Will Ideology or Pragmatism Rule American Politics?

Now that the dust from the midterm elections has settled, America remains just as divided as before on what type of governing approach it favors. As the LA Times’ Gregory Rodriguez, points out, if the United States “was a cartoon character, it would be a cheerful fellow with his head in the clouds and his feet planted squarely on the ground.”

To win the support of the public, America’s next governing consensus must encompass the nation’s highest ideals, while presenting realistic solutions to today’s challenges. In the short run, the ideological orientation of each party’s congressional representation will push both parties toward their ideological poles. Flush with victory, top House Republicans and strategists said, they saw “little distinction between incumbent members and those who would be joining them as freshman…both benefited from the Tea Party activism that helped them trounce Democrats” and said that “the support deserved to be rewarded”. Congressional Democrats, especially in the U.S. House of Representatives, are also more ideologically uniform than previously. Virtually all of the members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (75 of 79) were reelected in 2010, as were a clear majority (40 of 68) of the centrist New Democrats. By contrast, a majority of the conservative Blue Dog Coalition (29 of 54) were either defeated or saw their open seats won by Republicans. Together, these changes meant that, for the first time since these organizations were formed in the 1990s, the Congressional Progressive Caucus was larger than the Blue Dogs and New Democrats combined.

The magnitude of the Republican victory was impressive, but constituted more of a continuation of the type of partisan political volatility the country experiences during periods of great generational change than a massive shift of America to the GOP and conservatism. A Pew survey taken just before the election indicated that the distribution of party identification within the electorate was little different in 2010 (49% Democratic to 39% Republican) than it was in either 2008 (51% to 36%) or 2006 (47% to 38%), two years in which Democrats won sweeping victories at the polls.

Nor did Election Day exit polls show a clear endorsement of GOP positions on key issues. Only half of the voters (48%) called for repeal of the Democratic healthcare reform law. About the same number (47%) wanted the law left as is or even expanded. Only four in ten voters (39%) favored extending the Bush-era tax cuts to all Americans, including those with incomes greater than $250,000. By contrast, a majority endorsed either the Obama administration’s position of extending the tax cuts to only those with incomes below that level (37%), or the even more liberal position of letting the tax cuts expire for everyone (15%).

Moreover, exit polls indicated that although the Democrats lost some ground among almost all demographics, the composition of the two party’s coalitions remained largely unchanged. The votes of Millennials (55% Democratic to 42% Republican), African-Americans (90% to 9%), and Hispanics (64% to 34%) were only slightly altered from what they had been in 2006 and 2008. The Northeast (53% to 45%), the West (49% to 48%), and the nation’s cities (56% to 41%) provided a firewall that helped the Democrats retain control of the Senate.

The GOP did strengthen its position within its core constituencies, winning solidly among men (56% Republican to 42% Democratic), as well as in the South, in rural areas, and among senior citizens, all of which voted Republican by about 1.5:1 margins. The Republicans were also able to split the women’s vote which they had lost in previous elections, primarily due to massive support from female senior citizens who voted 57% to 41% in favor of the GOP, even as younger women retained their Democratic allegiance. Geographically, Republican gains came predominantly in the Great Lakes watershed where the GOP won at least 25 new House seats, or about 40 percent of their pickups.

The Republicans also made major gains in America’s suburbs, where the greatest number of Americans of all ethnicities and generations, including Democratic-leaning Millennials, African-Americans, and Hispanics, now live. Obama narrowly won the suburbs, 50% to 48%. In 2010, the GOP carried them even more decisively, 55% to 42%. Democratic losses in the suburbs were particularly great among white voters who had not completed college and were among those who had been most hurt by the Great Recession. The party able to win over suburban voters with a message that is both ideologically and pragmatically appealing will gain the strategic high ground in the battle over the nation’s political direction in 2012 and beyond.

One of the reasons for this shift in the makeup of the 2010 electorate was a drop in the contribution from Millennials. Turnout among those 18 to 29 years of age was comparable to previous midterm elections: 23 percent of all Millennials eligible to vote did so, slightly more than in 2002 but a point less than the 24 percent turnout in the 2006 midterm elections. Those Millennials that did vote preferred Democratic candidates in almost all contested elections and approved of Barack Obama’s handling of his job as president by a 60% to 40% margin. In contrast to all other generations, Millennials remain overwhelmingly Democratic and liberal in their political orientation.

If the 2008 election was a victory for young Millennials, the 2010 midterms represented a triumph for senior citizens. A big part of the increase in votes for Republican candidates was inspired by the Tea Party movement’s older supporters. A solid plurality (40%) of 2010 voters claimed to be Tea Party supporters and nearly nine in ten (87%) of them voted for Republican house candidates. The GOP’s clear emphasis on ideological themes, built around concerns about the nature and scope of government, inspired its frightened and frustrated base to turn out in record numbers to prevent what it perceived to be a dangerous drift toward liberal hegemony.

In the end, however, most of those who voted in 2010 had little good to say about either party. Almost identical majorities among those who voted had an unfavorable opinion of the Democratic and Republican Parties. Reflecting the opinions of some of their Tea Party supporters, even one-fourth of Republican voters expressed a negative perception of the GOP

So, in spite of the internal structural forces impelling both the Democrats and Republicans toward ideological uniformity, the new ruling party will be the one that most effectively integrates their party’s ideology with the country’s demands for solutions that work. That party will need to appeal both to those who embrace the ideals of individual freedom but also understand the need for a pragmatic program of collective action, integrating national purpose with individual choice. Shaped by some of the most profound demographic changes in American history, the key to future success for both the Democrats and Republicans will lie in synthesizing these two strands of America’s political DNA. The party that most effectively accomplishes that goal will be the dominant political force in the Millennial Era for the next four decades.

Dems, Not Independents will decide Midterm elections

Like the constant buzz of the vuvuzelas during the World Cup, leading members of the inside-the-Beltway punditry have generated an ever louder chorus of warnings recently that "angry" independent voters will determine the outcome of the 2010 midterm elections and, in so doing, threaten the Democratic Party's current congressional majorities.

Actually, however, it is not what independent-or even Republican-voters do that will determine what happens in this November's elections. It is what Democrats do, or perhaps not do, that will be decisive. This is true for two reasons.

First, a significantly greater number of voters now identify with or lean to the Democratic Party than to the GOP. Second, only a relatively small number of politically uninvolved and disinterested voters are independents that are completely unattached to either of the parties.

As a result, the big election story in 2010 will be the extent to which the large plurality of Americans who call themselves Democrats shows up at the polls this fall, and not the voting preferences of unaffiliated independents or Republicans.

This is a quite different situation from 1994, the last time there was a so-called midterm "wave" election in which the GOP wrested control of Congress from the Democratic Party. That year, the two parties were dead even in party ID at 44% each.
But, America is a different country now than it was in the mid-1990s, with a far more ethnically diverse electorate and a new, strongly Democratic generation, the Millennials (born 1982-2003), coming of age. These emerging groups comprise the core of a new, potentially long-lasting majority Democratic coalition.

This year, in sharp contrast to 1994, the Democratic Party holds a party identification advantage over the Republicans. In a June national survey conducted for NDN by highly regarded market research firm, Frank N. Magid Associates, 47% of voting age Americans identified with or leaned to the Democratic Party, well above the 33% who identified with or leaned to the Republican Party and the 19% who claimed to be unaffiliated independents. Even among registered voters the Democratic advantage over the GOP was 11 percentage points (47% vs. 36% with unaffiliated independents dropping to 17%). These numbers were replicated in an early July Pew survey showing the Democrats with a 49% to 42% party ID lead over the Republicans among registered voters.

