Manufacturing labor's reasons for ire at the GOP SHOULD be obvious, but apparently aren't, so they should be stated.
Everyone hears how great the economy is, and it IS great...on the coasts, in the financial centers. But if you're in manufacturing, or in the services that cater to people in amufacturing. The economy sucks and is getting worse, because Republican-style "free trade" means the wholesale export of manufacturing jobs to Asia. There is no job that an American manufacturing worker does that a foreigner cannot do as well for half the price. And there are fewer and fewer crops, even , that can't be grown competitively elsewhere and shipped right into America.
That great recovery and low joblessness is a national average...financial services areas on the coasts have full employment. Manufacturing centers have massive job anxieties. And guess what? They all voted Democrat this time. Republican seats in places like Ohio and Indiana, and of course industry-heavy Pennsylvania, all flipped.
You even see it in the Northeast. There is ONE Republican Congressman left in New England. ONe. Chris Shays of Connecticut's 4th district, the Connecticut "Gold Coast" of financiers from the Greenwich hedge funds and Stamford corporate headquarters. THAT constituency is doing well. But right next door, in a district that is industrial/manufacturing Connecticut, the long-seated Republicans lost or are about to in the recount.
This also explains the black vote in Virginia and Ohio. Blacks are in the bottom half of the socio-economic ladder. Like EVERYBODY in the bottom half, they depend on Social Security and medicare for retirement. And as a group far more than others, they depend on the social safety net and public education.
Republican economic policies most threaten the security of blacks, and as a direct result, even when there are good black Republican candidates on the ticket, the blacks STILL break overwhelmingly for Democrats. And no, it's not because they're brainwashed idiots. They understan their economic sitatuion well, and the Republican policies address it least.
So, put together alienated Hispanics, blacks, and manufacturing workers, and hard economic drivers turn those areas with high concentrations of any of the three Democrat Tuesday night.
It's still the economy, stupid, but Republicans are in the upper, financial, half of it, doing well, and don't really see the effects on the manufacturing base that so-called "free trade" wreaks.
Well, they saw on Tuesday night. Or they COULD see...if they would look.
Will we? I kind of doubt it. The Republican CORE is a certain financial outlook on the world. It's ideological more than pragmatic. I don't think that Republicans are for the most part willing to admit that when the numbers say the economy is doing great, they're losing a whole swath of the country because, really, the economy ISN'T great in a lot of places, and the reason it's not great is the effect of Republican policies. Anxiety breeds blue votes.
If the trend holds, the Democrat wins the election. Let Indiana and Ohio - manufacturing bastions - go blue, and it's over for the GOP.
The biggest thing we Republicans need to do is to have an honest talk about economic policy, and change course on a few things.
is right on
You are completely wrong to suggest that free trade and/or Republican policies are to 'blame', when in fact the opposite is true:
- Republican policies helped create 6 million jobs in the current boom, with the Bush tax cuts
- free trade is increasing export opportunities, and our GDP growth has been the highest of OECD nations (compare with Japan and Europe).
- productivity is higher
- Manufacturing production is higher than ever.
All this negativity about the economy is disturbing example of the success of media bias and mindless economic populism; that has hammered home phony 'solutions' to economic 'problems' (such as 'our jobs are going overseas') that are massively hyped up.
America has benefitted from being able to export products; free trade helps us.