Idiocracy

Since many of us were born, the American political map - with blue states on the coasts and Great Lakes region and red states everywhere else - resembled many other maps showing different aspects of American culture and economy. It roughly correlates to the map of obesity rates, with red states being fatter than blue ones; it matches the prevalence of Wal-Marts in US communities; it matches a map of US education levels. Are Republicans really fatter, more prone to shop at Wal-mart, and less educated than their Democratic peers?


Increasingly, yes they are. In today's NYT David Brooks published a revealing article on the shifting culture of political conservativism. When the modern conservative movement started, it was intellectually radical, challenging the status quo academic thinking regarding taxation, the role of government, etc. Its leaders, while weary of the liberal, Ivy League elite, also valued education, achievement, and intellectual rigor. This was the conservativism of William Buckley: populist but sprinkled with erudite sesquepedalianism. Through the mid 1980s, THIS was the conservative moment, and its appeal was broad - in 1984, Reagan took every state but Minnesota. But soon after Reagan, the GOP began to undermine this loose coalition of urban conservative intellectuals and rural voters. Instead of taking on just the liberal academic elite, they began taking on educated, coastal people in general. "Elitism" was not just used to describe liberal NYU sociology professors: it was used to describe any Californian with a good education and relatively high salary. This bargain had a Faustian tone to it: as the shift occurred, most of the intellectual muscle of the United States fled the conservative movement. Now, all the states with the most money (save Texas) are Democratic; lawyers donate to the Dems at a rate of 4-to-1; doctors, 2-to-1; tech workers and executives, 5-to-1; even those in the financial industry, those stalwart Wall Street Journal readers, donate a lot more to the Dems (2-to-1).

What is happening here? I propose two explanations, the first political the second more philosophical. A big reason for this massive shift in allegiances, of course, came about in GOP strategy think tanks. It was observed - and rightly so, as Karl Rove has demonstrated - that if the mass of relatively uneducated, southern and western Evangelicals can be mobilized, they will overwhelm the coastal "elites" in the electoral college. The electoral map from 2004 is stunning: virtually the entire mid-section of the country is red. Although these were the regions affected most by Bush's Iraq War, were decimated most by trickle-down economics, were - in short - losing more from conservative policies than the coasts, these were precisely the people voting the bums back into power. Thomas Frank's great book "What's the Matter with Kansas?" is an intriguing meditation on this important question: why do so many people in red states vote against their own economic self-interest? The answer, of course, are the ever-raging culture wars and the GOP's shrewd manipulation of them to get out the vote while never actual making a dent in the actual issues value voters care about. Herein lies perhaps the biggest stroke of political genius of the last 20 years: divide the people along cultural lines, invent issues that stir up emotional responses, and let the idiots duke it out with the "coastal elites." Joe Six-pack will inevitably overpower the tweed-wearing snob.

This is the political reality of the shift. But there is also an underlying philosophical transformation going on here. Backing up a bit: I've always leaned Democratic my whole conscious life. Indeed, one's family is the greatest predictor of political bent and my family has no shortage of "libruls." However, even in high school and before, I always understood and respected the conservative position. I didn't necessarily agree with it, but it was a consistent, rigorous philosophy with its own logical contentions, approaches, and solutions. Of course, this form of conservativism - the one that makes sense - it still out there. I consider George Will and David Brooks, for example, to be smart, principled conservatives. I don't always agree, but I always read their columns. Pat Buchanan, despite occasional forays into extreme right-wing cant, generally fits into this category as well. But David Brooks doesn't set the political agenda in small towns in Ohio; George Will isn't a commentator on FOX News; Buchanan is far more active on public broadcasting than he is in the screaming head, vitriolic media so frequented by red America. Politics aside, as all of the aforementioned conservatives agree, Republican ideas are in a state of emergency. Real world facts have changed but conservatives keep pounding home the same points they've anchored themselves to for years: cut taxes, keep military spending high, half-assedly pursue "cultural" issues, distrust "Big Government" (what about "smart government"?), etc. ad nauseum. Watching Palin speak is a exercise in beating a dead horse - although the world has changed, the talking points remain the same. The Republican philosophy is starting to rot.

Frankly, I don't understand how anyone can look at the hard realities facing us today and believe that the modern Republican message addresses them at all. I understood back in 1998 - I'm at a loss now. Barring those individuals who will vote for whoever says they're pro-life or pro-gun or anti-gay, the facts are so clearly in the Left's favor that it's a miracle the GOP is still hanging on to 43% of the popular vote. The list is way too long to list here, but over the last eight years many sacred cows of Republican thinking have been completely discredited. The failed wars show the limits of American military power and the tragedy of Empire; the ongoing economic crisis shows the complete failure of deregulation to create a fair, balanced financial system; the $10+ trillion debt shows us the unsustainability of tax cuts to the rich and spending beyond our means. (Ironic that conservative presidents have rung up such obscene deficits in the last 25 years.) The list goes on.

I've come to a certain conclusion: as conservative principles have begun losing their power to express the world, those who know better - ie., the educated coastal "elites" - have fled. Despite the handful of smart conservative analysts, scholars, and writers keeping the old intellectual revolution alive, the primary voices of the movement now are Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, et al. THEY are the ones driving opinion in rural red state areas, not the aristocratic William Buckley. As conservative principles have lost their intellectual power, therefore, the GOP has resorted to the only reasonable strategy they can adopt to maintain power - hoodwink stupid people into voting against their own interests. The ideas can't stand up on their own, but if you get Hannity screaming about the liberals coming to take away your American values, then you might get some traction. The GOP today relies not on southerners, Joe Six-packs, or Christians - it relies on stupid people.

Update: The conservative Wick Allison's assessment of conservativism is right on the money.

Update II: And another recent Op-ed piece by Bob Herbert that amplifies the argument here.