The missing white vote in 2012

IMO the punditry is missing one of the available analytic "angles" in thinking about this election.  IMO a lot of rural white people may have stayed home rather than vote for either BHO or Romney.  In their eagerness to see the US become a "multi-culti" kaleidoscope of peoples and groups the media are beating the drum hard for the GOP to turn itself inside out to become a slightly more rightward leaning version of the Democratic Party.  The 2% decline in the share of votes cast by white people is cited as evidence of inevitable decline of  caucasian dominance in the USA.

That may be a flawed analysis.

I think a lot of white people in all those red counties pictured above hold deeply racist views concerning BHO.  Some of them may have voted for him in 2008 out of fascination with the novelty of the idea of him and as a mute protest against the domestic and foreign policy misrule of the Bush administrations.  The financial disaster into which we were clearly falling probably added to willingness to experiment with the Obama idea.  After  4 years of his government and endless "cracker barrel" discussion of the notion of a n---r president, many of these folks were completely and irreversibly against him.  If you don't think that is true, you need to get out of the blue areas on the map above and talk to people.  You may be afraid to do that and you may be justified in feeling that way.  In my years as a business consultant I learned not to take foreign clients out into the countryside for meetings, recreation, etc.  In general they perceived a profound difference in the attitude of the rural people and wanted to flee back to the blue enclaves.

At the same time, the Mormon factor was in play in this election.  The polling of rural people, especially white evengelical Protestants is generally all about talking to people who have overcome their doubts about Mormons as Christians.  The polling is not extensive among those who would not vote for someone who they think belongs to a secretive, non-Christian cult.  Those people probably do not want to talk about this to poll takers.

If you seek a net effect from my hypotheses, it seems likely to me that the conclusion reached by quite a few citizens was that they preferred not to vote at all rather than vote for either of two unacceptable candidates.

That effect may have played a significant role in the result.  the Republicans should be careful in doing their "homework" before they start making themselves into Democrats.  The potential white vote out there in "flyover" country may be larger than what was showing in this election.  pl  

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2012

Comments

[Herb]

Romney was a terrible candidate. A city slicky who has never done an honest day's work in his life. I work throughout rural central midwest from Oklahoma to the south, the dakotas west and east as far as Ohio. The young and the old, if they are racist, are so for different reasons. They young are racist because their tatted up girlfriend left town and has a black boyfriend in Des Moines now and they are stuck in Fort Dodge tending bar at night and working at the Menards in the day. He might vote for Romney because the business-to-business sales guy, who watches FOX all morning in the hotel breakfast room, says that will put them in their place back in the kitchen. Cut off the welfare check, free cell phone and free housing. But then he just says screw it, I hate them all, can't get bothered to vote for that slimy weasel. He would vote for Jesse Ventura though!

The old white farmer doesn't like Romney, who is just like the shifty smooth local finance guy who ripped him off on that $500K tractor lease. But he isn't going to vote for Obama, because then gays can marry.

There is a reason Reagan and Bush the Younger would "clear brush" back on the ranch, even though it was theater, it showed that getting their hands dirty wasn't beneath their station. They could relate. Bush the Elder didn't do that, and who is the last president since Carter to not be re-elected?

This was a Republican own goal. Obama was hugely vulnerable. Last time, the threat of continued depression made many people overcome their racism to take a chance, this time, with that excuse removed, I think many white Americans reverted back to form, but still, Romney was the absolutely wrong guy. The Republican party has to learn that what the Ayn Randian business-to-business sales class wants in a candidate (a smoother sharpie than they are) is not what the vast majority of white Americans want either. They may be amused by a corporate thief like Donald Trump, but that doesn't mean they admire him, or want him as president.

So with that backdrop, the little things really mattered, and the biggest I think was Gov. Christie throwing Romney under the bus and planting a big wet one on Obama during the Hurricane Sandy thing. That was huge. Obama should be crawling to New Jersey on his knees in forgiveness, and the Republican party should be applauding Christie for being about the shrewdest operator I have seen in a long time. After Romney screwed him on the vice president thing, and after Christie had been the dutiful Romney booster, as required, he saw his opportunity for a revenge meal served cold and you could see the satisfaction in his eyes when he went on Fox and twisted the knife right in Romney's soft, white belly. Go back and watch on youtube, it's about as subtle and brutal a gutting I've ever seen. In. Your. Face. Well-played, sir. Well-played.

This guy Christie is a force, and if he can align his talking points properly, could very well be president. Only the Republicans are too stupid to probably get over his Romney betrayal.

[Paul Escobar]

The Moar You Know,

I too am familiar with California Latinos, who are obviously plentiful.

My cousins married early, had kids early, & cherish the cross. So I can only nod at what you all have said about social values.

However, there are some caveats.

Unlike their parents, Latinos under 30 are under the cultural tutelage of Black Americans. Everything from the messages in their music (not just party music, but actual meaningful music) to the manner of their favourite clothing is derived from Black leadership in these fields.

