February 25, 2016--Jose the Fanatic

Of the many startling things about Donald TRUMP's decisive victory in Wednesday's Nevada caucuses, beyond the fact that there was an historic turnout and he garnered more votes that Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio combined, was the fact that he also won easily among Latinos.

So much of both parties' campaigns is challenging conventional wisdom--that to win one needs a powerful, big-data-directed ground game (TRUMP has won three of four primaries and caucuses with hardly any ground game at all); that it's all about who can raise the most money (Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz did and look what happened to them--TRUMP raised hardly any, spent even less, and look who's leading); that Americans won't vote for a socialist (Bernie Sanders take note); and Latino voters overwhelmingly vote for Latino candidates (ask Rubio and Cruz about that) the same way blacks tend to vote for blacks, Jews for Jews, and so on.

In Nevada, TRUMP ran away with 45 percent of the Hispanic vote. Note, in 2000, George W. Bush was elected largely as the result of appealing successfully to Latino voters--he got an historic 40 percent nationally.

So TRUMP, who pretty much everyone having access to a microphone said would be lucky to get 10 percent of the Hispanic-American vote considering how he castigated illegal immigrants (mainly, to him, Mexicans) defaming them by labeling them "murderers" and "rapists" and promising that he would deport 12 million, that Donald TRUMP thus far, especially with the Latino-rich voters of Nevada, has run the table. How it might translate to the general election is for the moment another matter.

But his "appeal" to Hispanic voters is worth some thought. Why would any vote for him?

For insight I am reminded of one of my favorite Philip Roth stories--"Eli the Fanatic."

It is also one of his most overlooked, perhaps because of the direct way in which it deals with and excoriates secularized, seemingly-assimilated Jews.

Set in suburban America, it concerns a non-observant Jew, lawyer Eli Peck, who is hired by his Jewish neighbors to convince a recently-arirved group of orthodox Jews to close the yeshiva they established in their midst. The other Jews in town are embarrassed by the visible presence of these Hasids, fearing they will call attention to them and thereby interfere with their desire to blend in among the largely gentile residents of Woodenton.

To make a short story short, Eli fails in his attempts to get the ultra-orthodox to back off, including abandoning their traditional ways of dressing, and, after an epiphany of his own, gives up his normal wardrobe and appears before his stunned and outraged Jewish neighbors in Hasid garb, thereby exposing the ethnic roots of all of them.

Could it be that TRUMP's appeal to a large and growing percentage of Latino voters is because increasing numbers counter-intuitively support his views about illegal immigrants--that many favor building the wall and deporting those here without proper documents?

As in Roth's Woodenton, those Hispanics in the United States for decades and for others in the Southwest for many centuries, from even before Europeans landed at Plymouth Rock, for Latino citizens, for Hispanics who are comfortably "Americanized," having so many other Hispanics here illegally threatens their sense of relatively unobtrusive assimilation.

For Roth's secularized, well-educated, and affluent Jews, having Hasids in their midst, they feared, exposed them to their Christian neighbors who would not distinguish between them and the ultra-orthodox. Seeing them both in the same light and thus out of step with American culture, still rooted in Eastern European beliefs and superstitions, and wanting to live and cling together in self-imposed ghettos.

Perhaps the United States' most successful and assimilated Latinos, who are not self-hating, have some of the same kinds of feelings and support TRUMP as one way of declaring loyalty to the great American immigrant narrative, not wanting their place in society to be confused and conflated with those who came here illegally and live insufficiently in the shadows.

Philip Roth

May 20, 2014--Veeps

Though the 2016 election is more than two years away, it is roaring ahead.

One would think that much needs to happen between now and then to fill out the field of candidates and for the campaign itself to unfold.

That's what one would think, especially since the incumbent president is constitutionally not permitted to run for reelection. Thus, four candidates need to be selected, presidential and vice presidential candidates for both parties. That usually involves endless machinations.

But this time around I can save potential candidates and you a lot of effort and expense by filling out with assurance at least three of the four slots.

Unfortunately, we will miss a vibrant Democratic party primary season since Hillary Clinton only needs to formally announce her intention to seek the presidency for the nomination to be summarily given to her.

There will thus be no "likable enough" moments nor Joe Biden ramblings. The only uncertainty will be who will be her running mate.

I can end that speculation right now--Hillary Clinton's vice presidential partner will be the mayor of San Antonio, Julian Castro or his identical twin, Congressman Joaquin Castro. Or, since no one can tell them apart, it could be both of them.

Democrats are fantasizing that red-state Texas has the potential to be flipped to become a blue state, virtually assuring Hillary's election to the presidency. So to have a Latino Texan as her running mate is  irresistible and inevitable. This is largely why President Obama is about to appoint him Housing Secretary. To beef up Castro's resumé

So that's two down, two nominations to go.

On the GOP side, though the presidential nominee will be either Rand Paul or, sorry, Mitt Romney,  we know that with cynical pandering equivalent to the Democrats', they too will choose an Hispanic VP candidate. In their case it will be Marco Rubio of purple-state Florida. If Republicans can win the stand-your-ground state (and appeal to maybe 35-40 percent of Latinos nationwide), they at least have a shot at defeating Hillary. But don't hold your breath.

