Was it racism that did Harris in? Sexism? Turnout Troubles? Billionaires for Trump?
I doubt I would agree with many of the author's political leanings, but he plays it straight and by the numbers as a sociologist who looked hard at the common explanations and found them all wanting
A Graveyard of Bad Election Narratives, by Musa al-Gharbi at his substack Symbolic Capital(ism)
Critically, until somewhat recently, the voting patterns of men and women were not that different. Whoever got the lion’s share of the male vote tended to win the female vote too. This changed after 1996. And it didn’t change because men suddenly grew more Republican (they didn’t). It changed because women shifted aggressively towards the Democratic Party in the mid-90s, and consistently gave Democrats around 54 percent of their vote for every cycle since, irrespective of who was at the top of the ticket or what the pressing issues of the day were.
He believes this month's numbers are a continuation of trends over the last 30 years, in particular the division between those who have what he calls symbolic capital, making their livings in big tech, finance, media and entertainment, big law, branding, versus physical goods and services. We constantly note what good money people can make in trades and wonder why young people, particularly young men who seem to have diminished status these days, don't flock to them. This may be a large part of it. In the current world, they sense that higher status is held by those in the professions which rely on the manipulation of symbols rather than objects.
The old joke is that there are two kinds of people in the world: those who divide people into two groups and those who don't, so I am always suspicious of over-streamlined narratives like this. Folks is folks, after all. But this has a lot of explanatory power and will take some additional thinking about. He has at least one book We Were Never Woke.
2 comments:
The political dividing lines used to be race and marital status. It is now class and sex.
The Democratic Party has a problem with democratic processes. Or they can't help clinging to power.
Harris was a terrible candidate that nobody liked in 2020. Biden didn't want to let go gracefully, so he ran for 2024. When it was obvious that he was too feeble for another term, there was no way to not run the double-diversity VP.
Had Biden announced in 2022, that he would not run or endorse in 2024 because it was time for the next generation to take charge, the Democratic Party would have had a competitive candidate in 2024.
The class and sex issue looks right. I don't know what happens in 2028. It will eventually sink in that abortion is a state issue, so what pulls women to the left? The trans issue of men competing against women on the field and in the bathroom, already seems to be fading, so what pulls women to the right?
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