And anyone who has had an honest conversation with these settled young Latinos knows that they are not as meek & forgiving as their immigrant parents. They take the threats against their parents & families personally. In honest conversation, they will admit to a "re-conquest" as a legitimate response.

Rather than Asian-Americans, I see Latinos on a trajectory similar to American-Jews. Rather than fighting Whites for control of the Republican party, they will simply bend a malleable Democratic party to their will.

I know this is the stuff of Tyler's nightmares. But, IMO, this will give the Democratic party a backbone they have sorely been lacking for many decades.

[John]

As I former eastern Iowan, I have noticed the same thing.

Unfortunately, I do not have a good explanation for this either.

[Mishkilji]

Lets assume the hypotheses it correct (I largely agree with it). The practical political impact may not be as great as you suggest. Popular votes in the MidWest and South may be skewed even more so that part of the US votes to look like Oklahoma (70-30, instead of 60-40).

My family took a Shenendoah vacation in late October and I came back thiking Obama was toast in Virginia because Romney signs everywhere. Then I stood in line on election day in Fairfax County and realized it was going to be a lot closer. The demographic argument matters in swing states and that is where this election was decided. If North Carolina is any indication, the purple hue is speading south (but in Missouri the opposite is true).

[turcopolier]

mishkiji

"I came back thiking Obama was toast in Virginia because Romney signs everywhere. Then I stood in line on election day in Fairfax County and realized it was going to be a lot closer." You validate my hypothesis concerning the enclave status of the blues. pl

[Stephanie]

Asians went solidly for Obama in roughly the same percentages that Latinos did, despite the fact that conservative pundits routinely pay tribute to Asian family values, work ethic, IQ scores, etc. and how diligent and self-reliant they are in comparison to certain unnamed others. Doesn’t seem to be working.

No doubt when immigration reform passes, and it will, probably in the next four years as I expect GOP resistance to collapse, some Latinos may shift to the Republicans. But in the short term many of them are still fairly recent immigrants or struggling to make ends meet, and such people need help from the government to get to/stay on their feet no matter how hard they are working at lousy jobs. The Hispanic out-of-wedlock birthrate is high. Many of those single mothers also need help regardless of extended family support. Hispanics also support gay marriage in surprisingly high numbers.

I’ve read that evangelicals did turn out for Romney in sufficient numbers with only a very slight dropoff from 2008, which would suggest that his religious affiliation didn’t make that much difference to them in the end or their dislike of Obama outweighed their distrust of Mormonism. He seems to have lost with white working class voters elsewhere, who either voted Obama or didn’t show up. Probably Romney’s rich guy cluelessness and his position on the auto bailout made more difference than his faith.

[turcopolier]

stephanie

Wishful thinking. You are a Democrat aren't you? pl

[Medicine Man]

Col.: It's true that I'm not comfortable with it. I don't know the people or the region like you do; there is a big difference between me making that assertion and you making it.

I was more looking at what may have deterred natural GOP voters from pulling the lever for Romney. If you're suggesting that a white man in Obama's place may well have run away with this election, I will take your word for it.

[Mishkilji]

Yes, I did. I was pushing back on the political impact of "racism voting" on the national picture; those red states can't get any redder.

[Fred]

"The real transfer of wealth is the transfer of the hard work of good ol boys in Alabama,Tenn So Carolina etc. who are working in the auto factories for far less than the union guys up in the blue states."

Why don’t you stop to consider the number of retirees who have moved South and now spend their retirement money in communities there and all the economic benefits that entails? GM alone enabled hundreds of thousands of American to earn a middle class living, put kids through college, enjoy a real vacation and save for retirement – especially after the post WWII era. Don’t they pay enough in factories down South to enable employees to do that?

Last time I looked management set the wage rates, hours and conditions of work. If the pay doesn't adequately compensate for the skill and effort required to do the job then find another employer or unionize so that employees can collectively bargain for compensation packages that adequately reimburse the labor supplied as a condition of employment, but don’t blame Yankee union members.

Let me know if you’d like Bob King’s number or email address I can certainly get it for you. I’m sure he’d be happy to have the UAW represent American workers in Alabama and Tennessee.

[ked]

a raw data analysis based upon the latest form of public expression technology... http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/map-pinpoints-election-online-hate-tweets-article-1.1199402

[Trent]

Williamsburg, 76.09.24, William and Mary. I had the audience recording but not the soundboard. Sound quality is very good. Not wild about the matrix-like audience applause at the end of the songs, but otherwise, it's great.

[steve]

Hi, I'm the poster above, having erroneously typed in a nic I've used on other forums.

It is odd, particularly when any explanation one can come up with falls apart in very red northwestern Iowa.

Perhaps there's some basis in religion, as northwestern Iowa is heavily Dutch Reformed as opposed to Catholic/Lutheran northeastern Iowa.

I live in Mason City--west of here is all red, Mason City and points east are all blue.

