Sirotablog
David Sirota is a political journalist and nationally syndicated newspaper columnist at Creators Syndicate. David writes about political corruption, globalization and working-class economic issues often ignored by both of America's political parties.
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January 9, 2008 5:55 PM
Urban vs. Rural in New Hampshire
Bill Bishop at the Daily Yonder has a good rundown of the rural vs. urban divide in yesterday's New Hampshire voting.
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About David Sirota
David Sirota is a political journalist and nationally syndicated newspaper columnist at Creators Syndicate. He is the New York Times bestselling author of Hostile Takeover. He lives in Denver, Colorado. His daily blog can be found at CREDO Action. He contributes regularly to the Denver Post's Web site, is a senior editor at In These Times magazine and is working on his second book. He has been profiled in Newsweek and the Rocky Mountain News and is widely known for his reporting on political corruption, globalization and working-class economic issues often ignored by both of America's political parties. Sirota serves as co-chair of the Progressive States Network, a 501(c)3 organization that supports state legislators and that is a partner of CREDO.
You can subscribe to Sirota's e-mail newsletter by going to davidsirota.com and signing up in the lefthand corner. To find out more about Sirota, download his official biography or see his recent media appearances. You can e-mail him at sirota@credoaction.com.
The views expressed on this blog are his own, and do not necessarily represent the views of Working Assets (publisher of CREDO Action) or the institutions Sirota works for.
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Discussion
Good article.
The fact that Hillary won in blue-collar regions seems to prove my idea that populism doesn't work with voters anymore. They don't want a dragon-slayer or FDR, they want a status-quo candidate that doesn't rock the boat.
Even if that candidate will put them on butcher's block if elected.
McCain was no surprise since he carried the state the last time he was here. Though he pulled in a lot independents which shows the Democrats no longer have a lock on them.
If he continues to pull in independents, the Democrats better start sweating bullets because it means they lost the swing vote. Which should come as a surprise to them given the systematic betrayal by Democrats on the '06 mandate.
Speaking of NH and rural vote, I took a look at the general election 2004 results on that state on uselectionatlas.org. Interestingly, Kerry did rather well it seems even in the less populated counties while Bush barely beat him in the most populated ones. That's a sharp contrast to IL, OH, MO, IA, MN, WI, MI, PA, NY, and CA whereby the Democrat wins big in the urban areas to offset heavy losses in rural areas of those states.
waltc, I think the blue-collared voters in NH don't like any of the Democrats and have lost all hope in Edwards so they're forced into madly gunning for Hillary to win only to get drubbed big time in the general election. It would be so sad once again to see these people cheering for their GOP candidate winning a landslide even when their lives are at stake economy or foreign policy wise. Maybe something will unexpectedly change in the next 48 states to free us of Obama and Hillary, who knows?
northern rural areas are far different than the rural areas here in the south
look at northeast minnesota and northwest wisconsin: they are some the only oldschool leftwing blue areas left on the map!!! Mildly liberal Rep. David Obey (WI - Wausau, Superior) represents part of this area.
speaking of populism:
I am beginning to think that protectionism is not that important. If we have a minimum wage and high progressive taxation to redistribute the gains from trade, it could actually work out nice. I mean, do people really don't give a hoot whether they work in the service sector or manufacturing? As long as we are paid well, who cares? And it is not like we can do anything about the cheap asian goods - we may as well take advantage of it!!! now there is a leftist platform - free trade, but redistribution of wealth and worker protection. If the elite don't want protectionism, I say let us take advantage of their global economy!!!!
waltc:
you may be right on hillary/the end of populism. But it is OKAY that they did not go for Obama: he is not progressive.
I am reminded of a similar story here in my congressional district. I live in MD 02, represented by centrist democrat C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger. He is considered the man of the bluecollar dems, reagan dems, and even many blue collar GOPers. He talks with a genuine, thick MD accent. Gives off the air of being a real man of the people. I have seen him a couple times. But populism is absent from his agenda. And our district (MD 02) is one of the most bluecollar in the state, as well as the second poorest (the only poorer district is the one that encompasses the bulk of inner city baltimore and the "black" areas). Yet this lowermiddleclass, "white," and somewhat bluecollar district constituency decides that, while it wants a traditional democrat who talks like a man of the people, it could care less about any progressiveness in his agenda.
below_mason_dixon,
I forgot to include in my list of states. Now that you reminded me, I wonder now and then how long the Democrats in MD will last by relying on Prince George County, Montgomery County, and Baltimore city to be overwhelmingly blue all the while the rest of the state especially the rural areas get redder. Interesting point on the northeastern rural areas. That would certainly explain how rural ME and rural VT still stayed Kerry in 2004.
