Politico: Obama will have no mandate because he will lose white men!

[Holmes]

I'm a rural white man. Just living in a big city, though. So shut up, guys.

[Sbane]

I'm a rural white man. Just living in a big city, though. So shut up, guys.

Are you a racist? If you were born poor, do you blame that on blacks and mexicans? If not, this thread is irrelevant to you.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Can you elitist pricks go and read What's the Matter With Kansas? Then come back.

[So rightwing that I broke the Political Compass!]

Obama isn't going to win, but if he did win while losing the majority of white men he wouldn't have a "mandate". The reason being that white men are the most powerful and productive demographic in America. They pay the majority of taxes, are the majority of business owners/politicians/important media figures/soldiers, and have overwhelming hegemony in a vast number of states.

So yeah, no mandate unless you win the most powerful demographic group.

[Sbane]

Can you elitist pricks go and read What's the Matter With Kansas? Then come back.

I doubt I will learn in there why people think Obama is a muslim or hold racist views in general.

I do think I will learn about the cultural reasons for why they vote Republican, which is very different from the more insidious reasons. I don't relate with people who hold such views, but I do not consider them to be bad people. Not at all! Racists on the other hand.....

[Mechaman]

Isn't it ironic that some of the people who just love to play the enlightened card almost always come out as the most shockingly bigoted people?

Don't you live in Oklahoma? Then you should know exactly the type of people who come across as the most "shockingly bigoted". You know, the type of people who will go up to black people in service jobs and tell them Obama is a Muslim and that all blacks will riot if he doesn't win, just to get a rise out of them and then complain and get them fired. That is pretty shockingly bigoted. Please spare me the faux outrage about classism in this thread. Let's deal with something real out there, racism.

Oh yes nice way to avoid my points by pointing out where I live.
Yes, there is bigotry here like the Sharia Law ban that was passed a couple of years ago.  Sure, there are people who believe that Obama is a Muslim and I bet there are even people who think the black will riot if he wins (in the countryside anyways).  That still doesn't take away from my original point that a lot of you guys are hypocritical BIGOTS whose views, once properly spelled out, are quite shocking.  The views of a number of Oklamans isn't that shocking, frankly, because I never hear any of them raising the pretend card of enlightenment while they are making the claims they do.  You, and other two-faced "progressives", do it on an almost daily basis on here and you guys have been lucky that until now no one has called you out on it.
Well, that time is over.  And good riddance too.
I never seen such people in all my years, who preach tolerance while out of their mouths they say the most intolerant spiel about whole demographics.  Since you brought up Oklahoma and you think we are all bigots, I should point out that some of the damn best people I've ever known are Oklahomans.  People who don't harbor ill-feelings for every non-white non-christian person they meet.  People who have gay friends.  People who are gay.  People who, well you get the point.
But of course, to some people on here, who prefer the position of sitting in their little corners of America (or wherever else), in their little so-called zones of Enlightenment, it doesn't matter.  Instead, they prefer to bring out the very stereotypasaurus that they oft accuse the people they criticize for using on "unwanteds".  They prefer to sit in their little corners and judge, instead of giving a damn.  To me that's beyond pathetic.  If counselors took the same approach to alcoholism and drug addiction that some of the so-called "progressives" take towards the white male working class, our society would be in a shitty shape.  Needless to say, AA would stand for something else besides "Alcoholics Anonymous".
So no, let's not divert the conversation.  You guys like to pontificate, but not act, on your words.  It's about time the rest of us held you accountable.

PS: the idea that white working class is incapable of thinking logically reeks of the very thing you rally against, racism.

I don't see how you took my post as being directed towards all of Oklahoma. I live in Tennessee, and I have seen overt racism (which you do not see in California, but it exists), but I have also seen that most people are decent. Still, this does not mean that the views of those bigots should be taken seriously. They blame their problems on others instead of taking personal responsibility...and at the same time accuse others of doing the same.

I am not stereotyping anyone, and you better not accuse me of that again. Racists are racists are racists. It's as simple as that. There is more of it in the south, and it is certainly more overt. Those are also facts. It is also a fact that most people in the south are not racist. When I go off on racist people, I am only talking about those people. In the north they tend to be well hidden, in the south you see them speaking more truthfully, which is why I brought up your state. But yeah, thanks for showing your insecurity about your state.