As is the case in virtually every U.S. election, almost all of those who identify with or lean to a party plan to vote for the candidates of that party this coming November. In the NDN poll, about 95% of both Democratic and Republican identifiers who have made a choice say they expect to vote this fall for the congressional candidate of the party with which they identify. Meanwhile, among the presumably decisive independents, almost two-thirds (61%) are as yet undecided in the race for Congress. The remainder is split almost evenly between the two parties, with 21% preferring the Republicans and 18% the Democrats.

The solid Democratic advantage in party ID, coupled with the strong support given by Democratic identifiers to the party's candidates, and the closely divided independent vote, translates into a clear lead for the Democrats over the Republicans among all Americans on the generic congressional ballot in the NDN survey (35% for the Democrats vs. 29% for the GOP with 34% undecided and 8% favoring another party or candidate).

There is, however, a large fly in the Democratic ointment. At least at this point, Democratic identifiers are significantly less likely to be registered to vote than are Republicans (90% vs. 84%). Democrats are also substantially less likely than Republicans to say they are certain to vote in November (76% vs. 67%). These concerns are particularly acute among Latinos and Millennials, both of which are key components of the Democratic coalition. As a result of these disparities, the Democratic lead over the GOP on the generic ballot drops to three points among registered voters (35% vs. 32%), and to a statistical tie of just two points among those who say they are certain to vote this fall (37% vs. 35%).

What must the Democratic Party do to overcome these barriers? One thing is to organize. The decision of the Democratic National Committee to spend $50 million in 2010 to increase the registration and turnout of "first time voters" (meaning, primarily, Millennials, African-Americans, Latinos, and single women) is a key step in constructing and strengthening the 21st century Democratic coalition for this year and the decades ahead.

The NDN survey portrays a country that is anything but center-right. A solid majority of Americans prefer a government that actively tries to solve the problems facing society and the economy (54%), rather than a government that stays out of society and the economy to the greatest extent possible (31%). Three-quarters of Democrats (76%), and just over half of independents (52%), favor an activist government, while 60% of Republicans want a laissez faire approach.

Similarly, a clear plurality of the electorate (49%) wants government to ensure that all Americans have at least a basic standard of living and level of income, even if it increases government spending. Only 34% supported the alternative approach of letting each person get along economically on their own, even if that means some people have a lot more than others. A solid majority of Democrats (69%), and half of independents, opt for governmental policies aimed at increasing economic equality, something that is opposed by two-thirds (65%) of Republicans.

Nothing would be more confusing and dispiriting for Democratic voters than for the Democratic Party to turn away from the political and economic approach they strongly favor, and which has been the hallmark of the party's success and identity since the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Generating enthusiasm for Democratic candidates in the 2010 midterm election requires highlighting, not downplaying or running away from, the striking legislative accomplishments of the Democratic congressional majority during the first two years of the Obama administration.

Democrats would also be well advised not to base their campaign on pursuing independent voters, angry or otherwise. For one thing, the much-vaunted independents are far less likely to be registered (72%) and certain to vote (52%) than are either Republican or Democratic identifiers. While aiming at unaffiliated and uninvolved voters may be a good idea for a party that has fewer, or even the same number, of identifiers as its opponent, it is not the best strategy for a party that holds a clear party identification lead within the electorate. Doing everything that it can to mobilize its own supporters makes far more sense, and is likely to be far more effective. In the end, what happens to the Democratic Party in 2010 and beyond is in its own hands, and will be determined primarily by the votes of those who identify with it, rather than being in the hands of the media or the other side of the political aisle.

A Regional Perspective on 2010 elections

Virtually all polling analyses that deal with the possible outcome of the 2010 midterm elections, make frequent use of the "generic congressional ballot," a survey question probing House voting intentions on a national basis. But, while there may be national trends, there are no national elections in the United States. In spite of this, pollsters rarely report their results geographically beneath the aggregate national level. That's why a recent posting by Tom Schaller at FiveThirtyEight is so interesting, refreshing, and important. While many reports based on the national generic ballot stress the similarities between the 2010 midterm elections and those of 1994 in which the Democratic Party lost large congressional majorities, Schaller's analysis points to key regional differences that may buffer the Democrats from the kind of devastation they suffered sixteen years ago.

By eerie coincidence Democrats hold precisely the same number of House seats (256 or 59% of the body's 435) in today's 111th Congress that they held in the 103rd Congress of 1994. But, that is where the similarity ends.

In the 103rd Congress the Democrats held essentially the same percentage of seats (60% or a point or two less) in each of the nation's four geographic regions-the Northeast, South, Midwest, and West. Now, the Democrats control the vast majority of House seats in the Northeast (82%) and West (63%). Within the former region, all of New England's 22 Representatives are Democrats as are 26 of New York's 29 (with one Empire State seat currently vacant). In the West, the Democrats are especially strong along the Pacific Coast, holding 33 of California's 52 seats, 4 of Oregon's 5, and 6 of Washington's 9.

By contrast, the Democrats hold 55% of Midwestern House seats, slightly less than the 58% they held in 1994. But, the big change has been in the South. Now, only 43% of Southern Representatives are Democrats, far less than in 1994 when 60% were. It was, in fact, the 1994 election that finally flipped the South's Congressional delegation from majority Democratic to majority Republican. In other words, as Schaller's analysis makes clear "the two Democratic coalitions [in 1994 and in 2010] are not the same geographically."

The alteration in the regional composition of the two party coalitions described by Schaller is a part of broader demographic and political changes that have been portrayed in detail by NDN's 21st Century America Project. Survey research conducted this year in connection with that project both reflects and explains why the regional strength of the two parties in Congress has been altered so significantly since 1994. As the following table indicates, both the Northeast and West contain the greatest number of voters who identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party followed closely by the Midwest. By contrast, the South contains the fewest, and among white Southerners a clear plurality identifies with or leans toward the GOP.

Total Electorate Northeast Midwest West South Southern Whites
Democrat 47% 49% 48% 49% 44% 35%
Independent 20% 20% 22% 18% 19% 21%
Republican 33% 31% 30% 33% 37% 45%

Ratio of
Democrat to
Republican 1.4:1 1.6:1 1.6:1 1.5:1 1.2:1 0.8:1
These changes may place the Democratic Party in better position to avoid the massive losses of 1994-and thereby retain their House majority. Schaller projects two possible scenarios for the November midterm elections. The first he labels a "regular wave" in which the Democrats would lose about 36 House seats, a bit above the average losses for the president's party in the midterm election of his first term. The second Schaller calls a "big wave" in which the Democrats would lose about 61 House seats. While their losses would be serious in either scenario, in a "regular wave" Democrats would retain control of the House. In the latter, they would lose it.

According to Schaller, Democratic losses would not be distributed evenly across the country. In a "regular wave," he says, a disproportionately large share of Democratic losses (64%) would likely occur in the two regions where the party is already weakest-the South and Midwest. (That, by the way, would leave the Democrats with only a third of Southern House seats, continuing a trend that has been ongoing for the past five decades). However, in a "big wave," while a majority of Democratic losses would still be in the South and Midwest (58%), more of the incremental losses would come in the Northeast (26%) and West (16%). With three months to go before the election, there is no reason to believe that the midterm elections will necessarily result in a wave of any size, but Schaller's analysis does suggest the best place to look for any early signs of a tsunami that would cost the Democrats their House majority are in the contested districts of the Northeast and West.

Of course, its solid party identification lead nationally and its regional strength in the Northeast and West only provides the Democratic Party with an opportunity to avoid a repeat of the disaster of 1994. There is no guarantee that it will do so. As the election of Republican Scott Brown to the U.S. Senate earlier this year in Massachusetts, the bluest of all Northeastern states demonstrates, the Democrats can lose almost anywhere if they run a poor campaign and/or candidate. The Democrats lost that special election in Massachusetts not because the state had suddenly become a GOP stronghold or because Massachusetts Democrats turned against Barack Obama, the Democratic Party, or the policies that they favor. That "impossible to lose" election was lost because Democrats failed to mobilize their majority strength in Massachusetts.

