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August 31, 2004
Confused: Why Do They Vote GOP?

In yesterdays USA Today Michael Moore says The GOP doesn’t reflect America. He claims that most Republicans are not in line with their party on most issues, but their reason to vote for the GOP agenda is:

Money. That’s what it comes down to for the RINOs. They do work hard and have been squeezed even harder to make ends meet. They blame Democrats for wanting to take their money.

Is it really this easy?

Is this not more about fear of insecurity which lets people vote for the party they assume will make them more safe? If so, what part of the fear is real and what part is induced by propaganda?

“The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders … All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism.”
Herman Goering during the Nuernberg trials

Posted by b on August 31, 2004 at 11:35 UTC | Permalink
Comments

The whole scene in America is very strange today.
The Republican party has cobbled together a constituency based on wedge issues, with 70% of that constituency voting against their pocketbooks;preferring each time to vote their “Weggie”. This enables the <30% that control the party to advance their economic interests, on the back of the proles.
Throw in fear(not quite sure what everyone is afraid of). Add war as a CNN spectator sport(no chance of powder burns or messed up hair here).Season with LENI RIEFENSTAHL-style visual art.
There you've got the American Reich.

Posted by: Trotsky’s Ghost | Aug 31 2004 13:32 utc | 1

It’s not just money – it’s also racism –
and not just in the South. Suburbs grew as a result of “white flight”. White suburban votes ignore college costs going up, property tax increases, all of the other costs that have been passed onto them by the Repubs, as long as they are sure that the money going to “welfare mothers” is being cut. Yet, they are more than happy to pay for prisons. And yet, these same people go to Church and are “pillars” of their communities. On Election day, they might as well be wearing white hoods.

Posted by: fasteddie | Aug 31 2004 15:00 utc | 2

Looks like hate and anger play a rather large role in the equation. If it was simply fear, the empire would have never been advanced, citizens would not be nominating war criminals into office, and we wouldn’t be using war to end war. Probably a lot of ignorance too…

Posted by: b real | Aug 31 2004 15:09 utc | 3

…by ignorance, I was thinking along the lines of mindlessly relinquishing your own ideas and opinions to an authoritarian, and visibly financially successful, power structure. People in leadership positions retain a certain amount of ‘get out of jail free’ cards simply because of their position. This is evident every day in the way media relays official sourcing. And it was an excuse proffered by many a congress person when giving GWB the power to have the power to declare war. No doubt that an uninformed electorate also heavily relies on the “expertise” factor to form passable conclusions on matters at hand. That seems to be what the GOP is pushing right now, that the current leadership has the experience and experts needed to get the job done. If this wasn’t so crucial, they wouldn’t be engaged in so much in secrecy and manipulation.
Also, the GOP works to appeal via the values route, giving those who are disgusted by the free-market consumeristic excesses that surface in the form of bling bling capitalism an avenue to channel their disgust and hate. That’s another instance where ignorance plays a critical factor, b/c most of those problems are created by the very system that the GOP endorses. The South fought tooth & nail against the ideas of education and literacy for reasons which should be obvious today to those most in need of it. Brute force & ignorance. They are inseparable.

Posted by: b real | Aug 31 2004 17:40 utc | 4

Um, might we not be suffering a little smugness here?
Those who vote Republican are fearful, ignorant, misanthropic, authority-worshipping racists?
And those who vote Democrat are – what? Sunny, fearless, erudite, tolerant, and urbane?

Posted by: Pat | Aug 31 2004 19:18 utc | 5

Pat,
I think you’re right here. One way insults don’t really get people thinking.
But if you can get people to taste the truth in the name you call them, you can embarrass them into thinking enough to shift. And I mean this also as an answer to Bernhard’s question about propaganda’s role in getting people to believe lies: propaganda has much more money and organization behind it than any citizen can muster. But we can use the truth.
So let’s start calling the Republicans what they are – a party of deadbeat citizens. It describes perfectly the behavior: don’t tax papa’s income, food and education are wasted on kids like that anyhow; don’t clean up your neighborhood, move to the suburbs; and remember to beat the shit out of the first person who looks at you crossly, especially if they are your own kids or wife (citizens) because its important for people to fear you.
Share the vision for a moment: some Repug campaign ad comes on about the economy turning a corner, and everywhere there’s someone to say, “What a bunch of deadbeats. Sure, the check’s in the mail…” Dole lies in public that Kerry faked his medals, and people whisper, “What did they pay this deadbeat to betray a fellow veteran? Damn!”
Share the dream.