I frankly don't care to "understand" why they think Obama is a muslim or a terrorist. They need to be ignored by the rest of the populace as far as I am concerned. Does that come off as bigoted to you? If it does, I frankly don't care. But if you think I am stereotyping whole states, you don't know what the hell you are talking about. I voluntarily moved to Tennessee from California, you moron. And I do not regret it at all.

Insecurity?  Admitting that people in this state hold shocking views is being insecure?!  I would like to note that nowhere in my post did I deny that the views you described existed.  Nor did I say that Oklahomans are the height of enlightenment, or even better than the classists in this thread.

But I will make one concession, and that is that I didn't give you enough of a benefit of a doubt.  Frankly sbane, you are better than the other people in this thread who have voiced their criticisms of this group.  So I apologized for going off on you like that, but I still stand on some of the points that I made and still agree with Al about the nature of some otherwise enlightened people towards economically disadvantaged people.  And that it's just defeatism to give up on them.

So for what it's worth, I'm sorry if you felt personally slighted by my remarks.

[All Along The Watchtower]

I don't understand why Democrats are afraid to talk about class.

Seriously? Seriously?

[Marokai Backbeat]

My family's pretty poor. I live in a sh**ty rural, almost exclusively white, area in Southeastern Ohio a few minutes from a town with around half of the population living under the poverty line. Al and Progressive Realist are right in that the feeling of betrayal is semi-deserved and understandable, and I see a lot people around me here, all white, all desperately poor without a prayer of moving up the social ladder, who are viciously anti-Obama, or anti-Democratic in general. Near the river of the very poor and poverty stricken town I was talking of there's a huge display on the side of a hill that says "NOBAMA 2012, VOTE ROMNEY/RYAN." When I see that I can't help but be a little angry, at them and at the Democratic Party for not even trying to connect with people who would clearly benefit from a progressive economic vision, and a little sorry for them, even if I realize how condescending it is of me to feel that way.

I'm not sure I really have a point here beyond rambling, but I just felt like saying that I really get both sides here. King is right that on some level you reach a point that you can't pander to them, you just have to get in power, and prove them wrong. But you really must try to prove them wrong. Platitudes and pseudo-populism doesn't work when you get in office and govern as a neoliberal. Snowstalker mentions What's the Matter With Kansas?, but in Pity the Billionaire, there's a better explanation for what's happened in the wake of an economic collapse. The left, the forces of progressive/populist reform, don't have the politics of grassroots anger anymore.

People follow anger when they're given a reason to hate something, when they're given a target. Democrats didn't get out there in the Meigs County Ohios of the world and tell us that we should be angry at the businesses and pursue left-wing economic policy to fix it. But Republicans did get out here among us and they told us it was because of the San Francisco Democrat and the Chicago Black Man who were running the big bad government. The Tea Party should have been us. My grandparents adore programs like Social Security and Medicare, but they never vote for the party that would create such programs.

I'm honestly not sure how Democrats can fix this problem, at some point I guess there isn't a way to completely solve it, but I so so much wish we could. Because these people would be better with us if we simply had the balls to try. But Democrats today ain't no FDRs or LBJs when it comes to economic policy. I really believe if we did big things we could make these people who feel left behind (even if they aren't, as King said) understand, but the problem is that Democrats are turning into social liberals and economic technocrats. The worst of both worlds as far as rural whites are concerned. I think making peace with the fact that some of these people are just irredeemable racists needs to be more understood here, but that doesn't excuse no longer even really trying.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

As 2004 showed us, Obama will have a mandate if he wins the popular vote by 2.46%.

And we all recall how Bush used that mandate to push through Social Security reform, don't we?

[All Along The Watchtower]

The left, the forces of progressive/populist reform, don't have the politics of grassroots anger anymore.

People follow anger when they're given a reason to hate something, when they're given a target. Democrats didn't get out there in the Meigs County Ohios of the world and tell us that we should be angry at the businesses and pursue left-wing economic policy to fix it. But Republicans did get out here among us and they told us it was because of the San Francisco Democrat and the Chicago Black Man who were running the big bad government. The Tea Party should have been us. My grandparents adore programs like Social Security and Medicare, but they never vote for the party that would create such programs.

Nailed it. The Democratic Party doesn't care for economic populism anymore; and I'd argue that this is a reflection of the party's increasingly urban bourgeois constituency, in both votes and in $$$ donations.

