On Saturday night I had dinner with some new friends in Clifton Heights, Pennsylvania. Clifton Heights is an overwhelmingly white working class community in the heart of Joe Sestak’s district (which is anchored in Delaware County). The place was plastered with Sestak signs. No Republican signs anywhere. No Specter signs. The neighborhood consists of rowhouses that were built for returning veterans of World War Two. Most of the people that live there today are the sons and daughters of those vets. They’re probably properly considered ‘Reagan Democrats’ but there is no sign of any affinity for Republicans today. I don’t know whether to thank George W. Bush or Sestak for that, but that is what I saw.
The Philly suburbs are a complex place. Clifton Heights is not typical. It’s a hybrid. It’s an urban setting in a suburban location. Prior to the war, the suburbs were mainly populated by the very wealthy. It was the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944 (aka the G.I. Bill) that changed things.
An important provision of the G.I. Bill was low interest, zero down payment home loans for servicemen. This enabled millions of American families to move out of urban apartments and into suburban homes. Prior to the war the suburbs tended to be the homes of the wealthy and upper class.
The G.I. Bill created Clifton Heights. And the veterans who moved there actually wanted to continue to live in rowhouses like the ones they had lived in growing up in Philadelphia. This wasn’t ‘White Flight.’ It was an opportunity for the American Dream. And that is what the community remains today. It’s a kind of limbo for people of average means who want better schools and an opportunity to improve their station in life. Some stay, some move up and out to tonier locations.
There’s no evidence that these people are interested in the Teabaggers or Club for Growth lunatic Pat Toomey. They have no use for Specter. You won’t find signs for any Republicans. But they’re not liberals, either. They’re just hard working folks who are trying to raise their kids and scrape by in a very rough economy. And that’s kind of my point in writing about them. Because it seems like the current political debate that is going on in this country is almost wholly irrelevant to them.
Sestak’s going to clean up in Clifton Heights, but it isn’t because of any policies he advocates. They know him, he’s a vet and they can identify with him, and that’s good enough. They’ll vote for a Republican if they don’t know or identify with the Democrat, but that’s not the case this time.
It’s a kind of humbling reminder that all we political activists can accomplish is to nibble around the edges. Most people never read, let alone are convinced by, our arguments. Sestak is going to do better among more conservative Democrats despite having more liberal positions on the issues and Specter will do well in the suburbs despite a deplorable record on issues most suburbanites care about. Just to make this clear, Specter is targeting rural areas because he’s bleeding support there. He wants those rural voters to know that he opposed the Assault Weapons Ban in the 1990’s. That’s not a message he’d want to send in the suburbs. But voters are confused.
The race is too close to call (.pdf), but it really is a choice between a Democrat and a Republican. And that’s the basis on which I made my decision.
I’d vote for Sestak.
I’m like my mother; I have zero tolerance for party switchers.
are you going to focus at some point on the Illinois Senate and Gubernatorial races?
Yes. More the senate than the guv.
I was driving through central western PA last week and it was plastered with Sestak signs. Never saw one for Specter. It reminded me of traveling through the same area years ago and seeing all the Rendell signs.
Your point that ‘all we political activists can accomplish is to nibble around the corners’ is a very important one. Half of the population never votes and only hears about politics from scraps half-heard here and there. Of the half that votes sometimes, the preponderance only start paying attention the day after Labor Day of election year. That leaves a tiny minority that pays attention every day. Many in that tiny minority are paid for their attention and have a particular axe to grind – a certain set of corporations or an issue group they support or oppose. So, those of us who do pay attention tend to amplify quotidian gaffes or little triumphs or polls way out of proportion to their real importance. Mostly we are talking to – or shouting at – each other in that little circle. Most of the time, the personal characteristics of incumbents especially are much more important to their constituents than their ideology or policy stances.
This is exactly the lay of the land in places like Middlesex County in NJ and exactly what happened when Gov. Christie won this historically Democratic County by 5,000 votes last fall.
If you talk to folks in places like Wooodbridge, South Amboy or the Bayshore communities (which covers both Middlesex and northern Monmouth Counties) you hear very quickly that neither party is really addressing people’s issues. Shrinking wages (that is if you still have a job), Shrinking home prices without a similar reduction in property taxes, and skyrocketing health insurance premiums (that is if you still have health insurance). For people out of work, the jobs are few and far between.
This is the environment that a progressive leader like Frank Pallone is entering as he gears up for reelection. The Republican primary offers a choice between a “Tea Party Endorsed” republican mayor and a Wall Street millionaire’s wife who owns and publishes a local paper. Interestingly enough the state and county republican establishment is backing the millionaire’s wife.
And yet the core issues of jobs and health insurance premiums are still not being addressed in a serious way by national democrats.
The White House definitely thinks Specter is going to lose. Thankfully, they don’t seem to care.
It’s too bad Obama chooses to take a stand against Sestak after his long spell of pussyfooting around Republicans. Now he’s about to damage himself for a worthless cause when Specter loses. I stubbornly cling to the belief that Obama is head-and-shoulders more politically astute than we’re used to among Dems, but anybody could have seen this was a losing and pointless battle.
As to Rendell, I understand he’s a pretty good governor, but it seems like every time he makes a political pronouncement I want to deliver a hard kick in the ass.
Sounds a lot like the IL suburb where I grew up early on. Although maybe Clifton Heights is not as driven by racist hate/fear? It sounds like the kind of place where people could be swayed strongly by populist appeals, whether of the nativist/teaparty kind or the progressive kind. Maybe Sestak has figured out how to make the latter work? If that proves the case, he could be the model for Dems — other than turncoat Dems — nationwide.