07-29-2016, 12:21 AM
The re-alignment may be the Democrats winning most of the sorts of voters whose demographics suggested that they would vote for Dwight Eisenhower. Just look at my favorite overlay of Eisenhower and Obama. In 2008 Barack Obama won only one state, North Carolina, that did not go for Eisenhower. He won Indiana, a state reliably Republican except in the 1964 LBJ blowout. He won Virginia, a state which neither Carter nor Clinton ever won. In 2012 Barack Obama won 332 electoral votes, but not one from a state that Eisenhower ever lost. Ike won the three Northern states (Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Rhode Island) that Republicans usually have the most difficulty winning both before and after Eisenhower -- twice. Sure, those two Presidents have similarities of temperament (Ike was a mellowed 60-something Reactive and Obama acts much like a 60-something mellowed Reactive); both ran squeaky-clean administrations; and both show great respect for legal precedent. Obama's victory map looks more like that of Eisenhower than that of Truman.
Add the High Plains and Mormon Country to Obama 2008 and you have a typical Eisenhower victory.
Ike lost in the states in which, largely, educational standards were lowest. Those were the states, largely, in which segregation was the norm in schools and in which illiteracy was commonplace among white people.
Republicans used to have the "Rockefeller Republicans", identifiable largely by rationality and high levels of formal education if not by wealth. Formal education was a good proxy for economic success, and it was a good proxy for voting for Eisenhower... or Obama. In 2008 even the connection between voting Republican and income was also very weak.
As the Republicans started executing the Southern Strategy they attracted an electorate incompatible with the Rockefeller Republicans. By 1992 many of those voters shifted from Republican to Democratic in a Presidential election, Bill Clinton winning a raft of states in the Northeast (VT, NH, ME, CT, NJ), Midwest (IA, IL, MI), and Far West (WA, OR, CA, NV, and NM) that Democrats have either kept winning or have lost only in losing Presidential elections (IA, NV, NH, NM), but that Jimmy Carter did not win.
It's good to have the educated voter. Educated voters require some sophistication in appeals, but once one has them they can do some convincing of marginal voters. Under-educated voters say things like "I hate his guts" or offer an indefensible slander (like "Barack Obama isn't a real American"). Educated voters are more likely to vote and to get involved in political canvassing.
The Eisenhower coalition lasted for only eight years. The Obama coalition may be more durable.
I expect to have an interesting overlay of the 2016 Presidential election with some other election or elections. Let the High Plains turn on Trump and the overlay will look really close to those of Eisenhower in the 1950s.
Add the High Plains and Mormon Country to Obama 2008 and you have a typical Eisenhower victory.
Ike lost in the states in which, largely, educational standards were lowest. Those were the states, largely, in which segregation was the norm in schools and in which illiteracy was commonplace among white people.
Republicans used to have the "Rockefeller Republicans", identifiable largely by rationality and high levels of formal education if not by wealth. Formal education was a good proxy for economic success, and it was a good proxy for voting for Eisenhower... or Obama. In 2008 even the connection between voting Republican and income was also very weak.
As the Republicans started executing the Southern Strategy they attracted an electorate incompatible with the Rockefeller Republicans. By 1992 many of those voters shifted from Republican to Democratic in a Presidential election, Bill Clinton winning a raft of states in the Northeast (VT, NH, ME, CT, NJ), Midwest (IA, IL, MI), and Far West (WA, OR, CA, NV, and NM) that Democrats have either kept winning or have lost only in losing Presidential elections (IA, NV, NH, NM), but that Jimmy Carter did not win.
It's good to have the educated voter. Educated voters require some sophistication in appeals, but once one has them they can do some convincing of marginal voters. Under-educated voters say things like "I hate his guts" or offer an indefensible slander (like "Barack Obama isn't a real American"). Educated voters are more likely to vote and to get involved in political canvassing.
The Eisenhower coalition lasted for only eight years. The Obama coalition may be more durable.
I expect to have an interesting overlay of the 2016 Presidential election with some other election or elections. Let the High Plains turn on Trump and the overlay will look really close to those of Eisenhower in the 1950s.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