The Republicans control the present-day narrative in many of these white, rural, ancestrally Democratic working-class areas. That narrative is exploiting deeply held conservative views on social and cultural issues, but it is also exploiting overwhelming cynicism and anger towards not only Wall Street, but also the federal government that enabled Wall Street and Corporate America in general to hollow out the poor, working, and lower middle classes.

When the two parties are dominated by wealthy, educated types who basically agree on the neo-liberal program, working-class and poor people will drop out of the electorate. Those who remain will be more motivated to vote by provincial cultural biases, not economic need. And since the Republicans are experts at picking up on and stoking the resentments of lower-class and rural whites..well, that is what the Democrats get for abandoning economic populism.

You can't call poor whites who vote Republican "racist, ignorant, uneducated fools" and then wonder "Why don't they vote for us?? We are in their economic self-interest!", especially when the actual differences between the Democrats and the Republicans on economic issues are often trivial at best.

[Torie]

When looking at the thread headline, I had very low expectations for this thread. But at least this page is quite good actually (I did not check the first two pages because the Forum is sooooo sloooow right now).  Kudos.

[ag]

And the 95% of blacks voting for Obama gets little attention... this is not racism lad

Well over 90% of those 95% would have voted any D candidate over any R candidate, whatever the race of either one of them. They have a strong prejudice - against those who identify themselves as Republicans. Unless you consider "Republican" being a race, this ain't racism. Then, perhaps, you might be considering Republicans a race.

[Chartist]

The left, the forces of progressive/populist reform, don't have the politics of grassroots anger anymore.

People follow anger when they're given a reason to hate something, when they're given a target. Democrats didn't get out there in the Meigs County Ohios of the world and tell us that we should be angry at the businesses and pursue left-wing economic policy to fix it. But Republicans did get out here among us and they told us it was because of the San Francisco Democrat and the Chicago Black Man who were running the big bad government. The Tea Party should have been us. My grandparents adore programs like Social Security and Medicare, but they never vote for the party that would create such programs.

Nailed it. The Democratic Party doesn't care for economic populism anymore; and I'd argue that this is a reflection of the party's increasingly urban bourgeois constituency, in both votes and in $$$ donations.

The Republicans control the present-day narrative in many of these white, rural, ancestrally Democratic working-class areas. That narrative is exploiting deeply held conservative views on social and cultural issues, but it is also exploiting overwhelming cynicism and anger towards not only Wall Street, but also the federal government that enabled Wall Street and Corporate America in general to hollow out the poor, working, and lower middle classes.

When the two parties are dominated by wealthy, educated types who basically agree on the neo-liberal program, working-class and poor people will drop out of the electorate. Those who remain will be more motivated to vote by provincial cultural biases, not economic need. And since the Republicans are experts at picking up on and stoking the resentments of lower-class and rural whites..well, that is what the Democrats get for abandoning economic populism.

You can't call poor whites who vote Republican "racist, ignorant, uneducated fools" and then wonder "Why don't they vote for us?? We are in their economic self-interest!", especially when the actual differences between the Democrats and the Republicans on economic issues are often trivial at best.

What about Obamacare?

Was that not economic populism in ensuring universal coverage (aimed at the poor)? Why was that so unpopular with rural whites (including, one presumes, Marokai's grandparents)?

[All Along The Watchtower]

It is not classist to point out that overt racists come from a certain background. Not to say racism doesn't exist in the upper classes, but of course that is more or less classism. The bigotry of SOME working class whites is of a different quality.

So some rednecks who use the N-word and blame the Mexicans and gays for "what is wrong with this country", or who even (God forbid!) vote Republican, are somehow worse than the upper-class, educated, mostly white (and male) executives and professionals who actually control public policy, in Washington, the state capitols, and in the city governments-not to mention the "enlightened", highly educated mega-capitalists of Wall Street and Silicon Valley?

Is the low-educated truck driver who listens to Glenn Beck and screams at the government really a threat to the poor, or to gay people, or to immigrants, or to women? Or is this merely an unfortunate symptom of a society that has abandoned said truck driver, and others like him,, a society that literally does not need him, does not give a sh*t about him?

At least the Republican Party tells him he's special.

[Indy Texas]

Is the low-educated truck driver who listens to Glenn Beck and screams at the government really a threat to the poor, or to gay people, or to immigrants, or to women? Or is this merely an unfortunate symptom of a society that has abandoned said truck driver, and others like him,, a society that literally does not need him, does not give a sh*t about him?

