For decades, liberals have been scratching their heads, wondering how to win back the support of the white working class, who used to be the backbone of the Democratic Party that won five straight presidential elections between 1932 and 1948. Since then, these voters have been drifting steadily rightward, even voting against their own economic interests to elect Republicans who pass laws that favor “job creators” — aka rich people.
But now something has happened that actually might reverse this trend, and we have the rich people themselves to thank for it. I’m talking about the college admissions bribery scandal, of course.
It’s a truism of American politics that people don’t pay much attention between elections. And with so much sound and fury coming out of Washington lately, a lot of Americans are literally tuning out to preserve their own mental health. They pass off all the bad news from Washington as “just politics” and don’t feel it really affects them. But everybody — or almost everybody — has kids. And they want them to go to the best college possible, not least because they see that education as a ticket to a better life. It’s called the American Dream.
So when they hear that some millionaire’s kid got into a top school when their own child got rejected and that it was due to bribery and cheating, they’re going to take it very personally indeed. All of a sudden, rich people don’t look like “job creators” anymore; they look like ripoff artists. And this issue isn’t going to go away because on April 1 the colleges’ acceptance and rejection letters will start arriving in high school seniors’ mailboxes, and everyone will be reminded — and outraged — all over again.
And that’s great news for the Democrats in 2020, especially the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wing. She’d be the ideal candidate to carry this message, except for one detail: She’s too young. The Constitution says you have to be at least 35 to be president, and she won’t hit that mark until 2025. But with or without her, the Democrats’ winning strategy could be to counter Trump’s right-wing populism with some left-wing populism of their own.
Last time, they chose a woman and lost. So who should they should nominate this time? Two women — one for president and one for veep. I know this goes against conventional strategy in which the goal is a balanced ticket — pairing a liberal with a conservative, black with white, a man with a woman, etc. But not always.
In 1992 the Democrats doubled down and nominated two clones, Clinton and Gore, both moderately liberal, moderately young white Southern boys. They were trying to make it a generational election, and they succeeded in painting George H.W. Bush as an out-of-touch old guy who got flummoxed by supermarket bar codes.
This election is going to be a base election. Everybody has already made up their minds about Trump. They either love him or hate him; there’s no one left in the middle. So whoever is most effective at motivating their base will win. And nominating two women would send a powerful message to the Democrats’ base — women, minorities and millennials: This time, we’re not kidding. What do you think?
Reach Martin Snapp at catman442@comcast.net.