If Democrats are wise, what happened in Massachusetts will serve as a warning and not a prophecy of things to come. To ensure the former, Democrats should reject advice, some well-intentioned and some not, to focus their 2010 campaign on appeals to "angry" independents or "disaffected" moderates and focus instead on activating their own sizable base of identifiers, especially in regions where that base has the potential to be dominant. In 1994, when each of the two parties had exactly the same percentage of identifiers, the Democratic Party could not successfully do that. In 2010, it can-- and must-- if it hopes to retain its majority status in the House.

Democrats on Roll since Health Care Reform vote

This year, the GOP has been affixing itself ever more closely to the Tea Party movement, even as that movement’s public appeal weakens. Meanwhile, the position of the Democratic Party has actually strengthened since the passage of health care reform in late March. Democrats have a lead in the generic Congressional ballot for the first time in 2010; the “enthusiasm gap” between Democratic and Republican voters is narrowing; and Obama leads all potential 2012 Republican opponents by about the margin of his 2008 victory.
A mid-April CNN Opinion Research poll ) indicated that favorable evaluations of President Barack Obama continue to hold steady at 57 percent and that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have risen in popularity by eight and six percentage points respectively from what they had been about two months previously. By contrast, favorable ratings of Sarah Palin, the Republican perhaps most strongly identified with the Tea Party movement, dropped from 46 percent in December 2009 and 43 percent in January 2010 to 39 percent in April. Her unfavorable evaluations rose by nine points (from 46% to 55%) over the same period. In addition, while positive opinions of the Tea Party movement increased by five points (from 33% to 38%) since January, negative attitudes rose by 10 points (from 26% to 36%).
Also, according to the CNN survey, President Obama holds a clear lead among registered voters over four potential Republican challengers to his 2012 reelection bid—Mitt Romney (53% vs. 45%); Mike Huckabee (54% vs. 45%); Sarah Palin (55% vs. 42%); and, Newt Gingrich (55% vs. 43%). His margin against each Republican actually slightly exceeds his 2008 popular vote lead over John McCain (53% vs. 46%), indicating that in spite of all the turmoil and rancor of the first year of his presidency, Barack Obama retains as strong a position with the electorate as when he won the White House.
But, the president’s reelection campaign is still more than two years away. Of more immediate relevance, the Democratic Party leads among registered voters on the 2010 CNN/Opinion Research generic congressional ballot for the first time this year.

	Democratic Candidate	Republican Candidate	Neither	No Opinion
April 9-11	50%	46%	4%	1%
March 25-28	45%	49%	4%	2%
March 19-21	45%	48%	5%	2%
February 12-15	45%	47%	6%	2%
January 8-10	45%	48%	6%	1%

Even more important, after languishing for months,
the political enthusiasm and intensity of Democratic identifiers and the groups that together comprise the emerging 21st Century Democratic coalition rose sharply in the wake of the enactment of health care and student loan reform legislation.

	Definitely/ Likely to vote March 8-11	Definitely/ Likely to vote April 5-8	Percentage Point Increase
Democratic identifiers	40%	61%	21%
Women	41%	59%	18%
18-29 year olds	34%	46%	12%
African-Americans	29%	46%	17%
Hispanics	32%	47%	15%
Residents of Northeast	41%	60%	19%
Residents of West	42%	62%	20%

In early March, Republican identifiers were far more likely to vote than Democrats (51% vs. 40%). One month later, what had been an 11-percentage point “enthusiasm gap” separating Republican from Democratic identifiers had narrowed to four points (63% vs. 59%). In the most recent Daily Kos poll it widened again to eight points (69% vs. 61%). Still, the increased intensity of Democratic voters coupled with the Democratic Party’s party identification advantage over the Republicans (47% vs. 34% in the NDN survey) puts the Democrats in better position to compete effectively this November than they were just a month ago.
The lesson from this is clear. Like any majority political party, the Democratic Party will be rewarded by those who identify with and vote for it when it governs like the majority party that it is. The next step for congressional Democrats is to adopt financial regulatory reform over the persistent opposition of the GOP leadership and its Tea Party base. By so doing, the Democrats will prove that, “If you use it, you won’t lose it.”

Democrats Rock, the Vote on Campus

More than twice as many 18-29 year olds voted for President Barack Obama as for John McCain in 2008, and one year later the party preferences of college students remain similarly lopsided in favor of the Democratic Party and its political point of view.

The most recent data from communication research company Frank N. Magid Associates' show an equal percentage of students, 18 and older, call themselves liberals or progressives (31%) as describe their political philosophy as moderate (30%). By contrast, only 20% describe themselves as conservative, while another 20% haven't learned enough in college yet to say just what their ideological orientation is. Survey research data from 2008 and 2009 actually showed self-described moderates as the most common philosophical designation by Millennials, born between 1982 and 2003, with liberalism in second place. But those studies included Millennials who were not on campus, which suggests either that college students are a more liberal bunch than non-students by nature or there has been further movement toward liberalism among Millennials during the first year of Obama's presidency.

Almost all students on campus today are members of the Millennial Generation and bring that generation's commitment to civic engagement and consensus decision making to the political process. Unlike many members of Generation X or Baby Boomers who preceded them, a majority of Millennials believes in using government to help address societal problems and economic inequality. These philosophic touchstones form the basis of their political identification and belief system.

Millennials were inclined to be Democrats before Obama ran for presidency and both his campaign and his presidency have solidified that tendency. Beginning in 2006 as Millennials made their presence known among 18-29 year old voters, partisan identification among this age group moved from a roughly 50/50 split to a clear preference for the Democratic Party. In 2008, Millennials voted more than 2:1 for Obama over McCain (66% vs. 32%) and by roughly the same percentage (63% vs. 34%) for Democratic congressional candidates. Magid's 2010 data shows this same level of Democratic identification persisting among Millennials who are attending college. Twice as many college students call themselves Democrats as Republicans (47% vs. 24%). Only 15% are independents, with a similar percentage unwilling to identify with any of those three choices.

These numbers suggest the Young Republicans have a lot of work to do just to break even, while Young Democrats should have a rockin' good time of it on college campuses across America.

