Depends what you mean by “mainstream”. The Democrats are “mainstream” in that the institutions that tend to define mainstream, e.g., most newspaper, the universities, Hollywood, etc., are heavily Democratic.
On the other hand polls consistently show more people willing to define themselves as “conservative” than “liberal”.
On the other hand, polls that ask about, say, health-care reform without mentioning partisan affiliation tend to show that most American citizens support fairly social-democratic positions on many issues.
In other words, partisan self-identification has detached itself from actual policy preferences.
On the other hand, polls that ask about, say, health-care reform without mentioning partisan affiliation tend to show that most American citizens support fairly social-democratic positions on many issues.
In other words, partisan self-identification has detached itself from actual policy preferences.
I’d caution that this can be a misleading data point. Polls on universal coverage requirements or single-payer score higher than actual implementations of universal coverage or single-payer or the advocates of either position, but actual implementations or advocates are actually and meaningfully different. They’re attached to things like insurance purchase mandates (which poll terribly) or drastically change the insurance market and almost all policies on it now (which poll even worse).
Other polls can be misleading because people will voice, but not vote, on a topic. The political polls on a number of matters related to gun control overwhelmingly support certain ideas(1). But the majority of the populace doesn’t care about—and in many cases, doesn’t even understand—what they’re aiming to require or prohibit. It won’t actually drive votes for any specific politician, and excepting where the topic can be covered by a clear ballot initiative at a time where voter turnout, won’t even drive votes for a specific regulation.
(1) the exact number is usually overstated due to polling methodology, but exists.
Could you separate the difference between polling and voting on specific issues from the difference between polling on specific issues and turning out for party politicians? It sounds like there probably is a real difference, but it may be smaller than you’re saying after we account for the dysfunction of the current American electoral system in specific.
Could you separate the difference between polling and voting on specific issues from the difference between polling on specific issues and turning out for party politicians?
I’m not sure it’s possible to do so entirely, if only because the party a politician joins can itself be information about the sort of matters they’ll be able to put forward. You can almost always find better proxies than the first reported by media sources, though. Simple averaging together the various individual components of health care reform is a really stupid and obviously inaccurate tool—people don’t value individual components equally—but it shows a far more interesting picture of the full system.
If you start with an assumption of massive electoral dysfunction, that can explain a pretty large number of things—but it seems to have explanatory power, rather than predictive power.
Allow me to correct myself in a way that renders us both correct, in-context:
The American populace generally seems to be further to the left on economic issues but further to the right on cultural/social issues than the government they elect. The simplest explanation has already been given: a unitary government over extremely heterogeneous regions.
The American populace generally seems to be further to the left on economic issues but further to the right on cultural/social issues than the government they elect.
The phenomenon I describe isn’t limited to social issues, most notably it applies to tax rates.
Depends what you mean by “mainstream”. The Democrats are “mainstream” in that the institutions that tend to define mainstream, e.g., most newspaper, the universities, Hollywood, etc., are heavily Democratic.
On the other hand polls consistently show more people willing to define themselves as “conservative” than “liberal”.
On the other hand, polls that ask about, say, health-care reform without mentioning partisan affiliation tend to show that most American citizens support fairly social-democratic positions on many issues.
In other words, partisan self-identification has detached itself from actual policy preferences.
I’d caution that this can be a misleading data point. Polls on universal coverage requirements or single-payer score higher than actual implementations of universal coverage or single-payer or the advocates of either position, but actual implementations or advocates are actually and meaningfully different. They’re attached to things like insurance purchase mandates (which poll terribly) or drastically change the insurance market and almost all policies on it now (which poll even worse).
Other polls can be misleading because people will voice, but not vote, on a topic. The political polls on a number of matters related to gun control overwhelmingly support certain ideas(1). But the majority of the populace doesn’t care about—and in many cases, doesn’t even understand—what they’re aiming to require or prohibit. It won’t actually drive votes for any specific politician, and excepting where the topic can be covered by a clear ballot initiative at a time where voter turnout, won’t even drive votes for a specific regulation.
(1) the exact number is usually overstated due to polling methodology, but exists.
Could you separate the difference between polling and voting on specific issues from the difference between polling on specific issues and turning out for party politicians? It sounds like there probably is a real difference, but it may be smaller than you’re saying after we account for the dysfunction of the current American electoral system in specific.
I’m not sure it’s possible to do so entirely, if only because the party a politician joins can itself be information about the sort of matters they’ll be able to put forward. You can almost always find better proxies than the first reported by media sources, though. Simple averaging together the various individual components of health care reform is a really stupid and obviously inaccurate tool—people don’t value individual components equally—but it shows a far more interesting picture of the full system.
And you probably have other complicated variables to deal with. People don’t generally know the details of any specific law. Again, using health-care reform since has some of the best research, there’s pretty clear evidence that one in four people have never been aware of even the most popular parts of the law.
If you start with an assumption of massive electoral dysfunction, that can explain a pretty large number of things—but it seems to have explanatory power, rather than predictive power.
The again, in states that have them ballot initiatives frequently produce results to the right of what the legislature is willing to pass.
Allow me to correct myself in a way that renders us both correct, in-context:
The American populace generally seems to be further to the left on economic issues but further to the right on cultural/social issues than the government they elect. The simplest explanation has already been given: a unitary government over extremely heterogeneous regions.
The phenomenon I describe isn’t limited to social issues, most notably it applies to tax rates.