Too bad the urban areas in VA aren't enough to turn the state blue. Not to worry though, the DLC hacks are working on building Kaine's idea of shoring up the urban vote and grabbing some exurban and suburban votes all the while completely writing off the rural areas of VA.
maxpayne:
Well, frankly, relying on the dc suburbs (esp. montgomery and howard) for the state to stay blue is not a good idea in the first place. The good thing is that there are many liberal government workers. The OVERWHELMINGLY bad thing is that it is such a wealthy, DLC-style dem area. I would rather the dems relied on Baltimore, the workingclass suburbs of baltimore, and the poorer rural areas in western md and especially the eastern shore. Do keep in mind that some of our rural areas are actually quite wealthy. that is not the case in VA.
But the fact is the rural areas are hardcore red. And what's far worse than that is the BRAC commision plans which bring in wealthy, conservative people from northern VA and NJ to Aberdeen proving ground and Fort
George G. Meade (both in my currently overwhelmingly democratic district). This will make the baltimore suburbs far more red if the plan goes as planned. The ironic thing is that the plan was endorsed by most dems (including omalley and ruppersberger) on the basis of economic growth. The dems are sowing their own defeat throught their own policies!
I should also notify you that the chairman of the DCCC is Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Montogmery County, including Bethesda, Potomac, Rockville, and Silver Spring. This guy is EXACTLY the type that the DLC/centrists want to be running democratic campaings: a guy elected from a socially liberal but economically QUITE conservative area (with the exception of lower-scale gov't workers). Reminds me a bit of Melissa Bean from Illinois.
That's right. Montgomery County, MD is controlling the Democratic campaigns for congress.
We need to remember that FDR started running on what we might call today a DLC platform. What happened between 1932-34 was socialists begun running as Democrats. This moved FDR to the left. In fact the New Deal heavily relied on this new labor (ex socialists) vote, because the DLC liberals would not support it.
I actually disagree with Walt. I think if you look at the poll results it demonstrates the opposite. It shows folks are being brought to the polls by populist concerns, yet turning towards Hillary.
Clearly, her base and the issues they bring to the table are not the Clintonomic base. I would predict that if we looked at 92 results, Clinton voters would look more like Obama's than Hillary's.
I still hold that Edwards made a big mistake when he teamed up with Obama. While the media was on the change bandwagon; the whole action over rhetoric, and doing over talking certainly made an impression on me. As Karl Marx would say, you have ascend to the concrete. Hillary was able to do that somewhat, Edwards wasn't. I certainly think Edwards could have made that case, but he chose not to.
Edwards needs to wake up, leave the rhetoric of change to the chattering class. He should focus on giving a very specific vision of what an Edwards presidency would look like. And frankly, he should tell Elisabeth to take a step back or two. It was more than irritating watching her interrupt him so she could have the microphone back.
n*t*:
good points. I live in a state where we have a very traditional democratic base (lower to lower-middle class "whites" and "blacks" who are liberal on economics and moderate to traditional on social issues). This traditional base does not like the college types (the centrist PseduoLeft types who sit around at starbucks obsessing over global warming, etc.). They tend to support the establishment nominee, because even thought that person is moderate, people have more faith in them as bringing core democratic principles to the table. I think my state is goin strong for hillary. The problem to these people with "alternatives" like Obama is that they are not really alternatvies but rather more socially non-traditional (i don't believe in social liberalism/conservatism - i use the word tradition) versions of the same (sometimes even more conservative - after all - we are talking about wealthy college students) economic agenda.
Hillary will win. The rightiwngers can say what they want, but the fact is that most people do not compulsively hate her. Obama could have a hard time winning. Not cause he is too left (he is actually conservative), but because he represents "college activists" (who BTW are not liberal on any issues of consequence - i am near these wealthy bastards every day - all they care about is the environment and nothing else) and well, the fact is, there are many people (not just "white" - also latino and asian) who will refuse to pull the lever to someone who is part "black."
Maybe that is a sad thing. But that will happen, and it is not because the voters are racist. It is because they kinda get sick of the hiphop commercials and BET and all of the fashionably "black" enterntainment genres and most importantly, all of the reverse descrimination. So voting for obama would be like endorsing all that stuff. That is not racism, that is just not wanting to have people rub themselves in your faces.
I am just telling you how people think. Whether it is right or not is up to you.
"That is not racism, that is just not wanting to have people rub themselves in your faces."
I meant specifically that it is not racism on behalf of the "non-black" voters. Rather, it is these voters not wanting to have "black" culture rubbed in their face.
I would tend to agree that certain minority groups will not pull the lever for Obama. Even a lot of working class whites won't, for them because he has nothing to offer them, not even vague promises.
Here in California Democrats have found that out that certain ethnic groups will not vote for certain people of different ethnicities no matter what. Its one of the reasons we have Arnold and not a Democrat.
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