Democrats Should Act Like the Majority They Are

As the first article in this series, pointed out, the two chief demographic components of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal coalition that enabled the Democratic Party to dominate American national politics from the early 1930s to the mid-1960s—the white South and the northern white working class—have been drifting away from the Democrats and toward the Republicans for the past four decades. But, America is a dynamic country with a growing, changing, and increasingly diverse population. And, the Democratic Party is in position to once again dominate U.S. politics around the same core values, but now with a far different voter coalition than the one assembled by FDR eight decades ago.
Recent Gallup and Pew polls indicate that the Democratic Party has a national party identification advantage of about ten percentage points over the Republicans.
The voter coalition that underpins the Democratic Party’s current party identification advantage—and which also elected Barack Obama President of the United States in 2008—reflects the America of today fully as much as FDR’s coalition reflected the America of its era. While some of the components of the emerging Democratic coalition were a part of the New Deal coalition, others are brand new. If the white South and white working class have left the Democrats, other groups, some of which were decades from birth and others of which comprised only a negligible portion of the American electorate during the previous era of Democratic dominance, have joined. The major components of the new 21st Century Democratic coalition are:
• Young voters. Political scientists have long maintained that political realignments result from the emergence of new large generations of young Americans. The coming of age of the GI Generation (born 1901-1924) produced the New Deal realignment in the 1930s. The emergence of the sharply divided Baby Boomer Generation (born 1946-1964) ended that Democratic era in 1968 leading to forty years during which the Republican Party won the presidency in seven of ten elections. Today it is the Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003) and, to a lesser extent, younger members of Generation X (born 1965-1981) that are bringing about major political change. In 2008, Millennials voted for Barack Obama over John McCain by a greater than 2:1 margin (66% vs. 32%). Millennials also preferred Democratic congressional candidates to Republicans by about the same ratio (63% vs. 34%). A narrower majority of Gen-Xers (52% vs. 46%) also voted for Obama. By contrast, the forever-divided Boomers split their votes almost evenly between Obama and McCain, while the Silent Generation (born 1925-1945) opted for the Republican nominee (53% vs. 45%). The Democratic loyalties of America’s youngest voters have persisted since Obama’s election: in a mid-November 2009 Pew survey, Millennials identified as Democrats over Republicans by 58% to 19%. Gen-Xers did so by 51% to 38%. And, unlike older generations, Millennials are not sharply divided by gender and race: most male and white Millennials say they are Democrats, as do an overwhelming majority of the female and minority group members of the cohort.
• African-Americans. Blacks became charter members of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal coalition after seven decades of solid loyalty to the party of Lincoln. Black support for the Democrats became virtually unanimous in 1964, when the GOP nominated Senator Barry Goldwater, who earlier that year had voted against a civil rights bill that opened public accommodations to people of all races, as its presidential nominee. In 2008, not surprisingly, virtually all blacks (95%) voted for Barack Obama. But this was not much higher than black support for white Democratic presidential candidates had been in every election since the mid-1960s. Pew also indicates that African-Americans identify as Democrats over Republicans by an overwhelming 78% to 9% margin.
• Hispanics. Except for scattered regional pockets in places like Tampa, along the Rio Grande border, and New Mexico, Latinos were a negligible component of the American population both when FDR assembled the New Deal coalition and during the forty years afterward when the Democratic Party dominated U.S. politics. That is no longer the case. Hispanics now comprise 15% of the American population, a percentage expected to double within forty years. Latinos are now an increasingly crucial component of the new Democratic coalition. While a majority of them have voted for Democratic presidential candidates in every election since 1972, more than two-thirds (67%) voted for Barack Obama in 2008. With one exception (Bill Clinton’s reelection in 1996), this was the largest percentage in any election since Latinos became a large enough component in the U.S. population to tabulate separately in presidential election exit polls. The support of Latinos for the Democratic Party is likely to be of long duration, a matter of increasing importance as the Latino share of the American electorate grows. According to Pew, more than six in ten Latinos (62%) identify as or lean to the Democrats; only 15% are Republicans.
• Women. Women gained the vote in 1920 and, for most of the time since then, there was virtually no difference in the partisanship of men and women. Most people married and most husbands and wives voted alike. However, as the divided Baby Boomer Generation became an increasing share of the electorate, a partisan “gender gap” developed in U.S. politics. Starting in 1980, the Democratic presidential vote of women was, on average, eight percentage points higher than that of men. The gap has only grown in recent elections as older, less divided, generations pass from the scene. Starting in 1996, a majority of women voted for Democratic presidential candidates while at least a plurality of men voted for Republicans. In 2008, Barack Obama enjoyed a 13-percentage point advantage among women (56% vs. 43%). Men divided their votes evenly between Obama and John McCain. This difference is reflected in party identification. Overall, according to Pew a clear majority of women are self-perceived Democrats (55% vs. 39% who claim to be Republican). By contrast, males are about evenly divided between the parties (41% Democrats and 38% Republicans). The narrow Democratic advantage among men is entirely a function of minority group males: a clear plurality of white males is Republican (44%, as compared to 38% who say they are Democrats). White women, by contrast, identify as Democrats over Republicans by ten percentage points (49% vs. 39%).
• The Northeast and West. American party coalitions have always contained a distinct regional component. Throughout most of U.S. history it was the Republican (or Whig) Northeast opposing the Democratic South. Today, as always, the South and Northeast continue to be pitted against one another, but the partisan leanings of each region have been reversed. The South has not given even a plurality of its presidential votes to a Democratic candidate since 1976 and white Southerners have not done so since at least 1964. By contrast, in 1984 the Northeast became the most Democratic region in presidential elections. It has given Democratic presidential candidates at least a plurality of its votes since 1992 and a majority since 1996. The West follows the Northeast in its Democratic loyalties. Since 1992 the West has given at least a plurality to Democratic candidates and in 2008 preferred Barack Obama against John McCain by 57% vs. 40%. The Northeast (56%) and West (47%) also contain the greatest percentages of Democratic party identifiers according to Pew.
• Highly educated Americans. In 1930, on the eve of the creation of the New Deal coalition, not even 5-percent of American adults were college graduates and an infinitesimal number had received any postgraduate education. By 1960, as that coalition entered its final years, the percentage of U.S. college graduates had crept up to nearly 8-percent. During the 1932-1968 era of Democratic dominance most of America’s relatively few college graduates voted for and identified as Republicans. As recently as 1964, Gallup showed that a plurality (38%) of college graduates identified as Republicans, well above the percentages of those with high school (22%) or grade school (20%) education who did so. But things have changed. Now more than a quarter of Americans are college graduates and the New York Times exit poll indicated that 45% of those who voted for president in 2008 were college graduates, with 17% having at least some postgraduate education. More and more of these college graduates are Democrats. The percentage of college grads voting for a Democratic presidential candidate has steadily increased in each election since 1988 (from 37% to 50% in 2008) and those with postgraduate training have become the most strongly Democratic educational component in the electorate save for the now tiny number with less than a high school education. In 2008 college postgraduates voted for Barack Obama over John McCain by 58% to 40% and have remained Obama’s strongest supporters during his presidency. (http://www.gallup.com/poll/125423/Americans-Postgraduate-Education-Back-Obama.aspx) In addition, a majority of college grads (51%) now identify with or lean to the Democratic Party in contrast to 37% who call themselves Republicans.
America is a much different nation now than it was 80 years ago when the New Deal coalition was first assembled. The Democratic Party has changed along with America and has put together a new voter coalition, one that is very different from the New Deal coalition, but also one with the potential to become the dominant force in U.S. politics just as FDR’s coalition did so many decades ago.
The groups within the emerging Democratic coalition have clear political values. Most crucially they all favor an activist government that moves forcefully to resolve economic and societal problems in a way that protects and advances middle class Americans. These core Democratic values energized and held together the groups that comprised FDR’s New Deal coalition. These same values will energize and bond the disparate groups that now comprise a new 21st Century Democratic coalition.
But while a new coalition that can underpin renewed Democratic dominance has come into place, Democratic success in using it is by no means guaranteed. To do that, Democrats will have to have both the vision and the courage to see things as they are now and as they will be in the years ahead, not as they once were. If DC Democratic leaders and Democratic candidates across the nation are timid and fail to inspire and mobilize the emerging Democratic coalition by appealing to core Democratic values, the Democratic Party will manage to lose elections even in solidly Democratic places like Massachusetts. Democrats have a choice. They can either use their new majority coalition or they will lose it.

Happy New Year, Democrats

As the first year of the Obama administration draws to a close, Democrats would do well to celebrate their successes this year and look to the future, rather than dwell on the funk that seems to embrace many of its supporters these days.

While the numbers have fluctuated within normal statistical margins, throughout 2009 Pew research has indicated that the Democrats have held around a 1.5:1 party identification lead over the Republicans. During the course of the year between 48% and 53% of Americans identified with or leaned to the Democrats while between 35% and 40% identified with or leaned to the GOP. This Democratic advantage is significantly higher than it was in the Clinton years of the 1990s, when the Democrats' lead averaged about five percentage points. It is particularly large compared with 1994, the year the Democrats lost their congressional majority to the Gingrich revolution, when the two parties were tied in party ID at 44% each.

In fact, the competitive position of the Democratic Party now approaches what it was in the mid-1960s, when it was the unquestioned dominant force in U.S. politics. In a 1964 Gallup survey, conducted just prior to Lyndon Johnson's landslide victory over Barry Goldwater, the Democrats' party identification lead over the GOP was 49% to 24%.