At least the Republican Party tells him he's special.

Yes, he is. I come from a pretty bourgeois background. I know well-to-do Democrats and well-to-do Republicans. And the "country club Republicans" that were my parents' friends and my friends' parents have no problem with letting gays get married (who do you think does their hair and redecorates their vacation house?) and giving amnesty to illegal aliens ("I could never let them deport Rosa. She's like family to us!").

In contrast, when I was going to college in a podunk Texas town, who do you think vandalized the car of one of my classmates who was gay? A couple of Skoal-dipping local boys. And at the college in question, everyone knew that when bar-hopping there were certain venues that we needed to avoid if there were non-white people in our group, lest they be jeered at by "the natives." Oh, but yes, they're the ones whose "values are under attack." Mitt Romney was right when he said there is a segment of this country who insist on making themselves out to be victims.

The Democratic Party has done more than enough to try to help these people. They want job-training and affordable education. They support extending unemployment benefits at a time when even people who genuinely want a job often can't find them. We all want them to have better jobs and for their children to have better opportunities. But if you tell these people that they might have to, God forbid, actually open a book or take a technical certification class, they pitch a fit and run crying to Rick Santorum and he tells them they're right and that we're "snobs" for expecting them to actually try to better themselves.

So I'd say there's really not a whole lot else that the President, me, you or anyone else can or should do for them. If Obama wins tomorrow, he will have proved you don't need the white working class to win elections anymore. And he shouldn't: fifty years ago the overwhelming majority of Americans were white people who didn't go to college; that America doesn't exist anymore. So even if these people keep trying in vain to "take their country back" eventually they'll become a demographic asterisk. And, to paraphrase Mitt, it won't be our job to have to worry about them.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I'm not sure what the (provable) fact that rich racists are better at masking their racism beneath a thick veneer of bullsh!t has to do with the price of rice. 'Faux outrage' is the term used that I took particular objection to, for what that's worth...

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The whole point of having a reputation is to maintain it.

[Serenity Now]

Obama isn't going to win, but if he did win while losing the majority of white men he wouldn't have a "mandate". The reason being that white men are the most powerful and productive demographic in America. They pay the majority of taxes, are the majority of business owners/politicians/important media figures/soldiers, and have overwhelming hegemony in a vast number of states.

So yeah, no mandate unless you win the most powerful demographic group.

Seriously, what the f***...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes, he is. I come from a pretty bourgeois background.

That much was obvious.

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Oh what a fascinating, fascinating, absolutely fascinating sentence!

The obvious things to draw attention to are 'more than enough' and 'these people', but there's other stuff - including a complaint about the lack of gratitude! Always a bad sign - lurking there as well.

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This is pretty hateful. And also extremely right-wing. And also amusing given the 'more than enough' bollocks earlier - you think that extending unemployment benefits (but not by much) is going to deal with the systemic problems caused by deindustrialisation? Hah.

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Have you ever been to a mining town that's lost its pit, or a steel town without a steelworks? I ask out of genuine curiosity.

And, once again, I'll have to repeat this point:

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If Obama wins the election, then he will almost certainly have won Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Ohio and so on. It is not possible to win these states without a significant degree of support from people who are both white and working class.

Of course you actually half-mean hicks, rednecks and so on, but then the support of rural working class voters has never been essential in American Presidential politics.

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Quite a charmer. Anyway, are you expecting some kind of human version of Chestnut Blight to sweep through the Appalachians some time soon?

[So rightwing that I broke the Political Compass!]

Obama isn't going to win, but if he did win while losing the majority of white men he wouldn't have a "mandate". The reason being that white men are the most powerful and productive demographic in America. They pay the majority of taxes, are the majority of business owners/politicians/important media figures/soldiers, and have overwhelming hegemony in a vast number of states.

So yeah, no mandate unless you win the most powerful demographic group.

Seriously, what the f***...

He won, I have to admit that. But he doesn't have majority support among those with actual control and influence in society(whom are principally white men), hence this can't be considered a mandate.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Obama isn't going to win, but if he did win while losing the majority of white men he wouldn't have a "mandate". The reason being that white men are the most powerful and productive demographic in America. They pay the majority of taxes, are the majority of business owners/politicians/important media figures/soldiers, and have overwhelming hegemony in a vast number of states.

