Gentry Liberals

[Annie]

The LA Times is becoming very weird to read, a mix of thoughtful and it's traditional far left rants. This though I find in the former category. Certainly not 'right' but some good points both parties should be considering. It's been acknowledged for awhile now, the DNC is funded by more wealth than the RNC. Upshot, the policies now being advocated by the Democrats most likely would hurt the middle class and poor. Demographics I guess.:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-op-kotkin2dec02,0,3533253.story

he gentry liberals
They're more concerned with global warming and gay rights than with lunch-pail joes.
By Joel Kotkin and Fred Siegel

December 2, 2007

After decades on the political sidelines, liberalism is making a comeback. Polls show plunging support for Republicans and their brand of conservatism among young, independent voters and Latinos. But what kind of liberalism is emerging as the dominant voice in the Democratic Party?

Well, it isn't your father's liberalism, the ideology that defended the interests and values of the middle and working classes. The old liberalism had its flaws, but it also inspired increased social and economic mobility, strong protections for unions, the funding of a national highway system and a network of public parks, and the development of viable public schools. It also invented Social Security and favored a strong foreign policy.

Today's ascendant liberalism has a much different agenda. Call it "gentry liberalism." It's not driven by the lunch-pail concerns of those workers struggling to make it in an increasingly high-tech, information-based, outsourcing U.S. economy -- though it does pay lip service to them.

Rather, gentry liberalism reflects the interests and values of the affluent winners in the era of globalization and the beneficiaries of the "financialization" of the economy. Its strongholds are the tony neighborhoods and luxurious suburbs in and around New York, Washington, Boston, San Francisco and West Los Angeles.

Just as the number of industrial workers and traditional middle-class households has declined, the ranks of the affluent class have grown. From 2000 to 2005, the number of millionaires in the U.S. rose 26%. Meanwhile, households with incomes of more than $100,000 a year were the most rapidly growing income category, according to Ogilvy & Mather demographer Peter Francese. From 1994 to 2004, the number of six-figure-income households jumped 54%.

Although many of the newly affluent are -- as is traditional -- politically conservative, a rising number of them are turning left. Surveys done by the Pew Research Center indicate that an increasing number of households with annual incomes greater than $135,000 -- the nation's top 10% -- are moving toward the Democrats. In 1995, there were nearly twice as many Republicans (46%) as Democrats (25%) in this category. Today, there are as many Democrats (31%) as Republicans (32%).

The political upshot is that Democrats now control the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional districts, according to Michael Franc of the conservative Heritage Foundation.

In part, this is because the Democratic gains in the 2006 elections were in affluent districts once held by the Republicans. In Iowa, for instance, the three wealthiest districts now send Democrats to Washington, and the two poorest are safe Republican seats.

Perhaps the best indicator of the growing political power of gentry liberals, however, is their ability to generate campaign contributions. Chiefly drawing on Wall Street, Hollywood and the Silicon Valley, this year's Democratic presidential candidates have raised 70% more money than their GOP counterparts, according to the Wall Street Journal. The securities industry, which awarded Republicans 58% of their campaign dollars in 1956, gave the GOP only 45% in 2006. In the newest sectors of the securities industry, most notably hedge funds, Democrats are favored. This year, hedge fund managers have given 77% of their contributions to Democrats in congressional races, reported the Journal.

Gentry liberalism is not an entirely new phenomenon. Its intellectual roots can be traced to historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.'s 1948 book, "The Vital Center." Schlesinger himself was the archetype of the gentry liberal. A product of Harvard University, he was as comfortable in the fashionable precincts of Manhattan's Upper East Side as he was advising presidents in Washington. Schlesinger was suspicious of the traditional liberalism of President Truman, who baldy appealed to the basic interests of returning middle- and working-class veterans of World War II.

In "The Vital Center," Schlesinger dismissed both the then-largely Republican business class, as well as mainstream Democratic politicians like Truman, because he thought they were too craven in their appeals to middle- and working-class interests. He believed that government should be in the hands of "an intelligent aristocracy" -- essentially men like himself -- whose governance would be guided by what it considered enlightened policy rather than class interests...

 

[William Joyce]

Yes, but this isn't as new as the authors suggest. Some trace it back to McGovern. I hear "I didn't leave the Democrats, they left me" most often from 50 and 60-somethings. Also explains how Reagan got so much of the union/working class/Democrat vote.

I wouldn't say Republicans are so great for workers, either, happy as they are to toss out fair trade and kiss corporate butt.

I am telling you: a Republican who dares to stick up for working people could cream Hillary. But are there any?

 

[trobinett]

Yes, but this isn't as new as the authors suggest. Some trace it back to McGovern. I hear "I didn't leave the Democrats, they left me" most often from 50 and 60-somethings. Also explains how Reagan got so much of the union/working class/Democrat vote.

I wouldn't say Republicans are so great for workers, either, happy as they are to toss out fair trade and kiss corporate butt.

I am telling you: a Republican who dares to stick up for working people could cream Hillary. But are there any?

Seems YOU have a handle on it, is there?

 

[William Joyce]

Seems YOU have a handle on it, is there?

Not sure. Not that I've seen talking loud. Pat Buchanan did during his campaigns.