Posted on 12/13/2009 10:15:20 PM PST by Steelfish
DECEMBER 13, 2009
Whole Foods Republicans The GOP needs to enlist voters who embrace a progressive lifestyle but not progressive politics.
MICHAEL J. PETRILLI
The Republican Party is resurgent—or so goes the conventional wisdom. With its gubernatorial victories in Virginia and New Jersey, an energized "tea party" base, and an administration overreaching on health care, climate change and spending, 2010 could shape up to be 1994 all over again.
Maybe. The political landscape sure looks greener than it did a year ago, when talk of a permanent Democratic majority was omnipresent. But before John Boehner starts measuring the drapes in the Speaker's office, or the party exults about its possibilities in 2012, it's worth noting that some of the key trends driving President Barack Obama's strong victory in 2008 haven't disappeared. Republicans need to address them head-on if they want to lead a majority party again.
There are the depressing numbers on young voters (two-thirds of whom voted for Mr. Obama), African-Americans and Latinos (95% and 67% went blue respectively). But these groups have voted Democratic for decades, and their strong turnout in 2008's historic election wasn't replicated this fall, nor is it likely to be replicated again.
The voting patterns of the college-educated is another story. This is a group that, slowly but surely, is growing larger every year. About 30% of Americans 25 and older have at least a bachelor's degree; in 1988 that number was only 20% and in 1968 it was 10%.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
AS a Conservative Republican, my first choice would not be
liberals or close to it.
The Gratuitous pics on the thread are usually seen on the Paulite threads.
There is a better way to deal with this type of writer.
There were dozens of threads a few months back on FR
high fiving the owner of Whole Foods for his stand against
ObamaCare.
Huh? I’m college-educated, not particularly socially conservative (militantly conservative on economic and defense issues), live in the city, and wear fashionable high-heeled boots. I also love guns, endorse the Tea Parties, support Sarah Palin (who is a genuine intellectual without being a snob, unlike Obama, who’s a snob and a phony intellectual), and never shop at Whole Foods. What’s the point of reaching out to these “Whole Foods Republicans” if they’re so liberal they won’t even vote for McCain?
Oh, and supporting crap-and-trade is not a sign of “genuine luuuuvvvvvvvv” for the environment. Crap-and-trade will do NOTHING to protect the environment. It will ruin our economy, though. If the self-proclaimed “progressives” think crap-and-trade should be the litmus test for being invited to cocktail parties and praised in the New York Slimes...
Then again, make it the litmus test. It’ll show us who the sellouts and traitors are.
You have common sense and live in reality.
You have been able to think for yourself.
You also have the PhDs beat.
Hang in there with your future plans.
You can win a special interest group only if you can persuade it that the cost of pulling the whole house down is not worth the bennies your opponent promises to get it by doing so.
Who said fire couldn’t melt steel? A liberal.
Who said smokestacks cause hurricanes? A liberal.
Who said there were 57 states? A liberal.
Who thinks 100% of climate change is caused by humans, despite the fact that the earth’s climate has been changing for billions of years, before humans were even around? Liberals.
Who thinks Obama will pay for their gas and mortgage? Liberals.
Who is always kissing the ass of militant Islam, the most reactionary ideology on earth? Liberals.
Who proclaims learning to be a “white man’s thing”? Liberals.
Who doesn’t know the basic facts about American history and the Constitution? Liberals.
Who often doesn’t even understand how evolution works, even if they claim to believe in it? Liberals.
Who thinks New Age kookery is a legitimate alternative to modern Western medicine? Liberals.
Who’s anti-intellectual? Liberals!
Maybe we need herbal tea parties too.
bookmark
My liberal sister-in-law likes to rub in my face the fact that she has a PhD and I only have a bachelor’s degree. I asked her who the second President of the United States was. She stammered for a bit and then said there were more important things to learn about than old dead slave-owning white guys.
I told her that John Adams was not a slave owner. Then I said, “What’s that on your face? Looks like egg.” Liberal witch PWN3D.
This is just more RINOizing hand wringing.
Whole Freedom Republicans the GOP needs to enlist voters who embrace freedom but not socialist defined materialist equality.
There , fixed it.
Some people have started similar or derivative projects and they often overlap or duplicate but a broad consensus is that we are going after the educated middle. We are not after the brie and chardonnay crowd. We need something to run against and they are it. We want the kid whose dad was a truck driver and insisted that he go to college. We want Main Street.
The author touches some of the same conclusions that he have come to but still much of what he says is entirely new to me. The “Whole Foods” approach is an odd one. We looked at education levels region by region, state by state, county by county and we are going after the bright, young, ambitious people who have the intellectual curiosity to seek post secondary education. We don’t care if it is a year at the community college or four years at an Ivy. We are going toe-to-toe with the liberal establishment.
I don’t see Governor Palin as anti-intellectual at all. She has a way to go on the learning curve but it is not a serious obstacle. She reflects the country at large.
The liberal juggernaut is about to meet reality. We are going to be there to put the pieces back together again.
There are Republicans in Boulder?
I lived there — all I met were Ph.D taxi cab drivers high on coke or trust fund kids who were pissing off their parents.
.
Heh, that’s pretty funny. Your sister-in-law sounds like the stereotypical elitist.
We occasionally shop at Whole Foods when we get to a metro. The greenism and sanctimony, often on display, is kind of sickening, but they offer some nice produce, cheese and specialty items. We’ve never voted for a ‘rat, we just like good food, and are willing to pay for it.
Who said President Roosevelt got on TV in 1929 to speak to America about the stock market crash? Liberals.
Who covered up Stalin's genocide in the Ukraine? Liberals. (They kept their Pulitzer at the New York Times, too.)
Who gave Obama the Nobel Peace Prize? Liberals.
Who tried to say Ft. Hood wasn't about terrorism? Liberals.
Who said "Every child a wanted child". And then attacked Trig Palin? Liberals.
Cheers!
You are correct, this is more of that “Big TENT” bs so cherished by the pollsters and the political consultants who hire them.
Give the people a clear choice between common sense conservative principles, the ones this country was founded on, and the latest “intellectual” crap about GHIA and see who wins.
We just need someone who believes those principles, is willing to defend them, and expresses them well. Whomever it is will be savaged by the media. They need to be able to withstand that with a smiling rebuttal, like Ann Coulter does, while declaring a bigger truth.
If it is someone the media do not savage then it is someone they like better than we do, like McCain.
He’s right that this is something to worry about. This isn’t just a one-off fluke but a long-term trend. I think the GOP is losing these voters on style points. Some of these things are silly but they matter. Some folks just don’t find down-home appeal very appealing, but a lot of them are the very same people that will pay through the nose for ObamaCare. If all it takes to make them feel at home in the GOP is a little arugula friendliness why not?
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