ridden that the working class was forced to flee their ancestral homes, and go into exile in the suburbs. Regressive taxes on the working class plus high inflation on necessities became a real burden, forcing both spouses to work to make ends meet. Is it any wonder that they are unhappy with policies that don't work as advertised?

[Barkley Rosser]

Is this posting not a bit out of date? What we are dealing with here, in terms of working class whites outside of the South, is the old "Reagan Democrat" syndrome, not exactly a new phenomenon, which W. Bush has succeeded in at least partly overcoming.

Now, it is true that there continues to be some drift in some mid-tier states recently, thinking of West Virginia, a border state that was Dem until W. ran. The issues in that heavily rural state seem to have been more about guns, tobacco, and "brown Democrat" worries about anti-global warming policies in a coal producing state. Otherwise, it is the usual fear of abortion and now, rather than fear of blacks, fear of illegal immigrants/terrorists. Bah.

[anon/portly]

"The Democrats’ economic woes were compounded by the twin foreign policy disasters of 1979 (the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian hostage crisis), rising crime, forced busing, and affirmative action."

I've never found it very convincing that a few gestures toward Southern racists (like the Philadelphia MS speech) could be anywhere near as effective as policies (or gestures) towards racially-charged issues like "rising crime, forced busing, and affirmative action." My belief is that one thing that "rising crime, forced busing, and affirmative action" have in common is the costs are/were disproportionally much, much higher for lower-income whites than for higher-income whites.

[Holly W.]

I wonder how much of the defection from the Democratic party had to do with the association of the Dems with "identity politics" in the 70's and 80's -- i.e, being pro-minority and supporting women, blacks, gays, and non-Christians. I think alot of white people felt that there wasn't any place in the Democratic party for them any more -- and there was the Republican party in the 80's touting their welcoming "Big Tent."

Alot of people I know aren't comfortable now identifying themselves as members of either party because of identity politics, since the left still seems too rejecting of white men to them, while social conservatism has become the identity politics of the right. Economics doesn't necessarily have anything to do with it.

[anne]

"But regaining the consistent support of a majority of working-class whites would certainly help. Depending on the definition, this group constitutes roughly a third to half of the voting-age population."

Huh? I have no idea at all what Lane Kenworhty's essay is about. What is working class; which according to the General Social Survey is between "lower class" and "middle clas?" So the working class between middle class and lower class ia 1/3 to 1/2 of the voting-age population. This is nonsense.

[James Killus]

I suspect that the statistical "gotcha" here lies in the definition of "working class whites." There is also some suspicious weasel wording about "party identification" and other things.

Still, note that the punditry has undergone similar conversions since the 970s, a phenomenon that has been financed by deep pockets in the Conservative Movement, aided by media consolidation and the emergence of the talk radio phenomenon.

None of this alters the basic claim that the fortunes of the Republican Party for the past 30 years have been closely tied to a pandering to racial and religious bigotry. These phenomena are hardly confined to the South; it just happens that they are differently presented in different parts of the country. Getting the right tones for the dog whistles is what political consulting is all about.

[Bob]

The article is wrong.

Just as Franks "Whats the Matter With Kansas" was wrong.

Working class whites are not leaving the dems.

Here is Larry Bartels from Princeton explaining whats really happening

*************************************************

http://www.princeton.edu/%7ebartels/kansas.pdf

Whats the matter with "Whats the Matter With Kansas"

[Bob]

>> Things Got Worse for the Working Class Under Democrat Policies says...

Total baloney.

Krugman had the break down in one of his articles.

It went like this :

1932 to 1980 - real wages went up approx 150%

1980 to present - real wages went down by approx 5%

[save_the_rustbelt]

This is a more thoughtful analysis than the usual "white men are racists" tripe.

Some other random thoughts:

Many working class white men after the Viet Nam era were military veterans, not happy with the leftward tilt of the Dems.

The Dems have largely exiled any pro-lifers from the party (yeah, I know about Harry Reid) which took a large chunk of support away. Other cultural issues also had an impact.

The high inflation and high interest rates of the late 70s did have some impact, as did the Iranian hostage mess.

Issues such as forced busing had the elites using the working class to try to solve social problems (rich white liberals do not send their children to public schools, bus or not).

In other words, this issue is complicated and anyone who tries to overlay a simple model will be frustrated.

Since most elites do not really know any working class whites (other than maybe the local plumber) they don't have much clue. Maybe they should all taker up deer hunting and ice fishing. Have a Bud!

