George Rebane
The Left in recent years has intensified the narrative that the Right has shrunk in numbers while becoming more extreme in its ideology. The Left sees its own collectivist approaches to organizing society as having become the ideological lingua franca of most Americans. As evidence of this, the growth of the country’s self-declared independents is cited. And the conclusion from this line of thinking is that main street America is much more homogeneous in its liberal outlook today than are their representatives in Washington – in short, Washington is polarized while America in the aggregate is not.
William A. Galston, senior fellow at the left-leaning Brookings Institute, begs to differ with this view which he expounds in ‘Americans Are as Polarized as Washington’. There he cites recent research by Alan Abromowitz (Emory University political scientist) and the Gallup polling organization that party loyalty has intensified greatly in the last 40 years. Putting a finer point on it, Drs Galston and Abromowitz agree that during this polarization on the role of government the Right has moved a bit more to the right than has the Left to the left, this according to self-declarations on the seven point scale used by the American National Election Studies (here and here). However, the picture is more complicated because on social and cultural issues the Left has moved more to the left, than has the Right to the right. In any case, the split between the two sides has widened markedly since 1972 when Great Society programs had kicked in and Vietnam protests were a constant in the public square.
Since 2000 the share of Democrats who call themselves liberal (today 43%) has risen more than the share of Republicans who call themselves conservatives (today 70%). But overall, the Republicans can be seen as the conservative party, and the Democrats as the party of liberals and moderates (today 36%). In his analysis I was disappointed to note that Galston took no account of the federal and states governments’ marked shift to the left during these decades, and especially during the 2000-2012 interval. The concomitant increases in taxes, fees, regulations, and overreach in general does explain away the shift to the right by people who were paying attention. From that aspect, their digging in their heels to maintain liberties, enterprise, fiscal prudence, and free markets is understandable.
Another corroborative perspective comes from ANES. According to them, independents or middle-roaders comprise about 22% of the electorate, but they divide reliably into Democrat and Republican voters no matter how ‘middle’ these people seek to be. 22% of Democrat voters call themselves Independents, as do 16% of Republican voters. In education, of the liberal categories 32% had a college degree or higher, and 23% had some college. While the conservative categories yielded 43% and 32% in the same categories respectively.
Over the 1972-2008 period the percentage of self-identified liberals (ANES categories 1,2,3) have remained fairly constant, rising from about 19% to 21%, while the self-identified conservatives (categories 5,6,7) have grown significantly from about 26% to 33%. Again, this seems to be in response to the growth and overreach of government during this interval, which from the cited education data seems to have made a bigger impact on a greater number of voters with more schooling.
In sum, yes we are more polarized than ever across the country, and we have sent representatives to Washington and the state capitals who represent our more extreme views. The Left attempting to characterize this as an ideological aberration of the Right drifting away from the claimed historical middle does not hold water. Nevertheless, all of these numbers are very complex and hard to digest for the growing hordes of the undereducated and systemically unemployed. This says to many of us that there will be no rapprochement in the foreseeable future, if ever. The Left is quite sanguine about these developments knowing that their simple message of the rich screwing the poor with big government being the champion of the little guy will continue to resonate as long as the wealth transfer programs keep the checks coming in the mail.
On a more global scale, socialist Europe’s recent elections continue grinding the luster off the continent’s leftwing parties. Stratfor in ‘Europe’s Deep Right-Wing Logic’ reports –
It is undeniable that the right wing is ascendant in Europe. While leftist parties did well here and there in recent elections to the European Parliament, the story over recent years has been mainly about the right, symbolized most dramatically by the soaring popularity of Marine Le Pen’s National Front in France. But also in Denmark, Austria, Finland, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Serbia, the one commonality is the dynamism of nationalist-style political movements.
Meanwhile, our progressive neighbors continue to tell all who will listen that we as a nation are turning more purple (presumably congregating toward the muddled middle), and local polarization is a Paleolithic aberration maintained by our older, mean spirited, and feeble minded residents. Well, not quite.
rebanesruminations.com 
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