[different clue]

I was thinking about how to reply to this but I see others already have in major part. It might still be useful to ask just how wealth is being transferred from non-unionised car plant workers in the South to unionised car plant workers in the North and mostly in the Midwest. I believe cars made by non-unionised workers cost the same as cars made by unionised workers. Since most of the car plants in the Right To Work states are Japanese or German or Korean, wouldn't the wealth transferred from the lesser-paid non-union carworkers in fact be transferred over to Germany and Korea and Japan?

And as other commenters have already noted, there is a simple way to close off that leakage of transferred wealth. And that is for enough citizens of the Right To Work States to vote for legislators and governors who will repeal the Right To Work laws and pass and sign Right To Organise laws instead. Then the non-unionised car plant workers will finally be legally free and permitted to unionise and force their wages and benefits exactly up to where the UAW guys' wages and benefits are now. That would put a dead stop to that particular transfer of wealth.

[Eliot]

I'm a Southerner, and a Democrat by tradition.

My mother always told us the story about the paperboy in 38. My grandfather went out to get the paper on a crisp fall morning, the paperboy stopped and they exchanged greetings as they always did. The boy, he couldn't have been more than fourteen, happened to say something unpleasant about FDR and my grandfather (the good Democrat) just blanched - he told the boy to take his paper and get the hell out off of the property.

My grandfather never read the Winchester Star again.

-

I have trouble voting for Democrats these days. I may have grown up in the party, hell my father worked for Clinton, but I find myself alienated by the rhetoric. I've grew up around guns, I've always owned guns, I love the country - but I don't think the party understands people like me. They think I'm backward, they think I'm a savage.

I worry about the effect of development. I worry about the transplants who don't understand my culture, and the ones who want to destroy it. The party doesn't understand that.

I want to be left alone. I want benign neglect.

The party sure as hell doesn't understand that.

[William R. Cumming]

Perhaps not followed closely but President George W. Bush and his last Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff both invested a huge amount of personal time and effort in getting a major immigration bill drafted and submitted to Congress. The House bowed to a Senate lead if memory is correct. That bill almost passed the Senate but key Republicans killed it at almost the last minute. They basically used the word "Amnesty" to attack it.
In 2008 and again in 2012 the Presidential candidates promised work on immigration reform either closing it down or making it fairer. Neither parties leadership has really tackled it in Congress although the DREAM ACT was one successfull effort. A recent effort to allow college and university students to stay on in the US after graduation was defeated. So mixed messages are the norm.
I have long argued that Mexican immigration both legal and illegal if segregated out as a policy issue by Americans and their leaders would give a much clearer view of what is at stake. Mexico itself could assist by having a clearer picture of how much Mexico differes from the rest of the world as respects US immigration policy and issues. In many ways the USA and Mexico are one country although both make a major effort to ignore that fact. Time will tell!

As a fuzzy headed liberal I deeply respect the efforts of Bush and Chertoff on immigration and suspect their drafting efforts will guide both parties in the future. As always could be wrong.

[Tyler]

And whites are just going to bend over and take it? Maybe the self hating SWPL urbanites who are fond of the Toussant-esque cover on Newsweek, but there is a lot of America that is tired of being told it is stupid, intolerant, heading for extinction, etc.

A race war should be everyone's nightmare, Paul. However, the Left and its media enablers seem pretty damn set on playing with fire and trying to see how far they can go before they catch a spark.

I know more than a few people who have bought two AKs in the time since the election (!!), and these are the people who think I'M some sort of damn crazy fascist survivalist. Every single firearms/tactical training class at $400/class has been mostly whites with Military/LE backgrounds with a sprinkling of hard right Mexicans/Cubans/South Americans who make me look like an immigration advocate.

So what am I getting at? One side is preparing for something, and the other side is busy telling whites how stupid and dumb they are for not being down with multiculturalism and how they're going to like it or else.

This will most definitely NOT end in blood or anything like that, nope.

[Tyler]

Yes.

Back to the wilderness with me.

[Phil Cattar]

You wrote "I believe cars made by non unionised workers cost the same as cars made by unionised workers".I assume you mean cost to the consumer,not cost to manufacture.I believe that if the companies had to pay union wages and benefits to the currently non union southern workers ,the companies would raise the prices on their cars.They would simply pass their extra expenses on to the consumers .By working for lower wages the southern worker is subsidizing the consumers everywhere.................Your cars and many other items up north are cheaper for you because southerns are working for non union wages and southern(sunbelt)states have lower taxes etc on companies................This begs the response..................Why don't you southerns unionize ? Even get our government workers to do so ?..............Maybe one day we will but not too many people down here dream about their cities becoming the next Detroit or Gary In. etc,etc..................It seems to me the very blue states of IL. and Ca. are having serious financial problems Why is that?Could unions be partly to blame?Especially govrnment employee unions?...........When Chrysler had serious financial problems years ago,partly due to excessive union demands and a 20 % absenteism on most Monday mornings,Lee Iacocca had to clean it up.He said he did not have any $40.oo an hour jobs but had plenty of $25.00 an hour jobs.THe unions are very much to blame for the rust belt.People in the Sunbelt do not yearn to become the next rustbelt.