Describe a Dole 1996/Gore 2000 voter

[darklordoftech]

I have some ideas

[支持核绿派 (Greens4Nuclear)]

this guy

"Free trade, anti-union, lower taxes, globalist, vehemently pro-environment"

[Bidenworth2020]

a ton of asians

[TheElectoralBoobyPrize]

Any voter who deeply despises draft dodgers.

[darklordoftech]

Lieberman

Why do you think Lieberman voted for Dole?

[President Johnson]

A moderate Democrat who dislikes the Clintons for their ethical issues.

[SN2903]

A moderate Democrat who dislikes the Clintons for their ethical issues.

Yep.

[nclib]

Northeastern moderate Republican who was repulsed by Bush's rural Texan uneducated persona.

[darklordoftech]

this guy

"Free trade, anti-union, lower taxes, globalist, vehemently pro-environment"

A vehemently pro-environment voter voting for Dole? I can't see it.

[christian peralta]

Someone who lives in Orange County, Florida

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

Someone who lives in Orange County, Florida

or Charles County, Maryland

[MIKESOWELL]

Me LOL

[darklordoftech]

Me LOL

Why?

[Sumner 1868]

Interestingly, much like Romney-Clinton voters there weren't many of these voters outside high-income areas. Contrast strongly with Clinton-Bush voters and the infamous Obama-Trump voters.

[MIKESOWELL]

Me LOL

Why?

The increasing racial tactics used by the GOP was turning me off, as well as the increasing takeover by religious and social conservatives of the party. I was more of a middle of the road Eisenhower-Nixon conservative. I didn't like Bill Clinton personally, but the witch hunt on him by people who were doing the same things or had done similar repelled me.

[RussFeingoldWasRobbed]

Orlando

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

A Cuban-American in Florida who was turned off by W's butchering of the Spanish language.

[All Along The Watchtower]

A college-educated, probably higher-income moderate Republican in a large Northern metropolitan area who quite possibly voted for John McCain in the Republican primaries and was vehemently opposed to political dynasties, evangelical Christians, and "populist" politicians with Southern accents.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Interestingly, much like Romney-Clinton voters there weren't many of these voters outside high-income areas. Contrast strongly with Clinton-Bush voters and the infamous Obama-Trump voters.

Yeah, Republicans made a big deal out of Clinton's (lack of) personal morality and his lying about it. The fact that the issue was his sexual immorality certainly cemented a positive image in religious conservatives' minds of George W. Bush, faithful family man, son of a Greatest Generation WWII hero who himself was named George Bush and had served in a series of increasingly prominent public service roles (including as the increasingly sainted within-the-GOP Ronald Reagan's loyal Vice President), culminating as POTUS - only to be rudely denied a second term by the draft-dodging, pot-smoking, sexually immoral huckster from Arkansas and his second-wave feminist wife.

Note that Bob Dole - a WWII veteran and George HW Bush contemporary himself - ran his campaign in 1996 based on "restoring honor" to a Presidency that was already widely perceived (especially by Republicans) to have been desecrated by scandal and liberal Baby Boomer corruption and excess, even before Monica Lewinsky became a household name, Clinton's perjury on the matter, and the impeachment proceedings.

The failure of Clinton's impeachment, if anything, only cemented and galvanized the rapidly growing support for the GOP among religious conservatives (particularly white evangelicals) and specifically their support for "honorable family man" and born-again Christian George W. Bush (son of honorable family man George H.W. Bush) in 2000 and especially 2004. Combine this fervently anti-Clinton and pro-Bush evangelical base with both the Bush family themselves and their much wider, powerful, and extremely well-funded Republican political network's sense of revenge* and "Restoration" of the Bushes to the Presidency, and you have a recipe for George W. Bush being the odds-on-favorite for 2000 (though importantly, he and his campaign almost "blew it").

*It must be said that Dubya (along with Barbara) was the "Enforcer" and "gatekeeper" during HW's Presidency, and inevitably lashed out at any hint of criticism of his father - criticism was his job (and his brothers, of course). Really took "no one gets to the father but through me" very literally.