[ken melvin]

I can see clearly now and it is as clear as mud to me. We have the Republicans represented by: the evangelical wing represented by Brother Huck, the CATO/Libertarain/Randian wing represented by Ron the pas mal, the party of business wing represented by Mitt of the Deep Pockets, the Richard Nixon wing represented by being kicked around Rudolpho, and the Neocon wing represented by Joe John McCain the Lieberman. Hillary, Barak, Chris, Joe, Bill, John, Peter and Paul represent the middle class, bleeding heart, save the LGBT illegal alien crowd. The subject working class whites/working two jobs don't belong to any of the above, i.e., they are unrepresented. In reality, they don't exist. They are but a figment.

[anne]

"This is a more thoughtful analysis than the usual 'white men are racists' tripe."

This is utter deceit; imagine my surprise however. Show us the evidence of the usual tripe; I am waiting for the usual tripe evidence. Notice me waiting for all the tripe evidence.

[Wowsas]

Things Got Worse for the Working Class Under Democrat Policies:

Methinks that anyone who claims that DEMOCRATS are the party of regressive taxation has already betrayed the fact that he or she is a twit.

Thanks for playing.

[paine]

read the damn thing

man is it a bummmm-errrrrr

the further adventures
of
homer and gomer and vinnie t

the old memphis mobile trap

i suspect by now
many of you have figured out

i'm working on some very old
marching orders here...

in fact
the last orders i received
as agent 57--cell 19y--
came directly from party headquarters
yup
it was back in 79
--carter had already worn his sweater --
i got slipped it one nite over coffee
by a UN stringer named rajid from lucknow
it was just b4
the whole ball of red wax
did its final implosion
into deng's
busted iron rice bowl gig

in effect it went something like this

" keep trying to make
those semi-bribed
white wage giffs
of the yankee metropole
class howl and growl
oh and ....
report in by radio cypher
...ahh ...as you make progress..."

needless to say
in all the years since
there's been
no need
to use the cell's
secret bank of short waves
even if some one
over there
were still
waiting for my transmission

[realpc]

Of course Krugman wants to believe only racists left the Democrats. He is madly in love with the Democrats and can't imagine any sane reason for leaving it. Love is blind.

[paine]

master drew

"It, now occurs to me that the French-French/Canadian practice of "virtual" sector-wide agreements -- merely requiring non-union firms to work under agreements negotiated by unionized firms -- could make for a much smoother transition to sector-wide contracts in the USA."

your gonna need to do some
serious social wiring
if u hope
to string all those lights together comrade

[anne]

"Of course Krugman wants to believe only racists left the Democrats."

A vicious prejudiced lie; a lie for the sake of fostering prejudice.

[nocountry]

In a country where the politics of both parties are perceived as profoundly corrupted by special interests, the party that espouses smaller government has an advantage -- even if what they deliver is not in fact smaller government.

[paine]

anne
are you really confronting this issue

some simply say there are no
size-able contingent
of
reaganite white working class types
(outside the sunbelt )

some blame the white wagery's
(ladies division)
for nasty trog stain glass values
trumping economic interest

some notice rambocrats
(male call !!!)

the nanny party label
the hi ed snots
the pimps of no accounts
etc etc

but
obviously
as a sen might point out
thers a general system of many dimensions
in this preference
each party in our binary system
gets so many prefered dimensions
yes we can talk about intensity
here

and that i believe is where the dems lost
the alleged 20%
of wage based households

the dems winning dimensions
have not been re enforced
by deep benefits produced
not just gestured at
okay so the political climate made the economic agenda
impossible to en act

well
that;s both circular
and nonsense
the dems went after other
voting " groups"
for 20 years
72 to 92
and when the dlc types pushed
the right buttons in 92
they failed to deliver

i blame the 93-94 dem hegemony
for the rout
and i suspect after a purge of the money changers
the party of fdr may in fact
trump stain glass values with
greenback dollars let us hope so

[dale]

not working class whites per se-- just southern working class whites left the party.

[Bruce Wilder]

nocountry says...
"In a country where the politics of both parties are perceived as profoundly corrupted by special interests, the party that espouses smaller government has an advantage -- even if what they deliver is not in fact smaller government."

In a country, where one Party owns and operates all Media, that Party gets to lie with impunity. Its policies are never questioned, and its candidates are never vetted. The other Party is screwed, and must fend off all forms of slander, constantly.

[Jim Harrison]

The Democrats made the mistake of talking too much about the underprivileged as if their key policy innovations had been charity for despised minorities all along instead of benefits for middling people who are mostly white. Unfortunately, whatever else the factory workers, clerks, and school teachers that make up the American demos want, they definitely don't want anybody to suggest that they aren't really middle class, though obviously most of 'em are not bourgeois and never have been. The Republicans have been extremely good at playing on the vanity of the many, which, looked at another way, is a profound lack of self respect—the AM talk monsters spend as much time buttering up their listeners as attacking the liberals because they understand the injured feelings that drive them.

