Since the CA GOP is the beating heart of RINO-dom and completely happy to keep the scraps they now have, it is going to be hard to put together a coherent ground game to start undermining Leftist groupthink there. Trump might be able to do it, but I think it will take more time - and ultimately more of a Ron Paul-like figure to appeal to them. Find a libertarian-talking, good-looking, 45-ish, Hollywood actor to run as a Republican and he could easily sweep the state - especially if he is Hispanic.
With respect, I’m not sure you’re not arguing against yourself.
You say “They can be reached and turned out if they come to believe government is an existential threat to their incomes and lifestyles.”
I really do not see how this can happen when the vote count of a dependent class relentlessly pumped by illegal immigration and illegal voting; while formerly middle-class folks fall into this group as their high-paying mgmt jobs disappear; will never come close to outweighing the mere handful of Zuckerbergs. I live in a very, very liberal and high income (SF Bay) area. And, I fully acknowledge that it is a bubble and that my thinking/observations are totally warped and biased thereby.
That said, these people are absolutely, relentlessly liberal, by tradition, by groupthink, by leftover images from the 60’s and 70s. They despised Reagan to a man/woman and ridiculed him without mercy and without end during his terms. That leftists have gone from thinking Che Guevara was a charming yet harmless paradigm for the struggles of the downtrodden (never mind the stacks of corpses) to thinking he really, really is the answer. They are very not smart in terms of being analytical. They are entirely emotional voters. Key point.
I find it interesting, we have rapidly rising “visitor” crime (including carjackings street robberies and driveway pistol whippings-—absolutely, completely unknown out here, talking NEVER before) from nearby places of shall we say “diversity” and it’s a big fat nothingburger to them. Mustn’t profile, now. That would be hateful. And in classic useful idiot fashion, the absolute last thing they imagine is that their $1.7 MM homes will be ransacked in two seconds if and when the scales turn.
I am quite in agreement with Ann Coulter’s demographic take on this immigration fueled spiral into infinite welfare and endless tax increases for schools, environmental activist setasides, and an orgy of administrative initiatives to stave off social unrest. In CA, this has not yet peaked to some point where “persuasion” will overcome peoples sense of survival. And no amount of white middle class conservatism will overcome the sheer demos of endless immigration. Might it reverse under Trump? Could. In a couple of generations, no sooner.
The existential threat to their lifestyles and incomes, out here, will be met by neverending demands for further entitlements to stave off social unrest and poverty these libs do not want to see for a long, long time before anyone gets the idea that a return to conservatism is the answer. A very long time.
In much simpler terms, I just think that libs NEVER stop thinking the more government is NOT the answer, eg; more government is ALWAYS the answer. Government is (except for this time!) produced by the “will/voice of the people”. Well, there you have it. Government is good. More government, then, is better. Individuals, see, are the cause of chaos, disorder, these are the guys who stick a gun up your nose. Gov’t has to control them. Not with recrimination nor imprisonment, of course. Their actions against lawful members of society can be explained in sociological terms. It wasn’t that a vicious violent scumbag shoved a gun in your face. It was that society displaced and oppressed him and he was forced to resort to drugs and to pay for them, he just had to go to where the money was. Eg; you.
When they see poverty, they want government to take care of it.
When failed government policies produce higher and more clandestine immigration and domestically, more desperation and thus more crime, it is not the fault of government. It is that we consume too much of the worlds resources, leaving none for the downtrodden. We have to share. Ergo, we are guilty of depriving the downtrodden. We deserve our fate. And we need a government program to encourage, and if that’s not enough, enforce that.
If and when the underclass and underprivileged arrive at a tipping point where their formerly safe neighborhoods become dangerous, then they will want government to step in and make it safe for them. It will never be the fault of the individuals committing these crimes against person and property; their guilt will cause them to generalize and insist that yet another gov’t program is the answer.
That is why I see no end to this.