Hannah,

White working class voters believed they were included in “Morning in America” and “get government off our backs” rhetoric. However “Government” to white voters was coded rhetoric meaning “BLACK Welfare Queens” was causing the “Democrats” to “tax and spend” real “hard” working white folks (good people) to death. Working class whites translated “affirmative action” to mean government intervention for BLACKS at the expense of white privilege while white women distance themselves as key beneficiaries of affirmative action.

White working class voters saw “Morning in America” as “Mourning in America” as these Reagan Democrats associated their own false sense of powerlessness to U.S powerlessness from the Iranian Revolution and the Hostage Crisis.

The white working class somehow believed government spending was not favoring them or they didn’t see HOW they (as whites) really benefited from government spending and didn’t mine voting for Reagan and his rollback polices. White working class voters saw themselves as part of “Reagan Country”.

As I stated in my response, Reagan conceal his true class agenda using coded racial rhetoric — “Morning in America”, “All those people on welfare”, “Get government (people on welfare; people on social programs) off our backs” and most especially by inaugurating his campaign in Philadelphia, MS where civil rights workers were assassinated.

What you are missing by lowering the importance of race is the reason WHY it has taken this long for the ruling class to make a frontal assault on Social Security. The ruling class had to soften the populous by attacking the poor and most especially people of color first — by attacking social and urban programs. This is a key reason why there is NO national health care system in the U.S. — “Hard working; good working (white) Americans don’t need government assistance”.

Therefore without any analysis of racism you miss a key factor in understanding why the U.S. has persisted with 30 years of Reaganism and why white working class voters still support candidates whose policies clearly work against their interest.

Ok, you stated twice that you don’t believe that race was the primary factor in Reagan appeal among voters (despite the clear racial significance of Reagan inaugurating his campaign in Philadelphia, MS) then can you articulate what factor or factors where of primary significance?

Thanks,
Deadbeat

I think it’s pretty obvious why he didn’t; those policies aren’t supported by the majority of people. They have to be disguised in the rhetoric of “Morning in America,” get government off our back, etc.

I don’t deny Reagan played the race card in his campaign. I simply disagree that race was the only, or indeed the main, reason for his victory.

Reagan clearly promoted a regressive ideology and economic policies. My point is not about the ruling class rightward policies movement. The fact is that the ruling class could not achieve power if they could not in some way relate to the masses of people who elected them into power. That meant convincing the majority white population to vote for their rightward policies. If as the author responded that is was more complicated than racism then why didn’t Reagan just come out and tell the white populous that he intended cut taxes on the rich and lie about Social Security and shift the tax burden away from the progressive income tax and toward regressive SS tax and sales taxes.

The key to Reagan’s victory was the APPEAL to “Reagan Democrats” and the key to that was racism. Unfortunately many on the left choose to ignore, dismiss, or diminish the appeal of racism and its effect on the body politics.

I would like to politely disagree with some of it, though. I believe Reagan’s victory and the move to the right in US politics is more complicated than “racism,” and the thesis of this article is that there is no “problem” with Social Security at all; that the “crisis” is entirely manufactured. I hope you’ll read Parts 3-5 to hear why. Thank you!

One would ask why working class Americans vote to put Reagan in power so they can see their tax burdens increased. The answer RACISM. Reagan inaugurated his campaign in Philadelphia, MS where civil right workers were assassinated. Reagan scapegoated African American (and Liberals who were distancing themselves from people of color) as the source of America’s ills.

White Americans bought the canard hook line and sinker. They blamed blacks for the so-called “tax and spend” Liberalism. Whites pretended that they were not beneficiaries of social spending (affirmative action for whites especially after WWII where housing and other government programs were denied to blacks due to discrimination) and the myth that they pulled themselves up by their bootstraps. Liberals began to abandon social spending and redistribution with the election of the so-called pro-business “New Democrats” whose arose in 1974 after the drubbing of George McGovern in 1972.

The author refers to the 1986 Tax “Deform”. The major sponsors of that huge tax cut for the rich were Liberal” Democrats Bill Bradley and Dick Gephardt.

Another backdrop was that by 1980, White America also began to increase the level of hatred towards Arabs with the 1979 Iranian Revolution and their spike in oil prices. This coming not too long after the first spike in oil prices in 1973. Jimmy Carter then permitted then Fed Chairman Paul Volker to dramatically raise interest rates to induce a major recession causing white workers to then seek scapegoats. People of color where the obvious scapegoat. Thus the key to rise of Reaganism was the white working class (aka. Reagan Democrats).

Racism (and Zionism) is a cancer in the United States and the impetus of the crisis occurring in the U.S. today.

The biggest problem is that the working class WANTS it this way and they are making no attempts to bridge this divide especially on the left. White leftist like their privilege and so long as they prefer to wallow in their “privilege” the RICH WHITES will continue to rob and transfer wealth from everyone.