Underpinning this rebound in the Democratic Party's competitive position is a major generational and ethnic transformation of America. It is a very different looking America now than it was in 1964, but the Democratic Party is once again far better positioned to benefit in the future from the opportunities presented by our changing nation.

--In 1964, about ninety percent of Americans were white as were more than eight in ten (82%) of those who identified as Democrats. Today the "minority" contribution to America's population has nearly tripled and non-Caucasians comprise about four in ten Democratic identifiers. By mid-century the United States will become a "majority-minority" country, however, as in the mid-1960s, more than 95% of Republicans are white.

--In 1964, only a minority of women worked outside the home and almost all women married by the time they were 25. Now women, many of whom are unmarried or minority, comprise more than six in ten Democratic identifiers. Virtually all of the women who do call themselves Republican are white and most are married.

--In 1964, nearly half of the electorate had only a high school education. An additional third had gone no further than grade school. Just one in five were college graduates. Now, a majority of Americans have at least some college exposure and nearly three in ten are college graduates. While, as in 1964, about 30% of Republican identifiers are college graduates, the percentage of college graduates among Democrats has doubled from 14% to 28%.

--the 1964 electorate was dominated by the GI Generation (born 1901-1924), the generation of the New Deal and World War II, and the Lost Generation (born 1883-1900), that primarily came of age around World War I and in the 1920s. About half of the 1964 Democrats were members of the GI Generation, who identified with that party by a 2:1 margin. Half of 1964 Republican identifiers were from the Lost Generation which by then was a generation of senior citizens. Today, with a completely different generational configuration than in 1964, the GOP still skews relatively old and the Democrats young. Like the GI Generation before them, Millennials, born between 1982 and 2003, overwhelmingly identify as Democrats over Republicans (58% vs. 19% in a November 2009 Pew survey).

In 2008, only 40% of Millennials were eligible to vote and they comprised about 17% of the American electorate. When Barack Obama runs for reelection in 2012, about 60% of Millennials will be of voting age and one in four voters will be a Millennial. By 2020, when virtually all of them will be able to vote, more than a third of the electorate (36%) will come from the Millennial Generation. As the largest (95 million) and most ethnically diverse generation in U.S. history (40% of Millennials are non-white) the Democratic Party should benefit from their loyalty at least as much over the next three or four decades as did the attachment of the GI Generation to the Democrats in the middle-third of the 20th Century.

The United States is a changed and continually changing nation. Taken together, these changes have made America a more diverse and more open nation. This should let the Democratic Party face the future with confidence and courage. But, the Democratic Party's opportunities cannot be taken for granted. The first step in taking advantage of these opportunities for Democrats would be to start building a future for America built on this reality and letting go of the timidity and tentativeness that seems to have been their governing motif in 2009.

Obama Gets an A, Cong. Dems an Incomplete

Back to school week was a good one for President Obama, but Congress still has some lessons to learn. After telling the nation’s schoolchildren to study hard, stay in school, get good grades, and be unwilling to accept failure, the President directed a very similar message to Congress as he lectured them on the need to pass health care reform in this session. The end result was a significant rise in Obama’s poll numbers. CNN
and Democracy Corps questioned voters before the president’s congressional address and then again immediately afterward. There is little doubt that Democrats are simply glad that the president is sounding like the man they put in the White House last November.
CNN found that three-quarters (77%) of those who watched the speech had a positive reaction to it overall, with 56% being very positive. Nearly as many (72%) believed that Obama clearly stated the goals for his health care plan in his speech. After the address, 70% believed that Barack Obama’s policies would move the country in the right direction as compared with 60% who felt that way before. Most important, the number favoring the president’s health care reform plan rose sharply to 67% from 53%.
The Democracy Corps used electronic dials to gauge the perceptions of 50 “independent and weak partisan” voters in Denver before, during, and immediately after President Obama’s speech. Those who participated in the Democracy Corps research were about evenly divided among those who initially supported and opposed the president’s health care reform plan and McCain and Obama voters. Among these swing voters, support for Obama’s plan rose 20 points (from 46% before the address to 66% after). Moreover, attitudes toward specific aspects of the plan improved sharply following the address.

Health Care Reform Description:	Agree Pre-Speech	Disagree Pre-Speech	Agree Post-Speech	Disagree Post-Speech	Change
Will get health care costs under control	42%	46%	64%	36%	+22
Allows you to keep your current insurance and doctor if you choose	54%	32%	80%	18%	+26
Will increase competition and lower prices for health care	44%	42%	74%	24%	+30
Will give individuals and families more choice and control	36%	58%	60%	36%	+24
Government-run health care	60%	32%	46%	54%	-14
Will increase the deficit and raise taxes	62%	26%	40%	44%	-22
Will hurt seniors by cutting Medicare	40%	32%	20%	66%	-20

But the biggest jump in Barack Obama’s poll ratings came in the Daily Kos weekly tracking survey.
In just one week, the president’s overall favorable to unfavorable margin improved by eight percentage points (favorable up 4 points and unfavorable down 4). Obama’s favorable marks week-to-week improved in virtually every demographic and political group except among Republicans. However, the biggest gains came within Democratic core groups including Millennials (young people born 1982-2003), Latinos, residents of the Northeast, and Democratic identifiers. This suggests that, after a period of drift during the summer, what President Obama said last week, especially in his health care reform address, reinforced his base.

	Favorable 8/31-9/3	Favorable 9/7-10	Week-to-week Change
Total electorate	52%	56%	+4
Sex
Male	44%	50%	+6
Female	60%	62%	+2
Age
18-29	74%	80%	+6
30-44	42%	44%	+2
45-59	58%	64%	+6
60+	40%	42%	+2
Party ID
Democrat	77%	85%	+8
Republican	4%	4%	—
Independent	57%	60%	+3
Region
Northeast	76%	83%	+7
South	26%	28%	+2
Midwest	59%	63%	+4
West	56%	60%	+4

Unfortunately, President Obama’s Democratic colleagues in Congress did not share in the week’s polling upswing. The Daily Kos survey indicates that the favorable ratings of Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and congressional Democrats overall were essentially unchanged during a week in which the president registered significant gains. Perhaps it is for this reason that GOP consultants are telling Republican candidates to attack congressional Democrats, rather than President Obama, in the 2010-midterm elections.
It seems clear that the public, even the Democratic base, is taking a wait and see attitude about inside-the-Beltway Democrats other than President Obama. The coming months will determine whether or not the Democratic majority in Congress is prepared to do the job that it was sent to Washington to do and, among other things, at long last enact meaningful health care reform. This week’s polling numbers suggest that would not only be good for America, but also for congressional Democrats. Let’s hope they’re paying attention to Obama’s message.