Don't hold your breath because Marco, though Hispanic, is Cuban-American and being Cuban-American is not the same as being Mexican-America as is/are the Castros. In other words, all Latinos are not alike any more than all Asians.

But for those of us seeking entertainment from a out-of-control political contest, all is not lost.

If Herman Cain, Rick Perry, Donald Trump, and Chris Christie decide to seek the nomination, the GOP clown car will not be riderless nor humorless. And then, of course, there is the ongoing hope that Michele Bachmann will show up, dancing up a storm with her gay-curing husband.

March 11, 2014--White Men

Democrats finally are paying attention to the fact that in the 2012 election Barack Obama received just 35 percent of the white male vote, down from 41 percent four years earlier.

He won the election because he received more than half of women's votes (55 percent), 93 percent of the African-American vote,  71 percent of the Hispanic vote, 75 percent of the Asian vote, and 60 percent of voters between 18 and 29. That was his winning coalition.

But in the meantime, though Democrats kept the White House, largely because the overwhelming percentage of white male votes went to Republicans, the GOP maintained its majority in the House of Representatives and are threatening to wrest control of the Senate later this year.

This should not be new news. No Democrat running for president has received a majority of white men's votes since 1964 when Lyndon Johnson trounced Barry Goldwater, carrying 44 states.

What's the problem?

These men voted for Democrats for decades--from at least Franklin Roosevelt's time to LBJ's. But then they began to drift toward the right. Most notably, Ronald Reagan was elected not just because Jimmy Carter and four years later Walter Mondale were weak candidates but because he figured out how to appeal to what came to be known as Reagan Democrats--disaffiliated white men.

Many of these white men felt abandoned by the Democrats because the party began to be perceived as too devoted to civil and women's rights. These men who felt they had worked hard to achieve middle-class status were appalled by their perception that New Deal and subsequent Great Society programs, including affirmative action, were unfair to working people. And, of course, there was a healthy dose of racism and misogyny in the mix.

On the other side of the political spectrum, liberals and progressives began to caricature these men with equal passion and overstatement. If liberals were not tree-hugging N___ -lovers, conservative white males were not all redneck, trailer-trash six-pack guzzlers. In fact, characterizing these Reagan Democrats as such only drove more of them further right as they felt mocked and ignored.

Fellow progressives, let's be honest--we do tend to show not-so-thinly-veiled contempt for these white men. We do not want to engage as equals the less-educated and the unwashed. In our hearts we know too many of us feel this way and those who we largely mischaracterize are not unaware of what we think about them. From this kind of contempt, one cannot expect to widen one's political coalition.

The Democrats' plan seems to be to let demographic changes solve their problem. Hispanics are among the fastest growing segment of the population and as soon as there are enough of them in, say, Texas, just carrying Texas, New York, and California will give Democrat presidential candidates a leg up on an Electoral College majority.

But--and this is a big but--just as we might expect to see a series of Democrats elected to the presidency, we will simultaneously see increasing Republican majorities in Congress.

Waiting for demographics to overwhelm white men, then, will not get the job done. So what to do?

First, acknowledge that the 35 percent of white men's votes Obama received in 2012 (as unpopular as he was and as African-Ameircan as he is) is not insignificant. Nor was the 41 percent in 2008. The challenge for Democrats, then, is how to at least retain that 35 percent and inch back to Obama's 2008 41 percent.

To begin to do this we have to stop making fun of, showing contempt for these frustrated and unhappy men. In addition, we should try to figure out why they feel so disaffiliated. Polls tell us that they think the Democrats are the Mommy Party, more concerned about giving everyone food stamps and welfare than standing up to the unions, communists, and terrorists.

We shouldn't go along with the call to keep the "military option" on the table when confronting Russia in Ukraine; but we should listen respectfully to that argument and not mock it.

When they chastise liberals for pandering to gays, we should calmly state why gays should be given the same rights as the rest of us, and not make fun of their alleged homophobia. We should back off from accusing them of "waging war on women" (war is not the most appropriate or fairest metaphor) and talk with them about their hopes for their daughters.

And in the policy realm, Democrats should look to embrace approaches that would address the concerns and needs of these men. There should be tax breaks as much for them as for the wealthiest. We should make it easier and less costly for their children and grandchildren to go to college. We should improve veterans benefits and emphasize health care that focuses on men's issues, not just reproductive issues.

Above all, we should emphasize approaches to helping low-income people become self-supporting. We should agree with these men that it is not a good thing for people to need government assistance. It should be the last resort. A guaranteed annual income, for example, which many conservatives support, would obviate the need for most of our current safety net programs and offer dignity to those unable to fully support themselves.

For the progressive in me, to come up with a list of viable policy suggestions is not easy. Better minds than mine should be able to come up with an agenda, which isn't pandering, that could increase Democrats' appeal to these alienated white men. Fairness requires this as does smart politics.