Frankly Speaking: "Kansas" and the 2004 Election

November 12, 2004
By Carolyn Winter and Roger Bybee

The disaster of Kerry's loss and the widespread gains of Republicans have left many of us as bewildered by the continuing popularity of Bush and his narrow right-wing agenda as we are anguished over the implications of the results.

How can it be that an agenda that works against the interests of the overwhelming majority of the working people of this country attracts some 58 million votes? For example, the overwhelming economic reality of 230,000 lost jobs did not prevent George W. Bush from recapturing a majority of Ohio's electorate (if the official count is to be believed).

How is it that this regressive whirlwind has been fueled by the votes of the very people it most cruelly victimizes? How have Americans been persuaded to align themselves with their economic overseers and ignore their own most fundamental needs for decent jobs, quality health care and education, and an effective voice in society?

In his stunningly prescient book published earlier this year What's the Matter with Kansas? Thomas Frank addresses these questions with great insight into the cultural forces animating America. While Frank writes about Kansas, his insights contribute immensely to comprehending Kerry's narrow defeat.

To better understand why Ohio swung the election to Bush, one needs to analyze Frank's thought-provoking and thorough description of Kansas. Kansas represents much of middle-America; rural and small to middle-sized towns overtaken by their adherence to a narrow moral vision that centers on gay marriage and abortion.

It may be these two issues alone that cost Kerry the election. These so-called moral values propel a right-wing threshing machine that is relentlessly cutting down hard-won progressive economic gains that took decades to plant, nurture, and harvest for working people.

But the core of Franks' answer is that the conservative elite has succeeded in re-defining class in terms of culture, rather than economic status and power. Thus, Kerry and the liberals are part of the latte-drinking elite, while Bush represents the regular guy. In an act of political jujitsu, class is defined in terms of tastes, consumer preferences, and lifestyles, rather than who possesses actual wealth and power.

Corporations and the right-wing have managed to merge anti-intellectualism with class resentment. As people become more disempowered and insecure, their anger becomes focused on the liberal elite who oppose old-fashioned values rather than feel their alienation from the centers of real power. And as the present becomes more intolerable, people look to a mythical past that the right-wing has created. While this myth has some elements of truth, it glosses over a less-than-idyllic past and soft-pedals many unpleasant or inconvenient aspects of history.

In sharp contrast to the present, the true history of Kansas is marked by progressive struggles where people fought for a fair share of the wealth and a decent life for their families, as Frank documents. Kansas was once a vital center of progressive militancy where the state's farmers came together to protest unfair prices, debt and deflation by marching through small towns in day-long parades and wiping the state's traditional Republican masters out of power in the 1890's.

But now Kansas and the rest of the country buy into the red-state and blue-state divide that pits the "humble" down-home working stiffs of middle-America against the liberal "elites" of the coasts.

In his analysis, Frank points to the role of the religious right in demonizing the left. By incorporating this worldview, Republicans have been able, almost with a magic wand, to make the glaring inequalities of American life disappear from the public debate except when raised by marginalized leftists.

By successfully thundering against the illusory power of the so-called "liberal elite," the Republicans have managed to delete economic issues from popular discourse and turn populism inside out. As Frank notes, the economically-excluded have been enlisted in "a crusade in which one's material interests are suspended in favor of vague cultural grievances that are all-important and yet incapable of ever being assuaged."

Working people in Kansas and elsewhere have largely cast aside their progressive tradition, with some of the poorest counties in the country voting in greater numbers for George Bush in 2000 (and probably in 2004) than suburbanites in wealthy counties. For example, a small-town Pennsylvania man explained in a Newsweek article why he and his neighbors had voted for Bush in 2000: "Rural America is pissed. These people are tired of moral decay. They're tired of everything being wonderful on Wall Street and terrible on Main Street."

This is the incredible irony that is the core of Frank's analysis.

While Republican leaders have been extraordinarily effective in linking the dissatisfaction of middle-Americans with cultural issues and blurring true class distinctions, the Democratic party has offered very little in the way of a sharply-defined alternative vision; one that promotes community, economic justice, and social responsibility. While Republicans have utilized issues such as abortion, gay marriage, and the perceived loss of religious influence to foment volcanic rage; the Democrats have been inconsistent at best in pushing their issues such as job loss, poor education, and deteriorating health security and quality.

Frank identifies the weak and defensive positions of Democrats as playing into the hands of the conservatives. The Democrats no longer offer many middle-Americans a path to a better life or any tangible benefits. They no longer seem to serve as authentic and committed voices for working families and the poor. On the other hand, the Republicans appear to be directly reflecting their worldview and unambiguously affirming their values.

It is important for people to realize that Kansas (and Ohio), like much of middle-America, has been particularly devastated by the prevailing economic trends: de-industrialization, loss of family farms, the export of many agricultural jobs, the big business takeover of agricultures, and the loss of small businesses and local stores.

Republican hegemony in Kansas further illustrates the sublimation of economic needs in favor of the urgency of a Calvinist cultural agenda. Slyly mixing the culture war with the class war is symbolized in the very manifesto of the Kansas conservative movement - the platform of the state Republican Party for 1998 blends Christian-right grievances with corporate America's economic agenda.