So yeah, no mandate unless you win the most powerful demographic group.

Seriously, what the f***...

He won, I have to admit that. But he doesn't have majority support among those with actual control and influence in society(whom are principally white men), hence this can't be considered a mandate.

Mandates don't just come from 'those with actual control and influence in society'. Populist mandates are eminently possible, though rare in American history. Also, why on Earth are you using pronouns like BigSkyBob?

[So rightwing that I broke the Political Compass!]

Obama isn't going to win, but if he did win while losing the majority of white men he wouldn't have a "mandate". The reason being that white men are the most powerful and productive demographic in America. They pay the majority of taxes, are the majority of business owners/politicians/important media figures/soldiers, and have overwhelming hegemony in a vast number of states.

So yeah, no mandate unless you win the most powerful demographic group.

Seriously, what the f***...

He won, I have to admit that. But he doesn't have majority support among those with actual control and influence in society(whom are principally white men), hence this can't be considered a mandate.

Mandates don't just come from 'those with actual control and influence in society'. Populist mandates are eminently possible, though rare in American history. Also, why on Earth are you using pronouns like BigSkyBob?

If "those with actual control and influence in society" don't support a leader, then how effective can he/she possibly expect his/her governance to be?

As to the pronouns, I didn't even notice that I was using them excessively? Do you have a problem with them?

[WMS]

This seems like a good place to post part of my signature.

The political class has demonized the working class because the political class no longer represents the working class.  Neither Republicans or Democrats.

Thanks for proving Sam's point, liberals*!

*As distinguished from leftists - this thread sure is good for illuminating the differences between them...

You don't need to kiss ass to these people.  They're not worth your pandering.  They are literally dying out.  They are either too old to reproduce or, like Mike Naso, too repulsive to reproduce.  Their beliefs will die with them.

The biggest problem with many of these men is that they just assume they are educated and intelligent.  On the whole, every Opinionated Book Skimmer I've ever met has been apart of the prestigious white middle class male demo.  

But I repeat:  They're dying out.  You don't need to figure out how to bring them into the fold.  Nonwhites and women have a lot more to prove when they seek an education and as a result they learn more on the whole.  Educated women also control the reproduction of the species.  Keep these more educated voters in your circle and forget about the rest. 

You can still help them with policies, but don't let them dictate to you what needs to be done because they don't hold any power anymore and they don't actually know anything anyway.

You really are an arrogant Santa Fe ass, aren't you? Stop pretending you're any type of moderate swing voter and go put on the D-NM avatar already.

[King]

Hey, WMS.  That post was pretty angry in tone and I apologize.  I understand days before the election the trolling here was rampant and I was pushed to the crazy left; just as you've clearly been pushed to right since the days when we were agreeing with each other on most everything around 2004-07 on this forum.

I was just trying to point a statistical truth.  Blue collar whites are declining in population share, rural culture is declining, advances in technology will make the working class virtually non-existant in America by the end of the century.  I guarantee it.  Some can't fathom this, but the West and perhaps the world shortly after it is ascending beyond blue collar.  

Any political ideology that is looking to preserve the blue collar worker and win their votes is looking backwards.  They're not bad people and they need to be helped in the present through policy but they don't know what is right for this country because their views are to preserve something that cannot be saved.

I guess I'm a classist because I recognize that there is less need for laborers with each passing year.  I've been told I'm a lot of smug elitist things because I happen to enjoy looking at data instead of feelings and tradition to see what will happen in the future.   That kind of thinking gets you called a lot of things, especially with smug Santa Fe asses who believe in natural medicine voodoo.  The numbers never lie though and last night was just another drop in that bucket.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Yes, he is. I come from a pretty bourgeois background. I know well-to-do Democrats and well-to-do Republicans. And the "country club Republicans" that were my parents' friends and my friends' parents have no problem with letting gays get married (who do you think does their hair and redecorates their vacation house?) and giving amnesty to illegal aliens ("I could never let them deport Rosa. She's like family to us!").

In other words, rich educated people are enlightened because they have some gay/illegal alien friends. Uh huh.

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What if they are victims? What if the American social hierarchy (which, might I add, generously benefits the people, Republicans and Democrats, who you grew up with) places the rednecks and hard-headed working-class whites into doing the grunt work of the upper classes?