Have Patience-Republicans Just Going through 5 Stages of Grief

In 1969, Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross published a groundbreaking book, On Death and Dying, suggesting that people facing death went through five emotional stages before they could accept their fate. While never proven by subsequent studies, the five stages of grief have entered the realm of conventional wisdom and are often cited to explain the behavior of groups, as well as individuals, facing a life-threatening crisis. The actions of Republicans, and their conservative supporters, in attempting to disrupt Town Hall discussions of President Obama’s health care reform proposal suggests that the concept is alive and kicking in politics as well.
According to Kubler-Ross, the first stage in dealing with impending doom is to deny it’s happening. We witnessed this behavior in the immediate aftermath of the Democrats’ overwhelming victory last November. Republicans reacted almost identically to the way Democrats did after Ronald Reagan’s victory in 1980. The election results were attributed to poor campaign tactics by the loser, or the failure to develop a winning message by the campaign’s media strategists, or a plot by reporters to ensure the victory of the winning candidate, if for no other reason than to give them something new to write about. In the classic words of death deniers throughout history, Republican leaders continued to insist well into January 2009 that they “felt fine” and the results had “nothing to do with me”--the Republican party and its message. The only thing that was about to die, we heard GOP leaders like Rush Limbaugh and Michael Steele assert, was the muddled attempt at moderation by Senator John McCain and the failure of their party to adhere to its most conservative principles.
The second stage of grief according to On Death and Dying is anger, and this summer the Republican Party and its minions have clearly moved beyond denial to anger. Enraged mobs of extraordinarily well informed “average” citizens have descended on Democratic Town Hall meetings to demand that their Representative not follow Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s party line and instead vote against specific provisions of health care legislation that would, for instance, incent the writing of living wills, or substitute the judgment of health insurers for that of objective government entities on what treatments would be allowed based on their cost effectiveness. Above all the evil of government involvement in the health care system is to be labeled for what it is—the work of the devil, who is clearly a socialist, through his agents in the U.S. Congress. The fact that many of those most vociferous in their opposition to government supported health care are carrying their sacred Medicare card in their wallet is only ironic if you ignore the degree to which anger and denial are related emotions. In fact, Kubler-Ross points out that people often oscillate between those stages before moving on. This makes the denial of Barack Obama’s Hawaiian birth by many of these same angry protesters understandable, if not any more credible.
So what can the country expect once the Republican Party moves on to the next stage of dealing with the demise of its former electoral dominance? According to Kubler-Ross, the third stage of grief is “bargaining.” Here the individual or group hopes that it can at least postpone or delay death by promising to reform or turn over a new leaf. There are already early signs in the writings of Peggy Noonan, President Reagan’s speechwriter, that this next stage is coming to the fore. She suggests that if only President Obama would rethink the broad scope of his proposals and join in true bipartisan negotiations, Republicans in Congress would support a bill that leaves most of today’s health care system in place but without the nasty practices of denying health coverage to those with pre-existing conditions or canceling people’s insurance at the first sign that they might actually need medical treatment. The country can expect to hear more such offers from Republicans this fall when Congress returns and the real bargaining over the scope of health care reform takes place. But the party’s past misdeeds in building a majority coalition based on the racist premise of its Southern Strategy or its failure to appeal to the civic beliefs and attitudes of the emerging Millennial Generation or its most recent decision to sacrifice its future among Hispanics by voting against the nomination of Justice Sonia Sotomayor, make any such offer a fool’s bargain. The demise of GOP dominance is inevitable and Democrats should take no part in postponing the inevitable.
If congressional Democrats have the courage to use their majority to pass health care legislation and then go to the voters with an economy on the mend, the 2010 elections should serve to move Republicans to the fourth stage of grief—depression. Suffering from a series of unexpected and unexplainable defeats, Republicans are likely to go off on a prolonged period of silence, punctuated by bouts of crying over just how unfair politics has become. Kubler-Ross suggests that it is important not to try and cheer up the person in this stage of grief, but to let the individual work his or her way through the inevitable depression on their own. That way, her book says, the dying can finally come to the final stage of grief—acceptance.
This stage represents the end of the struggle and a willingness to accept one’s fate. The Republican Party as we have known it since 1968 will die for lack of political support. It may not accept that fate until after President Obama’s re-election, by a landslide, in 2012 just as the Democratic Party’s New Deal liberals did not accept their fate until after Ronald Reagan’s complete demolition of Walter Mondale’s candidacy in 1984. Still the end is inevitable, as many of today’s leading thinkers in the GOP are beginning to realize.
But Republicans can take heart in what Democrats were able to do after reaching the clarity of mind that comes with accepting one’s fate. By recognizing the death of its old ideas and rethinking their approach to the electorate after their landslide defeat in 1984, the Democrats eventually found a new road to victory—tentatively in 1992 with Bill Clinton and then more confidently with Obama’s victory in 2008. At that rate the GOP only has to wait until 2020 to have its next real shot at winning the presidency. If Republicans want to get to that goal sooner, psychologists might suggest that they move quickly out if their “summer of anger” phase, don’t bargain or obstruct too much over health care or anything else when Congress returns, and get ready for a good cry in 2010. Even better, such a course of therapy will improve the rest of the country’s mental health as well.

Republicans Gringo Strategy

In a recent posting on his Web site, Nate Silver raised the possibility that the Republican Party could more effectively compete in the 2012 and 2016 elections by turning its back on Hispanics and attempting to maximize the support of white voters in enough 2008 Midwestern and Southern blue states to flip them red. This would involve positioning the GOP as the non-Latino party by "pursuing an anti-immigrant, anti-NAFTA, 'American First' sort of platform.'" The Republican Party rode similar exclusionary strategies to dominance of U.S. politics during most of the past four decades.

But America has entered a new era. Propelled by the election of its first African-American president, an increasingly non-white and more heavily Latino population, and the emergence of a new, significantly more tolerant generation, the Millennials, America is not the same country, demographically and attitudinally, that it was in the 1960s or even the 1990s. These changes have altered the electoral environment and lessened the usefulness of divisive strategies that were once effective, but may no longer be so.

Superficially, a non-Latino strategy might seem more plausible than anything else the GOP has attempted since the election of Barack Obama. After offering significant support to George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, Hispanics have recently become a solidly Democratic group. Republicans may have little to lose in not courting them in the next election or two. Nationally, Hispanics voted for Barack Obama over John McCain by more than 2:1 (67% vs. 31%). They supported Democratic House candidates last year by an even greater margin (68% vs. 29%). Pew surveys indicate that four times as many Hispanics identify as Democrats than Republicans (62% vs. 15%).

Adopting a non-Hispanic strategy would certainly be compatible with strategies the GOP has been utilizing for decades. From the "Southern strategy" of Richard Nixon and Kevin Phillips in the late 1960s, through the "wedge issues" used by Lee Atwater in the 1980s, to Karl Rove's "base politics" in this decade, the Republicans effectively took advantage of white middle and working class fears of the "other" -- African-Americans, gays, feminists -- who could be positioned as being outside the American mainstream. Applying this approach to Latinos would only be doing what came naturally for the GOP during the past 40 years.

But, while ethnically exclusionary strategies may offer the possibility of short-term relief, they do little to resolve the deep difficulties now facing the Republican Party. The ethnic composition of the United States is far different now than it was in the 1960s when the GOP began to separate white southerners (and like-minded white working class voters in other regions) from their long attachment to the Democratic Party. Four decades ago, 90 percent of Americans were white, and virtually all of the remainder were African-American. Hispanics were a negligible factor within the population and the electorate. Since then, the percentage of non-Hispanic whites in America has fallen to two-thirds. Hispanics now comprise about 15 percent of the population and just under 10 percent of the electorate. Moreover, Hispanics are a relatively young demographic. Even if no additional Latinos migrate to the United States, their importance will continue to increase as older whites pass from the scene.

It is this rise in the Hispanic population that prompted Silver to offer his suggested non-Latino strategy to the Republicans in the first place. But Silver's plan, which he facetiously calls "Operation Gringo," would require the GOP to pull off a rare political balancing act or "thread the needle" to use his term. In order to compensate for expected losses in the increasingly Latino Southwestern states of Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and, without John McCain on their ticket, Arizona, Republicans would have to win states like Pennsylvania and Michigan that they have not carried in decades. They would have to do this while not, at the same time, losing Florida and possibly Texas with their own large Hispanic electorates.

Moreover, while it is true that Hispanics are not distributed evenly across the country, Silver concedes "there are Hispanics everywhere now." Latinos were decisive in Obama's wins in closely divided "gringo territories" such as Indiana, North Carolina, and Nebraska's second congressional district and the growth rate of Hispanics is greatest in "nontraditional" areas like the South and Prairie states. This means that "America first" campaigning may ultimately have the effect of hurting Republicans even in some of the "white" states where it was intended to help.

However, the biggest barrier in running against Hispanics is that American attitudes on ethnicity have changed significantly over the past four decades. A new Pew survey indicates that Americans have become less hostile toward immigrants and more positive about policies designed to incorporate immigrants, even undocumented immigrants, into American society.

