whatever happened to the gene mccarthy/rfk voters?
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  whatever happened to the gene mccarthy/rfk voters?
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Author Topic: whatever happened to the gene mccarthy/rfk voters?  (Read 1629 times)
WalterMitty
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« on: January 20, 2008, 11:11:52 PM »

i sometimes wonder what happened to the mccarthy and rfk voters in 1968.

specifically, i wonder what percentage of them ended up voting for reagan in 80 or 84?

funny thing happens when you grow up and make money...you become less concerned with singing folk songs around the flag pole and more concerned with protecting your assets and lifestyle.

i suspect the same will happen for a lot of these misguided youngsters that are now supporting obama.
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Nym90
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« Reply #1 on: January 20, 2008, 11:48:51 PM »

A lot of them turned out to be selfish all along, and supported liberal policies when those benefitted them personally, then went on to support conservative policies when those benefitted them personally.

A good portion of them did remain in the liberal wing of the party, however.

I certainly hope you are wrong about the Obama supporters, but time will tell.
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Cubby
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« Reply #2 on: January 21, 2008, 02:12:04 AM »

i sometimes wonder what happened to the mccarthy and rfk voters in 1968.

specifically, i wonder what percentage of them ended up voting for reagan in 80 or 84?

funny thing happens when you grow up and make money...you become less concerned with singing folk songs around the flag pole and more concerned with protecting your assets and lifestyle.

i suspect the same will happen for a lot of these misguided youngsters that are now supporting obama.

How exactly are we misguided? Are you saying that we'll become Hillary supporters in our old age? Just because she seems less threatening to you than Obama doesn't make her the better candidate.

Every generation grows up. That doesn't make RFK & McCarthy voters any less valid.
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J. J.
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« Reply #3 on: January 21, 2008, 04:23:49 AM »

I think they basically got jobs.
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Tetro Kornbluth
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« Reply #4 on: January 21, 2008, 02:08:03 PM »

This is... such... a strange thread for many reasons. The main one being that most of the hippies\yippies\SDSers were voters in the first place. Perhaps alot people influenced by them were - especially for McCarthy, but they never made up even a huge proportion of the population.

Though as Tom Wolfe pointed out the whole 60s counter culture was partially driven by money in the first place. Which is why the Oil Crisis killed it, not Altamont.
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JSojourner
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« Reply #5 on: January 21, 2008, 05:31:05 PM »

i sometimes wonder what happened to the mccarthy and rfk voters in 1968.

specifically, i wonder what percentage of them ended up voting for reagan in 80 or 84?

funny thing happens when you grow up and make money...you become less concerned with singing folk songs around the flag pole and more concerned with protecting your assets and lifestyle.

i suspect the same will happen for a lot of these misguided youngsters that are now supporting obama.

I was too young then and I was pretty much a far right Republican until about 1988-1990.  But I very much identify with the McCarthy-RFK wing of the party now.  My favor pols have been people like Paul Wellstone, John Kerry, Barbara Boxer and Russ Feingold.  I like Ted Kennedy on the issues, I guess, but not so much personally. I love John Edwards' rhetoric, but I have never really believed he was serious about pursuing it after he won the election.

But I realize, I am a dying breed.  You're a Republican.  I give you permission to bury me right next to my Republican hero, Mark Hatfield.  But not too soon, okay?
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« Reply #6 on: January 21, 2008, 06:18:54 PM »

i sometimes wonder what happened to the mccarthy and rfk voters in 1968.

specifically, i wonder what percentage of them ended up voting for reagan in 80 or 84?

funny thing happens when you grow up and make money...you become less concerned with singing folk songs around the flag pole and more concerned with protecting your assets and lifestyle.

i suspect the same will happen for a lot of these misguided youngsters that are now supporting obama.

I was too young then and I was pretty much a far right Republican until about 1988-1990.  But I very much identify with the McCarthy-RFK wing of the party now.  My favor pols have been people like Paul Wellstone, John Kerry, Barbara Boxer and Russ Feingold.  I like Ted Kennedy on the issues, I guess, but not so much personally. I love John Edwards' rhetoric, but I have never really believed he was serious about pursuing it after he won the election.

But I realize, I am a dying breed.  You're a Republican.  I give you permission to bury me right next to my Republican hero, Mark Hatfield.  But not too soon, okay?

