Sunday, February 20, 2005
What's the matter with Kansas or what's right with Illinois?
I just returned from the DuPage Democrats dinner where I met fellow blogger and Naperville Township Dem Committeeman Rick Klau. One piece of Illinois trivia that I didn't know: there is a Democratic state senator with part of DuPage in the district. Give up? Don Harmon has about 10 precincts in DuPage. The keynoter was David Wilhelm and he led with this interesting frame. In most of the country, the GOP playbook is cultural wedge issues: gays, guns and abortion. Identify with the electorate on those cultural issues, define the Dem as alien based on some or all of the wedge issues and coast to a majority. Probably throw race in there too. That worls for the Republicans in a lot of places where the federal GOP agenda of enriching the wealthy and choosing Corporate America over workers and consumers wouldn't be enough to earn support - but the cultural wedge issues do. Thomas Frank (a former Chicago guy) wrote a good book on the topic titled What's The Matter With Kansas. Wilhelm pointed out that the playbook doesn't work here. In the Chicago suburbs, gay-bashing just doesn't play. Look at state rep Joe Dunn's vote for extending civil rights in employment and housing to gays as an example. He represents Naperville - a GOP stronghold - but the anti-gay stuff doesn't resonate. So Illinois is an example of a healthier electorate. Maybe it's because we are better educated or farther north. Whatever the reason, the Dems in other states should be studying us to see what we are doing right.
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11 comments:
Dan, my bro's blog has a link to a WP article on people that ran for Prez. I made some comments about JBA, but you might add some stuff too.
See Yin Yang.
fightforjustice: I think it's simplistic to say that Illinois is a "blue" state just because of Cook County. Admittedly, Cook provides a big margin for Democratic candidates; but Cook always provided a big D vote, even when Republicans were winning statewide.
The difference is that DuPage, Lake, Will, and even Winnebago counties can no longer make up for the difference, despite their population growth. The GOP could reliably carry collar counties with over 60% of the vote as recently as ten years ago. In 2004, Bush carried Lake county by less than 5,00 votes; Winnebago was a virtual tie, decided by 1,000 votes in Bush's favor. Even GOP-vote rich DuPage County could provide a Bush margin of under 39,000 votes -- Bush got under 55% there.
The reason Illinois turned so blue is that Democrats can now easily get 40% or more of the DuPage vote. And that makes Dan's observations relevant.
Just off the top of my head, is the cause of the pinkization of the collar counties perhaps population outflow from Chicago to the 'burbs? Maybe moving into the city has more effect on one's voting habits, while those who relocate outward retain their previous affiliations? Or is it simply that more people move from the the city to the suburbs, with the excess suburbians moving to other states?
DJW,
When are you going to drop the Obama blog and the Progressive Illinois blog from your list? They haven't been active for months. Publish or perish.
I'll concede fightforjustice's point that not only has the GOP margin dropped in the collars, the Cook Suburbs have switched from GOP to Dem.
Illinois turned blue because the Republicans could not hold on to the suburbs. Marginal gains in downstate, particularly southern Illinois, cannot match the spectacular loss of votes in the burbs.
Dan presents, I think, a reasonable case that the socially conservative tint of the national GOP is not playing well in the Chicago suburbs.
The first campaign that made really targeted the suburbs was Durbin's 1996 Senate race. (Full disclosure: I was a paid staffer on that campaign.) Al Salvi -- running as a 1994-Contract-with-America-conservative -- ended up the surprise winner of the GOP primary. As a result, that Senate race was fought on the hot-button issues of abortion and guns, with gay rights making an occasional cameo appearance.
The target audience (for Durbin, at least) was soccer moms, and he won them over big. Since then, it's been fairly easy for Democrats to win 40%+ of the DuPage vote. And, as Rick points out, the GOP can't win in Illinois without getting 60%+ in DuPage. (Conversely, Dems can't win without a 500,000 vote margin coming out of Cook.)
The comparison with Kansas really doesn't cut it, because the areas of Illinois that look like Kansas pretty much vote like Kansas. The more interesting comparison is with Ohio, where the Democrats are perpetually struggling. (More disclosure: I worked on the 1998 Dem Gubernatorial campaign in Ohio.)
The difference between Ohio and Illinois is that Illinois Democrats (i.e., Durbin) took on the social conservatives early and directly. In Ohio, both parties avoided addressing the hot button issues. Thus, the social conservatives were able to take advantage of their already established networks to turn out the vote, without a spirited debate on choice, guns, and other social issues.
Hi all -- Anon, thanks for the link clean-up tip. I'm not sure if we can credit the Illinois burbs voting D versus the Ohio burbs voting R with the Durbin campaign's wisdom. I suspect (and just a hunch) that people here are just more tolerant than people over there. And FightFor -- the Cook County vote is largely independent of the patronage-driven machines in a presidential race. I think the 'Machine's' ability to turn out the vote is more reputation than reality (except in a few wards).
Eventually we are all going to have to distinguish between shades of red. Secular upper middle class and wealthy red, and then rural uneducated sectarian red. Most of the secular types I know don't hate gays, they just want to keep their money and not be forced to share it with the poor. The setrians hate gays, and are happy to share their money with the poor. I cna't wait till the republican party is forced to deal with this. Bush is skating on thin ice here.
Sorry to threadjack, but when I saw this headline this morning, I couldn't help but think about basketball. :-)
GOP PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT... Dan wrote: "The GOP playbook is cultural wedge issues: gays, guns and abortion. Identify with the electorate on those cultural issues, define the Dems as alien based on some or all of the wedge issues and coast to a majority." All true, but what about national defense? If you can't even mention it on your Dem-friendly blog, or if it didn't even occur to you, then you guys are going to continue to LOSE elections. - CF
CF -- perhaps defense was not mentioned as a wedge issue because it's not a wedge issue. Democrats believe in a strong defense. In fact, historically Democratic presidents have been pretty good about defense policy. Remember all those weapons Kerry was accused of voting against? Dick Cheney was the Secretary of Defense who wanted to eliminate those weapons programs.
The wedge issues like gay rights, abortion, and guns are wedge issues because people emotionally choose one side or the other. Defense policy, on the other hand, has only side: a strong US defense. The argument is over which party will provide it.
I believe it was a Republican President who said the following sometime in the early 1960s. [This Dem does not like spending 490 Billion dollars a year on guns and bombs and missle defense. Either did Paul Wellstone. He was a Dem too. Either did Paul Simon]
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
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