Walk with peace in your heart me amigo.
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I think part of it has to do with the association between right wing politics and patriotism.
I have relatives that live very modestly (maybe not poor, but definitely paycheck to paycheck with no buffer) and they are as right wing as can be. The one thing in common my poorer right wing relatives have is that they are military families. Yes, more affordable education and health care would be good, but none of that matters if we donât have our freedom. So priority #1 is to keep the military strong and they firmly believe that the republicans are more committed to military spending than democrats.
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Are free trade agreements inherently bad? As long as they contain enforceable standards for labor rights and environmental protections so that there is a level playing field shouldnât we embrace free trade?
[quote=âChesterfield, post:22, topic:72535â]
of it has to do with the association between right wing politics and patriotism.
I have relatives that live very modestly (maybe not poor, but definitely paycheck to paycheck with no buffer) and they are as right wing as can be. The one thing in common my poorer right wing relatives have is that they are military families. Yes, more affordable education and health care would be good, but none of that matters if we donât have our freedom. So priority #1 is to keep the military strong and they firmly believe that the republicans are more committed to military spending tha
[/quote]White people are underrepresented in the military, and middle and upper income people are overrepresented. Itâs been a very long time since the military was made up of poor whites.
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The makeup of the military has changed, for sure. But Jingoism is alive and well among poor white people even if they arenât signing up like they used to.
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Charles Stross argues that Europe imports political strategies from US. It seems plausible to me that Blair cribbed these moves from Clinton.
Traditionally, regions with weak manufacturing do better with protectionism than free trade â high tariffs on manufactured goods allows them to build up a local manufacturing base by helping local industry compete with more advanced foreign industries. And the tariffs help tax revenues as well.
Ulysses S. Grant had this to say about Great Britainâs support for free trade in the 19th century:
âFor centuries England has relied on protection, has carried it to extremes and has obtained satisfactory results from it. There is no doubt that it is to this system that it owes its present strength. After two centuries, England has found it convenient to adopt free trade because it thinks that protection can no longer offer it anything. Very well then, gentlemen, my knowledge of our country leads me to believe that within 200 years, when America has gotten out of protection all that it can offer, it too will adopt free trade.â
He was prescient, except that WWII made it more like 100 years than 200 years that the US decided free trade was good for everyone (i.e. the US).
Incidentally, the US has a very weak manufacturing base right now. Tariffs on manufactured goods would increase prices of manufactured goods, but also create jobs â it would essentially redistribute wealth from the middle class to the lower class.
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It can be both. The small condolence that you are not getting fucked quite as bad as the guy on the other side of the track.
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Poor people are frequently more right wing than the middle class.
Viewing from outside the US (Australia) this always seems peverse - that the low income families with little job security associated and vote for the Republicans who offer gun rights, patriotism and freedomÂÂŽ. While policies that may actually help them like controls on late stage capitalism (had to get in there) around health care, bad food, firearm safety, workplace reform are ignored.
Deer Hunting with Jesus was a good study on this conundrum for us non-US folk.
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To be perfectly honest, a lot of us watching it happen right in front of us also see it as perverse. Iâm another one of those with dirt-poor relatives living on food stamps and government assistance, but yelling about those (whatever racial epithet) welfare cheats, etc. Iâve honestly tried to talk to them about this from time to time, but they seem to response much better to Republican dog whistling.
I donât think itâs so much that the Democratic party did anything to alienate anyone, as the party hasnât been feeding on the fear and ignorance of these people. (A fear and ignorance that the Republicans do much to encourage, I note.)
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Seriously. All those white working class âReagan votersâ didnât go to him because he fought for unions. He busted unions and cut taxes on the rich.
Clinton had to deal with Republicans in charge of Congress. And so has Obama. Because these white working class people keep voting for Republicans. And lets be honest - itâs mostly white southern working class people. That was the biggest shift from D to R. And I think we all know why that happenedâŚ
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And indeed, Clinton campaigners worked on the Blair campaign and vice versa.
I think its fair to note that a real left platform was not winning in the UK and had not won for many years. Voters were pretty tired of tories by the time Blair won, so maybe he didnât have to compromise, or not do it so much, but maybe it would have been more Tories if he hadnât. For all his many many many many many many faults, he was better than more Tories. If voters are intent on being intensely self interested and fucking everything up, what can one do? Swing voters are, by nature, unprincipled arseholes, but, what can one do?
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Maybe they are principled but their principles arenât anchored to nor aligned with any political party?
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Itâs easy in life to sometimes say that such and such, is because of this or that . And maybe sometimes itâs true.
Sometimes, peopleâs decisions, likes or dislikes, or political leanings canât be easily explained.
Sometimes, there is just no accounting for taste.
Sometimes, there is just no accounting for taste.
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It sounds to me as if you are saying to working class whites: âHey, youâre (mostly) all racists, and we donât want you in our party. The GOP is welcome to you.â
Fine with me if thatâs your message, I guess. Are you OK with the Democratsâ candidates for office making that explicit??
Good luck finding a âfreeâ trade agreement with protections for labour and environment
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[quote=âlolipop_jones, post:37, topic:72535, full:trueâ]
It sounds to me as if you are saying to working class whites: âHey, youâre (mostly) all racists, and we donât want you in our party. The GOP is welcome to you.â
Fine with me if thatâs your message, I guess. Are you OK with the Democratsâ candidates for office making that explicit??
[/quote]Iâm not in a position to stop them from making that argument, even if I think itâs a bad one to make. But as Reich and Sanders have made clear, theyâre not going to make that argument. Theyâre going to do the exact opposite- functioning as apologists for racist whites as they try to get them back into the party. And that I probably will comment on, even if I canât make them stop.
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Finally, something that is unequivocal truth.
As I am a non-white person who is thinking about voting for Sanders, how do you see him as being an apologist for racist whites? It is not an angle Iâve picked up on, and I do look out for such things.
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Something like this?
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