Swing Bloc

An interesting story that once again disappears into the never-ending stream of piss that flows from the Trump Administration is the saga of the House Chaplain.  Paul Ryan fired him, then unfired him.  Within the context of this story is the idea that Fr. Conroy was fired for being Catholic. Ryan is, presumably, Catholic, as are quite a few House members. 

Then, of course, there is the Pope.  Francis is not a man likely to be sympathetic to Trump and Trumpism.  He has been an advocate for the poor and marginalized his whole life and has carried that into his papacy.  He has tried, in effect, to reshape the Catholic church as an institution less concerned with reproductive issues and more concerned with poverty and injustice.  I wish him well with that effort.

If he succeeds, even a little bit, in changing that focus of the Church, then it could have dramatic implications for American political blocs.  The so-called Reagan Democrats who swung away from the Democratic Party did so largely because of the abortion issue.  These while working class voters, especially those without college degrees, became a bulwark of Republican victories in places like Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin. 

The GOP has increasingly become a party of white, evangelical Protestants.  Tied deeply to that movement is a strong anti-Catholic component, going back to anti-immigrant, anti-Irish nativists in the mid-19th century.  It continued through opposition to the New Immigrants and into the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s.  The new KKK was staunchly Protestant, staunchly anti-immigrant.

And, of course, Hispanics are overwhelmingly Catholic.  If Evangelicals and Catholics rupture over obligations for the poor, it would decisively swing the Rust Belt back to the Democrats  and cement Hispanics even closer to the Democratic Party.  It should be a goal of Democratic strategists to make this happen.