Among the demands specified in this platform were: a flat tax or sales tax to replace the progressive income tax, the abolition of taxes on capital gains, the abolition of the estate tax, privatization of Social Security, deregulation in general, turning over of all federal lands to the states, and a prohibition of taxpayer dollars to fund any election campaign.

Voters are persuaded to cast their ballots based on fear of gays and abortion when these issues are generally far removed from the reality of their daily lives. This has been a particularly striking aspect of the recent election. For example, "gay pride" parades are not typically held on the Main Streets of small farming or factory towns, and gay weddings have largely been confined to places like San Francisco and Massachusetts. Abortion is unavailable in nearly 90% of US counties. Yet these very same small and medium-sized communities daily face the devastating results of factory relocations to Mexico and China and taxpayer-subsidized Wal-Marts driving local stores out of business.

Why are people are so willing to put gay marriage in Massachusetts and San Francisco ahead of issues closer to home? Obviously, we as Democrats and progressives have not learned how to seriously address the alienation and powerlessness behind these intolerant attitudes. We keep responding to feelings with facts. Bush certainly did not defeat Gore and Kerry because he had a superior, silver-tongued command of facts or policy analysis at his disposal.

Still, Bush and other right-wing elected officials are successful in recycling these emotional cultural issues at the same time that they promote economic policies expressly designed for the richest segment of our population. They use these social issues to retain their popularity as they enact a regressive economically-centered legislative agenda, often with a decidedly lower priority placed on the social issues animating the right-wing's base. Essentially, the Republican Party has merged the financial resources of the Business Roundtable with the Christian Coalition's footsoldiers, leaving the Christian evangelicals relegated to a distinctly junior role.

While the original populists demanded government come to their aid against the robber barons, "Today's populists make demands that are precisely the opposite. Tear down the federal farm program, they cry," Frank notes ironically. "Privatize the utilities. Repeal the progressive taxes. All that Kansas asks today is a little help nailing itself to that cross of gold."

What Can Be Done?

Frank advocates a two-pronged approach to engage the electorate.

First, Democrats/progressives must recapture their identity as the trusted voice of those facing the icy waters of deregulated capitalism by developing and promoting a strong economic agenda; thereby offering a distinct alternative to the right-wing's largely-hollow cultural agenda.

Second, Democrats/progressives must listen more closely to the cultural concerns of right-leaning populists by excluding controversial issues and appeals from their public program.

While we fully agree with the first part of his proposed solution, we have problems with the second part. As noted above, we think Frank has undervalued profound changes in the race, gender, and ethnic relations in the US, all of which have been utilized to fuel the right-wing reaction, especially the role that racism plays in the current backlash. Racism now takes shape in less overt forms than in the past, but it remains deeply embedded through highly-segregated living patterns and the withdrawal of many whites from contact with public-sector institutions like schools, mass transit, and recreational facilities.

In fact, much of the resentment against taxes and the public sector is tied to the gains enjoyed by African-Americans and Latinos in this sphere. Despite the fact that people of color and women remain stuck overwhelmingly in low-paid, powerless roles in society, they have become targets of the misdirected rage of many average white men and women.

This leads to some differences we have with Frank's solutions. The economic elites have ruled through dividing the different elements of the middle and/or working classes. All our work must appeal to uniting these disparate elements and creating an environment of tolerance.

Further, progressives often have a tin ear to the popular craving for a moral vision. This has been underscored by Kerry's defeat. Progressives can't ignore morality in its vision for a better America. We must address the alienation and powerlessness that leads to anti-abortion and anti-gay sentiment defining morality. A progressive morality must replace the intolerance of the old values with a worldview that emphasizes love, nurture, and tolerance. A specific example is the dissatisfaction of both left and right with the suffocating role of commercialism. We both agree that excessive and tasteless advertising degrades our culture.

The most promising place to begin is with those Bush voters who remain uncomfortable with the negativity, hate, and anger of the right-wing movement. We must also address a media that consistently fails to recognize the implications of the earth-shaking economic polarization that is shifting wealth from working families to the richest strata of society. Before we can change the major institutions significantly enough to have a people oriented media, though, we must create an opposition movement powerful enough to effectively command respectful media coverage.

To support our progressive vision, we need the Democratic party to actually serve as an authentic opposition party such as those in other western democracies. We have to move the Democratic party so that it forcefully articulates positions that defend working people and the environment. The Democrats also need a coherent moral vision to counter the Republican fear-oriented vision. Their current defensive strategy has only weakened them and removed from the public sphere any high-profile challenge to the reigning corporate truth. This undoubtedly will require a strategy to divorce candidates from the money of corporations.

But the most urgent need is for the Democrats and other progressives to expound this compelling moral vision loudly and persuasively. It the absence a moral vision that now prevents any advance by progressives.

Carolyn Winter and Roger Bybee are long time progressive activists and writers based in Milwaukee, Wis. They can be reached at [email protected].