Posted by: Citizen | Aug 31 2004 21:16 utc | 6

Pretty much the same as the other side of the coin. They don’t need to tout the racist aspect these days in such a blatant fashion, prefering now to mask it as part of the humanitarian/white man’s burden. And they don’t try to ply the religious right/puritanical patrilineal values mumbo jumbo as rigidly. The dems have used fear at least as much as the repubs recently. I cannot even count the number of mail requests I’ve rcvd over the past couple of years trying to scare me into sending money b/c things were so bad, even though their candidate is spending over $200 million to get across a platform that is no different in the issues I see as being most critical (Iraq, Foreign Policy, Israel, Imperialism). In all fairness to the citations above, Bernhard’s query literally dealt w/ the republican vote, but Pat’s correct in that these traits are not endemic to one party alone. That being said, and all smugness aside, the reality that the representatives of a sizeable number of citizens are getting ready to nominate a war criminal to speak for me leaves them open to narrowly-focused criticism & evaluation at this moment in time. The dems got theirs earlier in the month.
[having problems posting — apologize if dupe posts]

Posted by: b real | Aug 31 2004 21:20 utc | 7

Pretty much the same as the other side of the coin. They don’t need to tout the racist aspect these days in such a blatant fashion, prefering now to mask it as part of the humanitarian/white man’s burden. And they don’t try to ply the religious right/puritanical patrilineal values mumbo jumbo as rigidly. The dems have used fear at least as much as the repubs recently. I cannot even count the number of mail requests I’ve rcvd over the past couple of years trying to scare me into sending money b/c things were so bad, even though their candidate is spending over $200 million to get across a platform that is no different in the issues I see as being most critical (Iraq, Foreign Policy, Israel, Imperialism). In all fairness to the citations above, Bernhard’s query literally dealt w/ the republican vote, but Pat’s correct in that these traits are not endemic to one party alone. That being said, and all smugness aside, the reality that the representatives of a sizeable number of citizens are getting ready to nominate a war criminal to speak for me leaves them open to narrowly-focused criticism & evaluation at this moment in time. The dems got theirs earlier in the month.
[having problems posting — apologize if dupe posts]

Posted by: b real | Aug 31 2004 21:22 utc | 8

addendum to last post: And a strong case can be made that the dems will gain plenty of automatic votes, strictly b/c of who they are not, from a fervent bush-hating populace.

Posted by: b real | Aug 31 2004 21:49 utc | 9

Pat,
I think you’re right here. One way insults don’t really get people thinking.
But if you can get people to taste the truth in the name you call them, you can embarrass them into thinking enough to shift. And I mean this also as an answer to Bernhard’s question about propaganda’s role in getting people to believe lies: propaganda has much more money and organization behind it than any citizen can muster. But we can use the truth.
So let’s start calling the Republicans what they are – a party of deadbeat citizens. It describes perfectly the behavior: don’t tax papa’s income, food and education are wasted on kids like that anyhow; don’t clean up your neighborhood, move to the suburbs; and remember to beat the shit out of the first person who looks at you crossly, especially if they are your own kids or wife (citizens) because its important for people to fear you.
Share the vision for a moment: some Repug campaign ad comes on about the economy turning a corner, and everywhere there’s someone to say, “What a bunch of deadbeats. Sure, the check’s in the mail…” Dole lies in public that Kerry faked his medals, and people whisper, “What did they pay this deadbeat to betray a fellow veteran? Damn!”
Share the dream.

Posted by: Citizen | Aug 31 2004 22:34 utc | 10

At http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/, Ezra Klein types the “thought that must not be spoken” – that Bush really does represent the American people. Or – that the Republicans are masters at rigging the signals relied upon by people who put only a little time into deciding who to vote for. Probably it’s some of both. I haven’t read the book “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” yet, but probably what it talks about is relevant here.

Posted by: Mistah Charley | Sep 1 2004 0:13 utc | 11

Mistah C,
Thomas Frank, the author of
“Whats the Matter with Kansas” laid out his thesis pretty succinctly in Harpers recently and I’ve heard him talk about it extensively on some Left Coast radical radio…
What’s missing from the discussion above that Frank thinks is vital is the concept of the Repubs co-optation of religion as an integral component of winning the ‘culture’ wars….

Posted by: RossK | Sep 1 2004 5:09 utc | 12

@RossK
We’re witnessing a another Great (Religious) Awakening – close on the heels of the late-nineteenth-century, early-twentieth-century Awakening. Militant Protestantism is always bad news for the nation.

Posted by: Pat | Sep 1 2004 5:26 utc | 13

Pat, would be really interested to hear if you think this is a phenomenom that crosses party lines, or, if it is an important factor amongst the most moderate of Republicans (ie. moving towards swing voter territory)?

Posted by: RossK | Sep 1 2004 6:13 utc | 14

Surveillance Camera Players perform Wilhelm Reich’s “The Mass Psychology of Fascism”

Posted by: b real | Sep 2 2004 16:02 utc | 15

VERY cool, b real. Thanks for the link! 😉

Posted by: Kate_Storm | Sep 2 2004 18:16 utc | 16

The working class has aways been socially conservative. Society, however, has gotten more socially liberal. There is alienation and fear created by this which the right has successfully exploited.
Meanwhile, in many of the areas where the right has risen, the inequality of wealth and unavailability of healthcare has increased. Some the states where the religious right has sway has the lowest numbers of college graduates and rank lowest in funding for public education.
Its is a bitter irony that some of the people who supported Bush the most, have benefitted from him the least!

Posted by: George | May 10 2005 23:03 utc | 17

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