Industrial vs. Rural economics

The Duke has enjoyed exploring TPMCafe, which blends several thoughtful bloggers with a lot of public comments pages. Below are excerpts from a good post by Ed Kilgore of NewDonkey responding to a Mark Schmitt post, and The Duke's comments.

[Mark Schmitt said] "Again and again, we have traded, voluntarily or involuntarily, the security of the 1950s middle class for greater opportunity, but also greater risk." This axiom captures a major source of the communications breakdown that has long affected discussions between Democrats from different regions and different social backgrounds. It took me a while to figure this out, but after wondering for years about the strong resistance of many traditional Democrats from the midwest and northeast to economic change, I finally began to understand that the 1950s and 1960s represented for them a sort of social democratic "golden age." Precisely because the South only marginally enjoyed the fruits of the industrial age, southerners, and particularly rural southerners, have a peculiar openness to post-industrial economic opportunities and policies. ...

I make this point for two reasons: (1) I think it's important to understand why the politics of social-democratic nostalgia doesn't work very well in less-industrial parts of the country; and (2) we all need to get over the stereotype that "information-age" economic strategies, including a focus on technology, training, and quality of life, are just a latte-class relic of the 90s tech boom that we should now acknowledge as a partial betrayal of the economic interests of working Americans.

Ed makes a good point that the economic benefits championed by Democrats don't resonate well in non-industrial areas (in not just the South, but in small towns in the midwest and most of the West). The critics of this post are missing the point -- it's not that these economic policies won't benefit the South, but that Democrats frequently fail to communicate economic policies in a way that resonates with folks who have not experienced the benefits the way the industrial working class has.

Ed's saying that the politics don't work well, he's not disagreeing with the objectives of good jobs, health care, and a secure retirement.

I would take the point a step further. Many Democrats' failure to articulate an economic message that resonates in these communities makes it that much more difficult to gain the trust of voters on social issues. Clinton succeeded because people felt like he was "one of us", and we gave him the benefit of the doubt on social issues because he was watching out for our pocketbook.

Ed's second point about information technology is right on target. Mark Warner and other successful southern Democrats have found a way to use government to promote the interests of the working class that resonates in less industrialized areas. It's not "anti-government", as some critics here would have you believe, it's more effectively targeting government to the needs of the people.