Mark Hatfield is still alive.
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True Democrat
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« Reply #7 on: January 21, 2008, 10:58:57 PM »

McCarthy and RFK voters were very different.

McCarthy voters were primarily young, educated, elite whites from college campuses in the Northeast and on the West Coast (though he also did very well in the Wisconsin primary).  I would imagine that once these voters graduated college, stopped protesting, got jobs, and started paying taxes, they started to move to the right.  They probably voted for McGovern in 1972, were split among Ford and Carter in 1976, went somewhat for Reagan in 1980, and by 1984 many of them were firmly in the Republican camp.

Meanwhile, Kennedy was supported by people of lesser means, particularly the Hispanic and black minorities of the inner cities, along with the rural workers best represented by Chavez.  (There is one quote from Kennedy, that upon visiting Oregon before the primary, he asked his campaign manager there, Congresswoman Edith Green, if the ghettos were organized, to which Green replied that there were no ghettos.  That's one of the primary reasons why Kennedy lost Oregon, the only primary he lost in 1968 that he competed in.)  These Kennedy voters are probably still committed Democrats, with the possibly exception of the few people in organized labor who supported him (most supported Humphrey I imagine).  Particularly black voters continued to vote strongly for the Democrats, with only Nixon in 1972 making a dent into the black vote.  Hispanics on the other hand, particularly rural Hispanics, I am not as keen on their voting trends.  I think that they were more open to Reagan than blacks, but are still committed Democrats.  Finally, the poor whites who supported Kennedy (look at the Nebraska primary for example) are probably split.  I think that they probably went for Nixon against McGovern's perceived elitism.  The same probably goes for Reagan, as these rural workers were included in Reagan's conservative coalition.

That's my take on it anyway.
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Tetro Kornbluth
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« Reply #8 on: January 22, 2008, 08:06:17 AM »

^^^ That's Vaguely right. Though McCarthy at the start of campaign got support from people who wanted to escalate the war, not end it. That's because he acted as an "opposition to LBJ" weather vain. Also there was a decent amount of blue collar support for McCarthy in the Primary as there would be for McGovern four years later - especially in areas with weaker unions.. but that dissapated hard in the general of 1972, probably due to "Acid, Amnesty and Abortion". Of course there was always an element of hardcore in the Student movement who would never support a presidential candidate for the Democrats.. these were the people at Chicago and probably make up a good deal of ageing hippies themselves.

Also I don't really see McGovern as an elitist... the people he was (unfairly) associated with though...

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« Reply #9 on: January 22, 2008, 10:49:47 AM »

^^^ That's Vaguely right. Though McCarthy at the start of campaign got support from people who wanted to escalate the war, not end it. That's because he acted as an "opposition to LBJ" weather vain. Also there was a decent amount of blue collar support for McCarthy in the Primary as there would be for McGovern four years later - especially in areas with weaker unions.. but that dissapated hard in the general of 1972, probably due to "Acid, Amnesty and Abortion". Of course there was always an element of hardcore in the Student movement who would never support a presidential candidate for the Democrats.. these were the people at Chicago and probably make up a good deal of ageing hippies themselves.

Also I don't really see McGovern as an elitist... the people he was (unfairly) associated with though...



Your first point about McCarthy receiving support from pro-war Democrats is true, but only in the very, very early stages of the campaign, primarily in New Hampshire and Wisconsin before LBJ dropped out.  Also, I don't think you could really characterize them as "McCarthy Supporters" because they never really supported him.  Most of them probably ended up supporting Richard Nixon in the general election, with some Southerners going to Wallace and a few staying with Humphrey.

Blue collar support for McCarthy was limited at best, at least until RFK jumped in and took away pretty much all the blue collar support.  McCarthy's core base were college students.  In the run-up to the Wisconsin primary, McCarthy barely campaigned in the ghettos, and during a debate with Kennedy before California, his plan to essentially move people out of the LA ghettos and into Orange County was criticized by Kennedy and others.  Of course, McCarthy enjoyed slightly more support among rural whites, but still nothing like he enjoyed among the educated elite.