Here's a history lesson for you; racism as we know it was largely invented in colonial Virginia to provide a wall of separation ("the color line") between poor whites and black slaves. This system of divide and conquer benefits the ruling economic elites (most of whom are still white, FWIW) to this very day, because the greatest fear of the US elites is a united working class in America. Elites, like those well-to-do country-club Republicans you mentioned previously.

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You honestly think that most poor whites have that attitude? Why don't you say the same thing about poor blacks or Latinos or Asians or Native Americans who supposedly don't value education, while you're at it?

And just to let you know, Rick Santorum and many others like him are not and have never been "working class."

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Obama did win, and many of his supporters were white, rural, and/or working-class. Not as many as would have been nice, but with attitudes like yours on the Democratic side, perhaps it's not such a mystery why white-working class and rural support for the Democrats has eroded.

And just for the record; The Tea Party movement  is NOT working-class in background, by and large, although many certainly have delusions of working-class credentials.

[WMS]

Hey, WMS.  That post was pretty angry in tone and I apologize.  I understand days before the election the trolling here was rampant and I was pushed to the crazy left; just as you've clearly been pushed to right since the days when we were agreeing with each other on most everything around 2004-07 on this forum.

Fair enough, apology accepted and I withdraw my own harshness. And that's why I take this forum in small doses. Hmm...I think foreign policy has pushed me to the right, because I intensely dislike Obama's FP, especially, at the moment, in Syria. But that is another long topic perhaps for another time. Yeah, that was kind of the Golden Age around these parts, eh?

I was just trying to point a statistical truth.  Blue collar whites are declining in population share, rural culture is declining, advances in technology will make the working class virtually non-existant in America by the end of the century.  I guarantee it. Some can't fathom this, but the West and perhaps the world shortly after it is ascending beyond blue collar.

Ah, but it was the attitude behind your comments (and the comments of others, to be sure) that spurred the criticism. It is one thing to say a group is declining in share, it is another to imply that this is a good thing and that these people should be trodden into the mud. And liberals imply that a lot. For proof, see the rest of this thread.

Any political ideology that is looking to preserve the blue collar worker and win their votes is looking backwards.  They're not bad people and they need to be helped in the present through policy but they don't know what is right for this country because their views are to preserve something that cannot be saved.

To further continue along these lines, what are they being replaced with? It sure as hell isn't by the upper-middle class bourgeois types that infest this forum - or are we going to ignore all the statistics the Dems use in pointing out growing inequality and the decline in real income? And who gets to decide 'what is right for this country'? Based on what standards? Also, as Al and several others (and from my perspective I am a strange bedfellow to several of them ) have pointed out, liberals aren't really interested in 'helping' them. So their not voting for liberals isn't 'not voting in their own interests', it's a very cynical and rational response to a system that discards them as unworthy. At least the Republicans try to win their votes.

I guess I'm a classist because I recognize that there is less need for laborers with each passing year.  I've been told I'm a lot of smug elitist things because I happen to enjoy looking at data instead of feelings and tradition to see what will happen in the future.   That kind of thinking gets you called a lot of things, especially with smug Santa Fe asses who believe in natural medicine voodoo.  The numbers never lie though and last night was just another drop in that bucket.

Less need for laborers? Actually, your class just shipped those jobs elsewhere so you can get your shiny toys cheap. iPads, anyone? > Most of the laborer jobs left are the scut work done for a pittance no one else wants to do. Again, it's attitude - bourgeois liberals (yes, yes, conservatives too, but let's stay on topic) love to stand on their pedestals and talk about how much better they are than these horrible proletariat types. And yes, I've run into this attitude in person from liberals, repeatedly. Usually this is accompanied with their talking about how wonderfully tolerant and progressive they are. Unlike what most liberals seem to think, you know what, the white working class, rural or not, can detect BS quite well. At least the conservative Reps are honest about who they are. And if you let your attitudes influence your analysis, your data isn't as certain as you may think it is. What is now may not necessarily be in the future, and extrapolating trend lines based on their variables not changing is getting on shaky ground - are you sure Hispanics will continue to vote Democratic in the same percentages as they did this time? If the Reps ever stop being the party of Grover Norquist and Tom Tancredo, that could shift those percentages, and class plays a role amongst Hispanics like with everyone else (well, except American blacks and Natives, who are lock, stock, and barrel Democratic voters).

Or then again, perhaps the two useless packs representing the ruling class will continue to run us into the ground per the usual.