The other night on one of those cable news channels I watched a GOP operative urge that, while Hillary Clinton might secure the votes of the great white male working class, "there is no way on God's green earth (an admittedly nice acknowledgment) that they would vote for Obama." Then I pick up my Times and Susan Faludi is opining that Hillary "has converted (!) white males by coming in to the tavern not to smash bottles but to join in the brawl."
Time to take a collective breath. As a labor lawyer, I've spent my share of time with plenty of teamsters, carpenters, plumbers and others in the American proletariat. I've never smashed a bottle or joined in a brawl. We have even on occasion sipped a latte.
The "group think" ascribed to these white male Democrats (WMD's) is a fiction. And despite Hillary Clinton reinventing herself now as Mother Jones, many recall that the Clinton years were not always so kind. Some watched as Clinton trade policies left too many of their factories empty, jobs offshore and lives in tatters. They watched too as Wall Street was set "free," Enron collapsed, as did their pensions, and now their homes are at risk from the sub prime meltdown.
Yet the McCain forces should draw little comfort from all of this. It is true that with cultural fear mongering about guns and flags, you can fool some working people some of the time. But not this time. It does not matter that McCain may be tired or old but it does matter that his policies are -- more for the rich, less for the rest. So I'm confident of a Democratic victory in November. I may give up lattes though.
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