That blue-wave so many on the left expect to come crashing down on Republicans in November may never reach shore. On a recent trip home to attend a wedding in Ohio, The American Conservative’s Peter Van Buren writes:
That slack-jawed yokel look on my face is because I just came back from a wedding and some visits in flyover country, which turned the last few days into a highly unscientific survey of old friends and new relatives. I crossed three states during my travels and talked to dozens of people about politics. It was easy, as the media had already slugged my pickup line into the same category as weather, local sports, and whether the buffet chicken was any good: “whattya think, is Trump’s craziness gonna lead to big gains for the Democrats in the November midterms?”
I grew up in Ohio, and have written about the flyover voter ahead of the last election and in a book. Now once again these voters matter. As a bug-eyed Doc Brown preaching from his stool at the open bar would put it, 2020—and the future itself, Marty—depends on 2018! If Democrats flip the House by taking 23 seats away from Republican incumbents, they can block appointments, investigate everything in a Benghazi-like loop, and even impeach Trump, paving the way for Elizabeth Warren’s victory dance.
But for that blue wave to reach shore, a bunch of Republicans need to vote Democrat and the New Democratic Base, young people and a list of minorities longer than a CVS receipt, must vote in numbers never before seen. The second part of that plan has its own questions. But my recent travels make it pretty clear that depending on Republicans to vote Democrat because they no longer support Trump is out to sea.
I met plenty of people as ideologically committed, albeit 180 degrees to the Right, as their East Coast vegan socialist cousins. But most of those I spoke to could be better described as light purple voters. More than a handful enthusiastically voted for their first ever Democrat in 2008, then backed away from Obama in 2012, before returning to the Republicans, albeit Trump, in 2016. The idea today is that Trump’s boorishness will send them back to Democratic candidates.
Read more here.
Originally posted September 19, 2018.
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