The college students who would never support the Democrat at all were a lot smaller than people think, IMHO.  These were mainly people like the "Yippies" and some of the more radical members of "SDS," along with black nationalist movements like the Black Panther Party and SNCC (or what would become the radical SNCC if they had not segregated already, I can't really remember).  Contrary to popular belief, at the time the Chicago protests were happening, most Americans strongly, strongly disapproved of the actions of the protesters.  In fact, most though the police exercised the right amount of brutality or were not brutal enough.  Also, the effect of causing people to stay home because of the riots in Chicago is minimal, with something like only 1% of Democrats refusing to vote because of what happened outside (and inside) the convention.  (However, you should note that the overall effect on the race from Chicago should not be pushed aside.)

Your final point about McGovern not being an elitist is one I have to agree with.  In 1968, McGovern actually attempted to stand-in for RFK at the convention, receiving a I believe a little under 200 delegates.  However, just because he wasn't elitist doesn't mean CREEP didn't try to paint him as one.
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Tetro Kornbluth
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« Reply #10 on: January 22, 2008, 02:23:44 PM »

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Which is where he ran strongest (mostly). O\c neither state was exactly a stronghold of "hippieland" or the supposed Educated Elite.

Out of curiosity, would it be possible to get a map of the 1968 D California primary between RFK and McCarthy. I think that would be interesting.

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I agree. But it was significant enough to give him a stronger vote and showed how utterly dead the LBJ presidency was.

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RFK: Blue Collar? Not really - It was mainly Humphrey who got the blue collar support (at least in 1972.. I admit I don't know too much detail about the 68' primaries as I do about the 72' ones.). RFK was the candidate of Minorities, Catholics and the more moderate liberal intellectuals.

I do know that McGovern actually did do fairly well in Blue Collar areas in the 72' primaries; especially at the start of the campaign before Humphrey came in strong and the Democratic establishment much less determined to stop him winning.

As for McCarthy, well, who do you think voted for him in Minnesota? (Though I admit that voting for senator and voting for president are two different things..)

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Even that support was tenuous in many cases.

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They were small (though not THAT small; significant enough that they became in many ways the faces of the student movement.) but fairly important. After the Riots in Chicago Abbie Hoffman made a prediction that his group (the Yippies - he was their leader) had just elected Richard Nixon. Given how close it was in the very end seems to indicate that there was some truth in it.

After all even at its peak what is known as "the Student movement" made up what... 1% of the population. If even that. And those groups like the yippies were a fraction of that. Yet they had enomorous cultural significance (Though more in Music than in Politics o\c) . The fact that this is the 40th Anniversary of 1968 and the students, et al are still being talked about just shows this.

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I would believe that, but it wasn't just protestors Daly's crew were attacking - often passing civilians aswell.

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It gave the impression that the party was in chaos and falling rapidly apart. For some Democratic conservatives it seemed to show how the youth movement was trying to take over the party (Lol: But many believed that..) I can't claim with certainly that if not for Chicago Humphrey would have won.. but it was surely a factor and remember it was really, really close.

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Yes. Though to be honest it wasn't hard in 1972 - especially spouting anti-Vietnam views; which often were in the student movement and the hippies and etc a strong resentment of the military. They would claim that is because they were pacifists but that's not how most Americans saw it.
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JSojourner
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« Reply #11 on: January 22, 2008, 11:37:31 PM »

i sometimes wonder what happened to the mccarthy and rfk voters in 1968.

specifically, i wonder what percentage of them ended up voting for reagan in 80 or 84?

funny thing happens when you grow up and make money...you become less concerned with singing folk songs around the flag pole and more concerned with protecting your assets and lifestyle.

i suspect the same will happen for a lot of these misguided youngsters that are now supporting obama.

I was too young then and I was pretty much a far right Republican until about 1988-1990.  But I very much identify with the McCarthy-RFK wing of the party now.  My favor pols have been people like Paul Wellstone, John Kerry, Barbara Boxer and Russ Feingold.  I like Ted Kennedy on the issues, I guess, but not so much personally. I love John Edwards' rhetoric, but I have never really believed he was serious about pursuing it after he won the election.

But I realize, I am a dying breed.  You're a Republican.  I give you permission to bury me right next to my Republican hero, Mark Hatfield.  But not too soon, okay?

Mark Hatfield is still alive.

I know.  I am just expecting that he will depart this planet before I do.  Since he is in his late 70's and I am 42.  Then again, you never know.  Just reserve the plots for me, okay?
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