The number favoring a policy that would allow illegal immigrants (Pew's term) currently in the country to gain citizenship if they pass background checks, pay fines and have jobs has increased from 58 percent to 63 percent since 2007. While 73 percent do agree that America should restrict and control people coming to live in here more than we do now, that number is down from 80 percent in 2002 and 82 percent in 1994. Finally, support for free trade agreements like NAFTA has risen from 34 percent in 2003 and 40 percent in 2007 to 44 percent now.

The Pew findings are confirmed by the findings of a survey recently released by Pete Brodnitz of the Benenson Strategy Group. That study indicated that, across party lines, virtually all Americans (86%) favor the passage by Congress of comprehensive immigration reform when they are given full details of that plan.

Leading the way in these increasingly tolerant attitudes is the Millennial Generation (Americans born 1982-2003). Only a third of Millennials (35% vs. 55% for older generations) believe that the growing number of immigrants threatens traditional American values. Just 58 percent of Millennials (compared with 77% of older generations) agrees that the United States should increase restrictions on those coming to live in America. A large majority of Millennials (71% in contrast to 62% of older Americans) favors a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. And, 61-percent of Millennials favor free trade agreements such as NAFTA in contrast to just 40 percent of older generations.

To date America has only seen the tip of the Millennial iceberg. In 2008, just 41 percent of them were eligible to vote and they comprised only 17 percent of the electorate. By 2012, more than 60 percent of Millennials will be of voting age and they will be a quarter of the electorate. In 2020, when the youngest Millennials will be able to vote, they will make up more than a third of the electorate. Over the next decade, this will make the ethnically tolerant attitudes of the Millennial Generation the rule rather than the exception in American politics.

At this early point in the Millennial era, Republicans remain most open to the intolerance and immigrant bashing of ethnically exclusionary strategies. Pew indicates the number of Democrats and independents who favor a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants is up 11 points and 3 points respectively since 2007. By contrast, the number of Republicans who favor that policy is down by six points. In the end, a non-Hispanic approach by Republicans would amount to a continuation of Karl Rove's base strategy. As the Republican base continues to diminish in the Millennial Era, that strategy will be a recipe for disaster for the GOP, certainly in the long term, and very likely in the short run as well.

What MTV and the GOP have in Common

MTV premièred in August 1981, seven months after Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as America's 40th president. It revolutionized TV and the music industry as much as Reagan changed the country's politics.

And now, just as the election of Barack Obama to the presidency signaled the end of that political era and the beginning of another, MTV is belatedly shifting gears as well.

The network, long known for cynical and vapid content, has suddenly understood the importance of being earnest. Booze and bikinis are out. Do-good singers and hard-working art students are in.

MTV acknowledged that its programming had become out of step with the progressive, service-oriented values of today's youth, the Millennial Generation. "It was very clear we were at one of those transformational moments, when this new generation of Millennials [born between 1982 and 2003] were demanding a new MTV," a channel executive explained.

After losing ground for years, MTV finally got it. But many other corporations and institutions – the Republican Party comes to mind – still don't. As a result, they risk alienating the approximately 95 million young Americans who will be defining the nation's politics and culture for decades to come.

MTV's mistake was to assume that the members of particular demographic groups, in this instance young people in their mid-teens through their mid-20s, behave the same and hold the same attitudes at all times. If only MTV's executives had gone to the movies more often, they might have recognized these generational changes much sooner.

For baby boomers (born 1946-1964), a generation of idealists driven by strong personal values, no coming-of-age-movie captured their rebellious and moralistic spirit better than "The Graduate." The protagonist, Benjamin Braddock, is a depressed loner who rejects his parents' "plastic" values. In his dalliance with Mrs. Robinson, Benjamin seeks emotional attachment and deeper meaning, whereas she is in the "relationship" only for physical release.

The movie ends as Benjamin rescues his true love, Elaine (Mrs. Robinson's daughter) from an "arranged" marriage by blocking the door from the church with a cross. Benjamin and Elaine ride away on a bus, embracing a new idealistic lifestyle while forever turning their backs on the shallow and meaningless existence of their parents.

But the tone of coming-of-age movies shifted dramatically when Generation X (born 1965-1981) became teenagers and 20-somethings in the 1980s. This generation was best represented in "Risky Business."

Tom Cruise portrays Joel Goodsen, an alienated young man who, like many real-life Gen-Xers, is a latchkey kid abandoned by his vacationing parents at their suburban home.

Unlike Benjamin Braddock, Joel does not use his alienation from the grown-up world as a reason to pursue deeper values. Instead, he uses his time alone to perform an iconic dance in his underwear while lip-synching to "Old Time Rock and Roll." He wrecks the family car, hires a hooker, and, in true Gen-X entrepreneurial fashion, provides a "for hire" outlet to satisfy his friends' sexual desires, using the family home as his place of business.

Contrast those stories with the emblematic Millennial movie "The Devil Wears Prada."

Millennials are the American generation least bound by gender role expectations, so it isn't surprising that the protagonist is a young woman with an androgynous name, Andy (Sachs). Because Millennials are also the most tolerant American generation, it's not surprising that Andy's best friends are an African-American woman, a gay man, and her sensitive boyfriend who aspires to be a chef. In true Millennial fashion, Andy constantly relies on her friends and parents, whom she adores, for love, advice, and support.

Andy is temporarily attracted by the glitter of the world of high fashion. However, like others of this generation who are driven by a desire to solve society's problems, she realizes her true calling is far different.

She breaks with her boss, Miranda Priestly, at the fashion magazine where she works, so that she can take a job writing for a liberal newspaper. But, as a polite and conventional Millennial, the break is not harsh. In fact, her old boss, the devil herself, provides the crucial reference for Andy's new job.

Everyone in politics and pop culture should learn the lesson MTV belatedly has. To really understand the preferences of young people, take a look at their generation and not simply their age. That will tell you everything you need to know.

How to Lose a Generation

If the Republican Party thinks it has problems now, just wait. The party's incredibly poor performance among young voters in the 2008 election raises questions about the long-term competitiveness of the GOP.

The "millennials" -- the generation of Americans born between 1982 and 2003 -- now identify as Democrats by a ratio of 2 to 1. They are the first in four generations to contain more self-perceived liberals than conservatives.

And a recent Daily Kos tracking poll should send shudders down the spine of any Republican who understands how powerful a voting bloc this generation could become over the next decade.

Only 9% of millennials polled expressed a favorable opinion of the Republican Party. Only 7% were positive about the GOP's congressional leaders. By contrast, 65% of millennials had a favorable opinion of the Democratic Party, and a majority also approved of congressional Democrats.

Though many people question the political sophistication of the millennials, they have been instilled with egalitarian and participatory values by their parents since birth.

This child-rearing produced a generation that was wide open to the personal appeal and message of Barack Obama and his party. Moving forward, the initial preference of millennials for President Obama and the Democrats will remain in place for a lifetime unless Republicans can quickly adapt their message and find a messenger who can speak to this powerful new force in American politics.

Only 41% of all millennials were eligible to vote in 2008, yet their overwhelming support for Obama transformed his win from what would have been a squeaker into a solid victory. Obama's popular-vote margin over John McCain was about 9.5 million nationally; millennials accounted for nearly 7.6 million of those votes.

In the 2010 off-year election, half of millennials will be eligible to vote, representing about a fifth of the overall electorate. By 2012, 60% will be eligible to vote, and they could make up about a quarter of the American electorate when Obama runs for reelection. By 2020, when virtually all millennials will be over 18, they will represent 36% of the electorate and will completely dominate elections and the political agenda of America.

And it seems likely that this civic generation, like its "Greatest Generation" great-grandparents, will vote in big numbers. Turnout among voters under 30 has been rising steadily since millennials began to replace the alienated and more cynical Gen-Xers in this age group. From a low of 37% in 1996, turnout increased to 53% of all eligible millennials, and 59% in the key battleground states in 2008.