[Bob]

>> Of course Krugman wants to believe only racists left the Democrats.

Back into Limbaugh mode eh ?

Good idea.

Look how well it worked for conservatives in last years election.

[ken melvin]

Where oh where have they gone? Large numbers abandoned to the non-voting, I suspect. Suspect quite a few went running to the evangies; when you've lost your job security, union, ... tent meetings do well. So the rise of evagenlical in Latin America. Very similar, the Church's fall to that of communism, methinks. After a while people got fed up with unfulfilled promises and sought new gods.

[Callahan]

It's a wonderful world, child labor slaves are making your shoes, not sure they are making ends meet, but I know I'm not (well maybe I am barely).

Michigan is a poor state God help us, but we are making ends meet (sort of).

Yup, it's a wonderful world.

[kharris]

What pgl said, with a bit of sociology sprinkled on top.

Aren't working class folk (whatever that might mean) typically conservative in their social outlook? I mean that in the sense of "change bothers me" rather than in the modern political sense. The genius of the GOP has been to poke the blue-collar white male (and a good many females, too) with the notion that their way of life is threatened. Blacks, immigrants, bureaucrats, college boys, al Qaeda – the list of threats is long. If you can link any of those things to taxes, all the better. (Academic studies are all paid for with tax money, but good old common sense is free.) If you can link any two of them together, that's good too. (Immigrants come from outside the country. So does al Qaeda. So do French people.)

There are lots of working stiffs who are far too smart to fall for any of this, but the GOP doesn't need everybody in the working class to fall for their stuff. They just need to move enough votes to change a few election outcomes. Hell, by calling the GOP "the party of ideas" for a decade or so, they got shifted a lot of the smarty-pants class. That seems to be fading now. (The smarty-pants class needs to abandon old alliances to seem smart.)

As for the issue of who helps working class whites most, I think we are talking past each other. The original point had to do with urban decay, not real wages. I don't pretend to know enough about the causes of urban decay, but timing was such that it was easy to blame Democrats.

[EE]

I am a/an Professional _______________, a middle class member. I make less than $100,000 per year, and thus, cannot "Eat cake."

Which candidate is going to enact policies that will help me in someway to keep my job/industry in this country?

Which candidate is going to enact policies that will close the tax loop holes that currently allow companies to relocate a mailbox to Bermuda to avoid paying US taxes?

Which candidate is going to enact policies that will provide either closer scrutiny, or will heavily fine and/or jail those responsible for unsafe imported products? Local products that are unsafe are subject to near cap-less tort laws that provide the economic incentive to not produce unsafe products.

Which candidate has a plan to reduce our full-stream energy costs?

[James Killus]

Rustbelt: Since most elites do not really know any working class whites (other than maybe the local plumber) they don't have much clue.

So what's your bowling average, Rusty? And when was the last time you worked at manual labor or in retail on the register? Oh, right, some of your best friends are working class, but you aren't one yourself, are you?

And all the Vietnam vets I know despise Bush and his nasty little war. Yeah, Vietnam really turned a lot of guys conservative, it did.

That's quite a dog whistle you have there, sport.

[reason]

by the twin foreign policy disasters of 1979 (the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian hostage crisis)

Now that is new to me. The Soviet invasion was an American foreign policy disaster? America sure is a strange place?

[anne]

"The Democrats’ economic woes were compounded by the twin foreign policy disasters of 1979 (the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian hostage crisis), rising crime, forced busing, and affirmative action."

Reason:

"The Soviet invasion was an American foreign policy disaster? America sure is a strange place?"

Yes; thank you for pointing out this absurd comment from the essay. The absurdity to the domino theory does not matter and is rather like a vampire that lives forever in the hearts of war-lovers. The entire passage is at best comically unsupported.

[ken melvin]

Absurd? I give you 'Global War on Terrorism'.

[STS]

ken_melvin:

"The subject working class whites/working two jobs don't belong to any of the above, i.e., they are unrepresented. In reality, they don't exist. They are but a figment."

Maybe you're onto what's really wrong with "What's wrong with Kansas". Thomas Frank argues that working class whites have been talked into voting against their economic interests because it's more important to vote *against* "baby killer" Democrats than to vote *for* your own interests.

But maybe the problem is that the upper middle class world of the media has *told* us that working class people are all waving flags and carrying Bibles to the polls to vote Republican. Maybe this had no effect on any actual working class people (none are in evidence on TV anyway), but *did* help to make Democratic political appeals sound phony. "Hey, if all these average Joes think Bush's tax cuts are fair, who am *I* to argue? I'll think I'll just take my patriotic tax cut and buy me a tax-deductible Hummer!"

When has reality ever gotten in the way of a popular media narrative anyway?

