And for at least the last forty years, the two parties have broken down distinctly along this double axis. The Republican party has been the party of cultural populism and economic elitism, and the Democrats have been the party of cultural elitism and economic populism. Republicans tend to identify with the traditional values, unabashedly patriotic, anti-cosmopolitan, non-nuanced Joe Sixpack, even as they pursue an economic policy that aims at elite investor-driven growth. Democrats identify with the mistreated, underpaid, overworked, crushed-by-the-corporation “people against the powerful,” but tend to look down on those people’s religion, education, and way of life.
It's more accurate to say that Republican leaders use the rhetoric of cultural populism but are often uncomfortable with it in practice, while Democrats use the rhetoric of economic populism but don't live it themselves.
NPR and PBS, which reflect the Democrat worldview almost perfectly, are good examples. Their talk is all of helping the poor and oppressed, but their actual programming is transparently aimed at attracting the top 10%.
I especially appreciated the author's observation that an attitude of cultural populism is not enough by itself. It must be backed up with a coherent philosophy of the goals of society and the government. Reagan had such a philosophy, which is why I think the media's desperate efforts to portray him as stupid generally bounced off in the public's perception. While I'm a big fan of Sarah, if she has such a philosophy she did a poor job of communicating it.