Their unity of opinion and their numbers will make millennials' preferences for economic activism, a non-intrusive approach to social issues by government at any level and a multilateral interventionism by America in foreign affairs the policy paths to political success during the next decade.

It is simply inconceivable that the Republican Party can craft a winning strategy between now and then that doesn't accommodate these ideas.

But so far, Republicans appear to be tone-deaf on the issues that millennials care about.

Millennials have been reared with a desire to serve their community, and the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act provides them an opportunity to do just that, while at the same time dealing with their single biggest financial worry -- the high cost of a college education. Unfortunately, all but 25 House Republicans voted against the bill, despite its co-sponsorship by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah).

Millennials also are experiencing higher levels of unemployment than any other generation. They expect the federal government to take an active role in fixing that problem and support redistributing income if necessary. But the almost-unanimous Republican opposition to the "recovery" act helped convince millennials that only one party actually understood their problems and was prepared to act in accordance with their beliefs.

Polls consistently show millennials are more committed to environmental protection than any generation in American history, willing to sacrifice economic growth or endure higher prices in order to save the planet. Given the millennials' overwhelming concern with the environment, House Minority Leader John Boehner's comments recently that carbon dioxide isn't a real threat because "we all breathe it out" and, besides, "cows give out a lot of gas too," went beyond inanity into the realm of political suicide.

The only tentative Republican gesture to millennial power to date is the GOP's sudden fascination with a new social network platform, Twitter. By choosing Twitter -- with its limitations on content -- to connect to millennials, Republicans are actually demonstrating how little they know about this generation's commitment to engaging in the content-rich challenges of rebuilding the nation's civic institutions and national unification.

Republicans will need to find a new message and much better messengers than their last presidential ticket or their current congressional leaders if they want to truly connect with today's young voters. Failure to do so will leave Republicans, to paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, locked in the dogmas of their quiet past, unable to think and therefore act anew.

Doing What Comes Naturally During a Makeover

While Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter's announcement that he was switching from the Republicans to the Democrats may have gratified the latter and upset the former, no one should have been surprised by it. Historically, party switching is common, indeed inevitable at times of party realignment.
Spurred by the rise of a new large dynamic generation and the emergence of a new communication technology, realignments occur about every four decades in U.S. politics. The most recent one began with the election of Barack Obama last November. These large political makeovers normally enthrone a new dominant national party. Beneath the surface, realignments are characterized by major shifts in the voting coalitions that support the two parties. Demographic groups and regions move to and fro between the parties.
These demographic shifts, and the attendant ideological solidification of the two parties, leave some politicians, like Senator Specter, who no longer represent their party's mainstream thinking, as outliers and essentially marooned. Faced with the prospect of almost certain defeat by a reduced and much more conservative base in next year's Pennsylvania GOP senate primary, the politically moderate Specter made the only rational choice he could and left the Republican Party.
The last previous realignment, which began with election of Richard Nixon in 1968, saw the movement of numerous Democrats, primarily Southerners, to the Republicans. Starting with Strom Thurmond and continuing through Richard Shelby, these conservative Democrats, along with many of their constituents, saw the GOP as a more comfortable political home. But, the movement between the parties wasn't only Southern, nor was it only in one direction. Conservative Colorado Democratic Senator, Ben Nighthorse Campbell became a Republican and liberal Republicans like New York's John Lindsay and Don Riegle of Michigan went the other way.
If history is any guide, Arlen Specter's move from the Republican to the Democratic Party will not be the last during the next several years. Other moderate Republicans, most likely from New England, the Northeast, and the upper Midwest, will almost certainly join him. At some point, it is also probable that a smaller number of conservative Democrats, who feel uncomfortable or politically threatened by President Obama's expansion of the federal government, will find the GOP more compatible with their beliefs and fortunes. Just as the baseball offseason is a time for trading players, a political realignment leads to changes in the rosters of the two parties. Let the switching begin.

Everybody's Wrong But us

Conservative columnist, Michael Gerson, in the Washington Post, and then Karl Rove in the Wall Street journal cited a recent Pew Research Center poll, to claim that the "polarization" between Democrats and Republicans in their approval of President Barack Obama's performance is greater than for any other president in surveys stretching back to the early days of the Nixon administration But their interpretation of the poll's results are dead wrong.

In the Pew survey a nearly unanimous 88-percent of Democratic identifiers, as opposed to a scant 27-percent of Republicans, approved of the president's performance, a gap of 61-percentage points. Independents (57% approve) fall precisely between the Democrats and Republicans. Overall, in that survey, 59-percent of all Americans approved of the job the president was doing, a number that rose slightly (to 61%) in the most recent Pew survey, conducted in the wake of Obama's European trip.

The reason for this polarized electorate however is not the actions of President Obama but the events of last year which has brought America into a new civic era, a turning point that has occurred roughly every eighty years throughout American history. Each time the country enters a civic era there is a rise in partisan identifications, a more coherent ideological divide between the two parties, and an increase in straight ticket voting. Even Gerson noted that polarization might be a good thing when it is a "decisive" and "ambitious" president like Franklin D. Roosevelt who is doing the polarizing to achieve overriding national goals. Despite his attempts to blame Obama for our current level of partisan divide, the truth is that such a division is inevitable in a civic era.
The polarization between Democrats and Republicans in the Pew and every other survey has much less to do with President Obama's personal and political style than it does with the inability of his own Republican Party to adapt to this new era. From the earliest Pew survey conducted in 1989, the first year of George H.W. Bush's administration, through 2005, there was near parity in the distribution of party identifiers within the electorate; no more than three or four percentage points ever separated the Democrats from the Republicans. By contrast, since 2006 the percentage of Americans identifying themselves as Democrats has risen significantly while the number saying they are Republican has fallen. In the most recent Pew study, conducted early this month, the Democrats held a clear 52% to 35% lead over the Republicans in party ID, a 13-percentage point shift toward the Democratic Party since 2004. And, only 21-percent of American voters are "pure" Republicans, a group that consists only of those willing to call themselves Republicans and does not include independents that say they lean toward the GOP. This is the smallest number of "pure" partisans for either party in any survey ever conducted by Pew.
Quite simply, the GOP has become an ever-declining corps of conservative true believers. A recent Frank N. Magid Associates survey indicates that while Democratic identifiers are almost evenly divided between liberals or progressives (45%) and moderates (42%), among Republicans, conservatives outnumber moderates by more than 2:1 (61% vs. 26%).
As a result, Republicans see things very differently than almost everyone else. The latest Daily Kos weekly tracking poll, for example, indicates that more than two-thirds of Americans (67%) have a favorable opinion of President Obama. In that poll at least sixty percent of both women and men and all age and ethnic groups have a positive impression of the president. Only among Republicans (23%) and, in the geographic center of the GOP, the South, (41%), is only a minority favorable toward Obama.
Given the distance of the Republican Party from the current American political mainstream, and the increased sense of party loyalty felt by many Americans, it shouldn't be surprising that most of the public is reticent to see President Obama compromise with Republicans on important public policy questions as Gerson suggests. In a March CBS/New York Times poll, a clear majority (56%) wanted President Obama to pursue the policies he promised in the campaign rather than working in a bipartisan way with Republicans (39%). An even larger majority (79%) wanted Congressional Republicans to work in a bipartisan way with the President rather than sticking to Republican policies.
By refusing to do so, it is the Republicans and not Barack Obama who are now polarizing American politics and, as a result, it is they who are polarized from most of their fellow citizens as well.
If Republicans truly want to see bipartisan policy making they will have to retreat from their position as a corporal's guard on the right wing of American politics and join the rest of the country in seeking real solutions to the major issues facing the United States at the dawn of the 21st Century.