Michael Barone:
John Judis, co-author of the book The Emerging Democratic Majority, now says in an article in National Journal that that majority has disappeared. His title: “The Emerging Republican Advantage.”
The original book, published in the Republican year of 2002, forecast accurately the groups that would make up the Democratic majority coalition that emerged in the 2006 and 2008 elections: blacks, Hispanics, gentry liberals, single women, young voters.
But as Judis writes now, that coalition has come apart. That’s partly because of diminished support from Millennials and Hispanics, but mostly because of additional white working-class defections and erosion among suburbanites unhappy with higher government spending and taxes.
In fact, he now says that the majority he predicted endured for only two elections. President Obama was re-elected with a reduced 51 percent of the vote, but Republicans won the House in 2010, 2012, and 2014, and the Senate in 2014. Democratic strength in governors’ mansions and state legislatures is at its lowest level since the 1920s.
That’s in line with voting patterns that have been steady for two decades. In three of the last four presidential elections, both parties have won between 47 and 51 percent of the vote. And in nine of the eleven House elections from 1994 to 2014, Republicans won between 48 and 52 percent of the popular vote, and Democrats a bit less, between 45 and 49 percent.
Democrats have had the advantage in presidential elections because their clusters of base voters give them more safe electoral votes. Republicans have had the advantage in House and legislative elections because their voters are spread more evenly around the rest of the country.
To put this in historical perspective, neither party has really had a permanent majority for an extended period, as Sean Trende argues persuasively in his book The Lost Majority. And the two political parties’ coalitions over the years have been of a different character. The political cartoonists are right to portray them as two different animals.
The Republican party has always been built around a demographic core of people considered by themselves and others to be typical Americans, even though they are not by themselves a majority. Northern Yankee Protestants in the 19th century, white married people today. When they come up with policies that have broader appeal beyond that core, they can win majorities. Otherwise, they can’t.
The Democratic party has always been a coalition of disparate groups that are different from the Republicans’ core. Southern whites and Catholic immigrants in the 19th century; blacks and gentry liberals today. When they cohere, Democrats can win big majorities. When they split apart, the party is a disorderly rabble.
Liberalism is good for the country in that it shows the country how bad liberalism is for the country. It is apparent that no amount of logic, common sense or historic precedence can convince some idealistic people that there is a finite quantity of wealth available to right all injustices, including those invented on the spot to rally political support.
Liberalism is the only cure for liberalism, but sadly, the cure always fades away and requires another booster at some later date.
Hillary is a non starter if the EC goes against her.
“The first 2016 Electoral College Map looks bad for Democrats”
“Now then, I am not saying that the 31 states where Republicans control
the legislature will definitely go Republican in the 2016 presidential
race. But if they do, that’s 314 Electoral College votes. You need only
270 to win.”
http://donsurber.blogspot.in/2014/11/the-first-2016-electoral-college-map.html?spref=tw&m=1
Yet the establishment leadership of the Republican party is doing it’s best to wrest defeat from the jaws of victory.
Meanwhile some Democrats are openly admitting that illegal immigration is their path to turning things around, and are working hard to make that happen.
Virginia Lawmaker Explains: Dems Need Illegal Immigrants to Vote
More Cities Following D.C.-Area Lead, Debating Non-Citizen Voting Rights
Exclusive: California DMV Ordered to Overlook Identity Theft by Illegals
Or, (dare I say,) register to vote, or steal the vote of the person who’s identity you have stolen?
Ohio Official Warns Obama: Executive Amnesty Could Harm Election Integrity
Oh, FA trolls will no doubt show up and say that there is “nothing to see here,” but we have fellow Democrats above admitting to their plans.
@Ditto: Un-fettered illegal immigration is all about diluting the electorate with a fresh supply of government dependents. Once they have ID’s, the door to voter fraud is swung wide open. It is totally transparent why the left propagandizes so hard against voter ID; to leave the fraud door open.