I missed several Sabato’s Crystal Ball emails due to accidental unsubscribing. Here is one of many make-up posts.
05/15/2008
Forget about soccer moms and NASCAR dads. The key voting bloc in 2008 is the white working class. According to the new conventional wisdom of American politics, the presidential candidate who can win the support of white working class voters will have the inside track on becoming the next president of the United States.
Moreover, the support of this group is considered especially critical for the Democratic candidates since the white working class was a key component of the electoral coalition forged by Franklin Roosevelt during the New Deal. For Democrats to regain their dominant position in American politics, according to this argument, they must first regain the loyalty of the white working class.
It’s an appealing story and one that the Democratic presidential candidates appear to believe. Lately both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have been spending lots of time on the campaign trail trying to woo white working class voters by promising to renegotiate trade agreements and bring back good paying blue collar jobs in places like Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana.
There’s just one problem with this story. It’s not 1936 or 1948 any more. It’s 2008 and those good paying blue collar jobs are not coming back.