[darklordoftech]

especially 2004

Why? I'd think that Clinton being out of office would result in the evangelicals having less to be angry about and I'd think that 9/11 would redirect the evangelicals' anger away from domestic issues and towards the Middle East.

[TJ in Oregon]

Interestingly, much like Romney-Clinton voters there weren't many of these voters outside high-income areas. Contrast strongly with Clinton-Bush voters and the infamous Obama-Trump voters.

Yeah, Republicans made a big deal out of Clinton's (lack of) personal morality and his lying about it. The fact that the issue was his sexual immorality certainly cemented a positive image in religious conservatives' minds of George W. Bush, faithful family man, son of a Greatest Generation WWII hero who himself was named George Bush and had served in a series of increasingly prominent public service roles (including as the increasingly sainted within-the-GOP Ronald Reagan's loyal Vice President), culminating as POTUS - only to be rudely denied a second term by the draft-dodging, pot-smoking, sexually immoral huckster from Arkansas and his second-wave feminist wife.

Note that Bob Dole - a WWII veteran and George HW Bush contemporary himself - ran his campaign in 1996 based on "restoring honor" to a Presidency that was already widely perceived (especially by Republicans) to have been desecrated by scandal and liberal Baby Boomer corruption and excess, even before Monica Lewinsky became a household name, Clinton's perjury on the matter, and the impeachment proceedings.

The failure of Clinton's impeachment, if anything, only cemented and galvanized the rapidly growing support for the GOP among religious conservatives (particularly white evangelicals) and specifically their support for "honorable family man" and born-again Christian George W. Bush (son of honorable family man George H.W. Bush) in 2000 and especially 2004. Combine this fervently anti-Clinton and pro-Bush evangelical base with both the Bush family themselves and their much wider, powerful, and extremely well-funded Republican political network's sense of revenge* and "Restoration" of the Bushes to the Presidency, and you have a recipe for George W. Bush being the odds-on-favorite for 2000 (though importantly, he and his campaign almost "blew it").

*It must be said that Dubya (along with Barbara) was the "Enforcer" and "gatekeeper" during HW's Presidency, and inevitably lashed out at any hint of criticism of his father - criticism was his job (and his brothers, of course). Really took "no one gets to the father but through me" very literally.

I'm a bit too young to remember much of the Lewinski scandal and how it influenced Evangelicals, but I can tell you that at the time among Catholics things were generally polarized between those more concerned about economics (at that time the Democrats being the more union/blue collar friendly party) and abortion. As the Dubya years unfolded, culture war issues came increasingly to the forefront and US politics became increasingly polarized along religious lines. We slowly transformed from a society in which both sides of the political aisle were ostensibly Christian and simply disagreed about what aspects of morality were relevant to the political sphere into one where one side carried the mantle of a politicized Christianity and one carried the mantle of its rejection, albeit behind a thin facade of religious membership. This divide became yet starker during the Obama years, and, it appeared to many, as that the Christian side of the culture wars was decisively routed, so decisively that the thought of improving society slowly turned into a talking point that Christian Republican membership no longer really believed in. American society and politics became the latest battle in Tolkien's long defeat. And on the Democratic side, the slow evolution had, by 2012, reached the point of open and undeniable hostility toward Christianity as had been believed in and practiced throughout the near entirety of its history. A presidential campaign was run on rejecting the faith far as a major talking point and rewarded with victory. Compared to the vague illusions of previous cycles it as all so brazen and so resounding. So then, against all odds comes Donald Trump (of all people) to the rescue as a man who makes no promise of virtue, only of defense. And in a last desperation move on the part of the Christian voters, he actually wins. And as long as the Democrats make it one of their main talking points that Christianity (in the sense that religious conservatives believe in it) is bigotry and the one thing we cannot tolerate is intolerance, well then, it shouldn't be much of a surprise that no one much cares what Trump does anymore.