[mrrunangun]

Democratic New Deal policies were aimed at making life materially better for the great mass of people in the country. They were broadly supported and broadly successful. Lyndon Johnson's policies were less broadly targeted, but his major initiatives in Medicare, Medicaid, and Civil Rights had broad appeal in his time. Contemporary proposals and the resultant policies have been aimed at making life materially better for relatively small select categories of, rather than the great mass of, people. This is true whether those proposals are Republican like elimination of the inheritance tax which benefits a tiny but influential GOP group or expanded AffAction which benefits groups entirely Democratic in affiliation. These are not national policies, they are party policies and by no means all in the party benefit. Most people in the country are opposed to policies of this type, but many are enacted due to the strength of the espousing interest groups within the parties.

[Icarus]

Mrrunagun,

The "death tax" is theft. People who have earned, saved, and paid taxes on their money, should be allowed to privately pass it on to whomever they want.

[mrrunangun]

Icarus,

What about people who didn't earn, save, and pay taxes on it, but merely inherited it from someone else? The inheritance tax only kicks in on estates above $2 million. Why should the very rich continue to pass untold millions untaxed to their heirs ad infinitum?

[save_the_rustbelt]

James:

I am a little old for manual labor, but can still run a bulldozer and a chainsaw, do some elementary carpentry, seal coat an asphalt driveway and put a broom finish on concrete (not much, the back isn't into it). Were it not for a very large truck crushing my car and breaking my back some years ago I might be a little friskier.

I was always lousy bowler but still do a great job of watching and drinking beer.

I'm opposed to the war and just about everything else Bush does, and of course Bush is not a conservative.

[ken melvin]

I think the dead should be allowed to keep their money and vote an absentee ballot.

[Lafayette]

Article: But when I read Paul [Krugman]'s call for "smart, bold populism,"

Patience beyond one's imagination

I think that may be a contradiction in terms: Smart and populism.

Populism is rarely very intelligent, as it appeals to the baser instincts of the population. It is often associated with nationalism.

Smart populism would be a somewhat educated middle-class that has come to the conclusion that "enough-is-enough and there must be some better way to do things". Then follow up with public debates of various issues, as we do in this Forum.

It would take a while, but it could stir sentiment for change. Without that will to alter conditions, there can be no progress. Overcoming the inertia to change is a monumental task. It takes patience beyond one's imagination.

A sign of a fed-up realization is the level of complaints in the blogosphere. Complaining can only go so far, it lets off steam but changes nothing. It must get one to the point where they are willing to commit themselves personally to an effort to change.

Otherwise they remain at the "bitch level" of a blog. Which is just intellectual self-masturbation.

[Patricia Shannon]

I have made several smallish contributions to John Edwards, even before I got a job which will start when my current one ends, because I believe he is the best person running, certainly the best who has a chance to win. Many small contributions to someone who cares about the ordinary people can help offset the monetary advantage of those who are favored by the powerful ultr-rich.

[Lafayette]

PS: because I believe he is the best person running

It's nice to have such conviction, PS. I'm admittedly envious.

I am trying to guess, through the fog of rhetoric, who is telling the least in order to get the most electoral votes. And, when so, which one will then do the best for those with the least. (That's the only way to get elected in America today with such splintered interest groups.)

But, the "change agent" that is so necessary? Not to be seen anywhere, to my mind. So, I figure America is left to wandering in the desert another 8 years.

Within today's political landscape, inn his time, I doubt even FDR could have got elected. There is no common central block of the truly disgruntled.

[icarus]

mrrunagan,

whether rich or poor, you have a right to do what you want with your private property. it is not for the public to confiscate.

any rule which confiscates personal wealth or property will, and should induce capital flight. if i have saved 5 million dollars over my life, i should be able to distribute it as i wish, and not hand it over to a govt.

the concept of a death tax is ludicrous. it would induce such pathetic behavior.

[Lafayette]

Ic: whether rich or poor, you have a right to do what you want with your private property. it is not for the public to confiscate.

Anti-tax bunk and wholly predictable from Icarus.

Death and taxes are two inescapable facts of life. And, they occur simultaneously for most of us with an "estate" (a person’s money and property in its entirety at the time of their death).

The collective (government) decides what is "right", not the individual - in a democracy, according to the will of the citizens. And, if you don't like it, go live on an island.

You can make your own rules there, but you won't be leaving much in terms of "estate".

[icarus]

lafayette...

the rich will simply offshore their wealth...or, move it into instruments which can avoid the death tax.

the public has no right to confiscate private wealth like that.

[Lew]

Virtually every white male has had the experience of being denied a job because of affirmative action (I am no exception). In fact it has happened to me several times. I simply can't get past this and work for Democrats any more.