Facts about "Reagan Democrats" (user search)
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  Facts about "Reagan Democrats" (search mode)
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Author Topic: Facts about "Reagan Democrats"  (Read 3450 times)
Badger
badger
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« on: May 22, 2016, 04:11:01 PM »

Since this incredibly stupid term is rearing its ugly head again, some things need to be pointed out:

1-"Reagan Democrats" by and large were not blue collar union workers. For proof go look at the 1984 results in Western Pennsylvania or the West Virginia coalfield.
2-Most "Reagan Democrats" ceased to even be Democrats after that. They were mostly the white blue dog southerners.
3-Reagan was last in an election 32 years ago. The youngest people who voted for Reagan are going to be 50 years old. And these would be people who voted for him in his first election, not consistent Democratic voters prior to that.

Basically the actual Reagan Democrats are all either in retirement homes or dead today. They're not commuting to their stereotypical blue collar job listening to John Mellancamp and Bruce Springsteen along the way and there's no group of people or demographic today that could be accurately defined as even sharing the traits of "Reagan Democrats" who are an important swing demographic. The term is meaningless as applied to any 21st century election. You might as well talk about "LBJ Republicans". So no, Trump is not going to win any states on the strength of "Reagan Democrats", the few that remain might vote for him but they've been voting Republican for decades now already.

It's good posts like this, BRTD, that make your attention whore posts about scene bands, hipster Christianity, and suburbs all worth it. Smiley
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Badger
badger
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Posts: 40,404
United States


« Reply #1 on: May 22, 2016, 05:07:53 PM »

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Perhaps, just perhaps the source was not reliable and had zero relation to reality?

Or, for those of us who remember, Reagan was NOwhere near the popular 49 state sweep guy in 1982-3 due to the (then) worst recession since the Great Depression.
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Badger
badger
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Posts: 40,404
United States


« Reply #2 on: May 22, 2016, 06:10:23 PM »

the best i can tell the best equivilent to "Reagan Democrats" in this election are persuadables (i sometimes prefer that term to "swing voters") who strongly prefer Trump's protectionism to Hillary's generally free trade views. Voters like that are more likely to be blue collar and thus Dem leaning.

Maybe "Perot-Obama voters" is a slightly better (albeit still outdated) term?
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