Yesterday I posted on the diary Paris Hilton Democrats and it was reccomended that I start a seperate diary on my thoughts on the so called Investor class. Now after the 2004 elections, it seems like everyone out there thinks that 51% of the population is into JESUS and therefore in order to win, we must abandon gays, Jews, Muslims, atheists, poor people, women, and blacks and instead begin talking about Jesus ourselves. Now while I'm sure that people at the DLC, Bob Shrum, and other respected DNC leaches who have done nothing but lose elections yet never get replaced are probably in favor of this. But most of us, well people with brains and some common sense anyway, know what a stupid idea this all is. And I'm glad to see that most Kossacks agree. And I won't waste valuable diary space talking about how idiotic it is to try and go after JESUS voters and listen to Bob Novak. But now here is my feeling on what kind of voters we need to go after.
I say we need to push to win over so called "Investor Class" voters. Don't get me wrong, this isn't designed to win over super wealthy Manhattan millionaires and billionaires like Mr. Big (Carrie Bradshaw's love interest on Sex in the City, played by Chris Noth, who in the end after 6 years of heartache she finally ends up with). As far as I'm concerned, Mr. Big and his pals all voted for John Kerry last November. He probably walked with her to the polls (probably with Charlotte since she lives nearby on the upper east side) and voted early in the morning and was probably shocked the next day to find out Bush had still won. Anyway.... My feeling is, we need to pursue not values voters but investor voters. Americans are creative and ingenuitive people by nature. The number of Americans who invest in stocks, bonds, and even real estate (until the bubble birsts) will continue to grow. I think that in terms of the coalition keeping Bush and Republicans in control, they're the ones who keep voting to put in charge even though they know the tax cuts are bad, know that our energy policy must be reformed, they are disgusted with the Iraq war, and are probably scared by the JESUS people. Yet many are still Republicans, still reluctant Bush voters. If we want to win in 2006, these are the voters we need to win. Now the marketing people here can steamline a lot of this and actually produce the most effective ads and slogans but here would be my main concepts for winning these voters.
- Be tough on corporate crime. Frame small investors not as investors but average Americans who need to be protected from the Enrons, Adelphias, and Tycos out there. The idea being that the small investor is a good patriotic American and in a world full of bad people who want to rob him of his money, we'll be the ones to protect them, Republicans won't.
- Appeal to white collar workers in general. Unfortunately with the decline of manufacturing jobs, the number of blue collar workers is dwindling and the power of unions is declining. Recently I read an article where the 2004 elections were called a failure for labor unions. Frankly, I think that is an inaccurate characterization. The only place the unions failed was Ohio. In states with large numbers of union members, Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New York, unions were successful, we won all of those states. Along with promoting universal healthcare, we ought to promote quality of life issues for those that don't work for enlightened corporations and companies.
- We ought to acknowledge that more average Americans are in the stock market these days and more Americans are investing in real estate and other business ventures than ever before. We ought to come up with policy ideas that will make capitalism less risky and come up with other ways to help people make profits. I don't know what those ideas would be but I am sure the econ grad and econ professor Kossacks could come up with quite a few.
- Continue to attack the anti environment records of the Republicans as well as their phsychotic social views. Karl Rove has shown us how well fear works in campaigns. We need to in other ways scare these voters. Frankly, they should be scared already with all Schiavo stuff. But we need to press the issue to these voters of just how radical the Christian right is.
Lastly, I think Howard Dean is definately on the right track, at every single event I've been to, he says "You can't trust Republicans with your money". I'd like to see other Democrats, instead of kissing up to Chris Matthews and other media blowhards, say the same thing. Reinforce it through the media by constantly repeating it.