Threading The Needle

Matthew Yglesias made a facile version of this argument on Twitter, but he unpacks it here with some interesting data.

Basically, there is an overwhelming bias in the Senate and the Electoral College in favor of small, rural, white states and working class white voters.  He runs through the data on this, so if you're interested, go read the link.  The conclusion he reaches though is worth looking at.

If we live in a country with a system that disproportionately over-represents WWC (white working class/whites without college) voters, how do we change that system to properly represent the ideal of "one person, one vote."  There are some suggestions like DC and Puerto Rico statehood that are reasonably "easy" compared to amending the Constitution.  In order to get even those "easy" solutions, you need a Democratic Senate majority. 

Senate Democrats currently have 47 seats.  They need to win a net of three and the presidency to change that.  Susan Collins and Cory Gardner are the most vulnerable Republicans, and Doug Jones is the most vulnerable Democrat.  Joni Ernst, Tom Tillis, Martha McSally and possibly Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell are potentially vulnerable.  A second Blue Wave MIGHT deliver the Senate, but the point of the argument is that the Senate's natural gerrymander protects Republicans where they otherwise wouldn't be protected.

Yglesias makes a further political argument that deserves more attention.

He harkens back to the 2006-08 political cycle, and how Democrats largely avoided talking about same sex marriage.  Obama would later "evolve" on the issue, but he pointedly did not run on marriage equality for one simple reason: it was a losing issue.

The race for the nomination has seen a leftward sprint from many of the candidates.  On some issues, there is real potential to poach WWC voters: health care, minimum wage, infrastructure, the Billionaire Tax, maybe even some green energy tied to jobs.  But obsessing about pronouns or calling for open borders or eliminating private health insurance is a terrible, terrible political strategy. 

As Martin Longman has argued, Democrats don't need to win WWC voters.  They win all the other demographics, in some cases by large margins.  What they can't afford to do is lose WWC voters by huge margins.  You can win Philly, Pittsburgh and their suburbs, but you can't get wiped out in the rural and exurban areas.  You can and will lose them, but if you're losing by 75% or 65% matters.  Getting to losing by 65% is the goal.  In order to do that, you maybe should soft-pedal some of the more "woke" positions on social issues.  Julian Castro's open border or Beto O'Rourke's "we're coming for your guns" are simply bad politics.  Whether they are good policies or not is irrelevant if you can't implement them.

This is why I do think Biden might actually be the most "electable."  He's an old white guy who has huge support from African Americans.  He might have mentioned that he's from Scranton once or twice.  He would be a mediocre president most likely, but there is a reason why he beats Trump pretty easily.  The concerns about whether he can keep it together during the long campaign is legitimate, but demographically and in terms of what he's talking about?  He might just be the safest bet.