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The vanishing Republican
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If you voted for John McCain Tuesday, you may not be long for this world.
That is neither a prediction nor a curse and certainly not a wish. Indeed, may you all live long, healthy and happy lives.
It’s just straight-out demographics, and a punchy gimmick to illustrate how deep is the pit into which the Republican Party has fallen.
Oh, the party will and should survive. It is the political vehicle for people who need one.
But it’s in trouble, and the likelihood that McCain voters are closer to the end of their days is one reason. According to the exit polls, the people who voted for John McCain Tuesday were richer, whiter (meaning, in a political context, non-Hispanic whiter. Or white/ Anglo-er), more rural, more religious, and less educated.
Oh, and older.
There is nothing wrong with being any of those things. I am a few myself. It’s just that every year a smaller percentage of the electorate falls into any one of those categories, much less all of them.
Well, except for that last category—the one about older. More people get older every year. The trouble for the Republicans is that the folks who are now old—and they are the ones most likely to vote Republican—are (relatively) soon going to cease to be old. They will do so by becoming dead, thereby losing the right to vote.
Behind them, becoming old, are people who were somewhat less likely to vote Republican. Behind them, becoming middle-aged, are the ones who actually voted for Barack Obama. Yes, even the non-Hispanic whites under 30 voted for Obama.
And, as mentioned, non-Hispanic whites of all ages are a dwindling share of the whole. Who’s burgeoning? Latinos, mostly, who gave Obama 66 percent of their votes. That’s how he easily won Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico, and might have won Arizona had that not been McCain’s home state. All those states are now more Democratic than Republican.
But wait a minute. For Republicans, the news only gets worse. Not only is the country becoming less White Anglo, it’s becoming less rural, and perhaps even less religious.
Meaning, in political terms, less Christian, specifically less Protestant. Most Catholics voted Democratic Tuesday. Jews and Muslims mostly voted for Obama. So did that still small but growing minority—mostly Asian-American—raised in the Buddhist or Hindu traditions. So, in all likelihood (the exit polls don’t get into these areas) did those who were raised as Christians but now consider themselves New Age, neo-pagan or simply indifferent.
Every year, there are more of these folks, fewer of the stereotypical traditional American—the rural, white Protestant whose ancestors have been here for generations. Every year, the country gets more diverse, more metropolitan, more cosmopolitan, even a bit more secular. In the process, it gets less Republican.
Can the outlook get any bleaker for Republicans? Yes, but we don’t want to depress them (or elate Democrats) too much in one serving. This exercise dealt only with the demographics. In a few days, we’ll deal with the ideas. The Republicans have some. The voters seem not to like them.
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