An interesting piece by Tom Edsall on the demographics of the Obama coalition sheds some light on both the Tea Party phenomenon and on the frantic fear-mongering by the Republicans.
The combination of persistent, prolonged unemployment, record deficits, the refusal of Republicans to raise taxes, the underfunded Social Security Trust Fund, and a demographic transition moving the nation closer to a non-white voting majority have, together, revived, enlarged, and intensified the battle for limited government resources—pitting those seeking to protect what they have against those seeking more.
The ranks of those who identify with either the "haves" or the "have-nots" are swollen, while the number of those seeing themselves as in the middle, centrally positioned, has declined...
These developments are functioning to aggravate fear among the "haves" that the competition for resources cannot be resolved by traditional means – that is, by economic growth....
The current economic straitjacket is forcing government constraint that is turning traditional policy conflicts between the "haves" and "have-nots" into a zero-sum struggle, in which the gains of one side are at the expense of the other.
Not surprisingly, those who are being crushed at the margin between haves and have nots are the people most opposed to health care reform and to the Democratic agenda, since they see themselves as the most likely losers in that zero-sum game.
There is another constituency—self-employed men and women (often barely afloat)—who identify with the "haves," their present economic status notwithstanding. What they have is not so much current wealth, but a history of, or aspiration towards, status, authority, and autonomy. They are not willing to relinquish their past beliefs or their goals for the future. They conceive of themselves as self-reliant and as integral to what was once an undisputed notion of "American Exceptionalism." The number of the self-employed is expanding at a much faster pace than the population as a whole—to some extent out of necessity, as firms impose major cutbacks, forcing employees to go out on their own.
The GOP is whipping up these groups to maintain the intensity of their support. Meanwhile, the numbers of the "have-nots" - particularly non-whites and unmarried men and women - are growing:
At the same time that the ranks of those identifying with the "haves" have expanded to incorporate those of modest means, there are two other powerful forces—the rise in the number of non-white voters, and of unmarried men and women—boosting the ranks of the "have-nots."
This growing demographic is strongly supportive of government intervention in the economy to provide a social safety net, and as it grows it will move the Democratic Party away from its currently more conservative and corporatist profile.
A July, 2008, Gallup survey asked respondents to categorize themselves as either "haves" or "have-nots." By nearly 2.5 to 1 (64-26), whites consider themselves "haves." In contrast, slight pluralities of both blacks and Hispanics see themselves as "have-nots," (46-45 and 48-40, respectively)...
By a solid 12 percentage points, 53-41, self-identified Democrats view socialism favorably, as do an even larger share of self-identified liberals, 61-34. Among these segments of the electorate, "socialism" is not rejected reflexively, according to Gallup...
These general findings suggest the possibility that the political strength of voters whose convictions are perhaps best described as Social Democratic in the European sense is reaching a significant level in the United States. With effective organization and mobilization, such voters are positioned to set the agenda in the Democratic Party in the near future.
If only we had a well-known, charismatic, politically talented community organizer around to get things underway on that agenda! Anyone know where we can find one?
Anyway, it's a fascinating article, nothing startling if you've read Ruy Teixeira's examination of the demographics that favor the Democratic Party over the coming decades, but interesting for the picture of the intersection of those trends with those exacerbated by the Great Recession, and the implications for developing political strategies for both parties.