A decade ago, Democrats made a concerted effort to bring rural and exurban voters back into the party’s fold. Today, Republicans are struggling with the opposite problem — how to win over voters from America’s booming cities.
National Republicans have given remarkably little thought to how to reverse their decline in urban areas, even as they have grappled with how to be more inclusive and diverse.
But there are stirrings of a renewed effort by a handful of GOP candidates and activists to edge the party into being more competitive in America’s cities. They see their efforts as a necessity for the party’s long-term competitiveness given the rapid growth of America’s urban centers.TAB 9 YEARS AGO - (AND AGAIN 5 YEARS AGO):
THE GOP MUST WIN OVER URBAN AMERICA TO BECOME THE MAJORITY PARTY - AND HERE'S HOW...
The 2008 presidential election county-by-county map ...
looks a lot like the 2004 map:
The GOP carried the rural counties and most of the suburban counties but loses most of the urban counties by a very wide margin.
Obama carried the cities by more than Kerry and this is why he won.
Some of this is due to voter fraud and some due to concentrations of students indoctrinated by left-wing dominated colleges professors.
Some of it is due to vestigial voting patterns and still strong urban machines and coalitions.
BUT MOST OF IT IS DUE TO THE FACT THAT OUR CITIES HAVE BEEN DEMOCRATMACHINE STRONGHOLDS FOR DECADES AND DECADES.
Many of our largest cities are one-party towns in which the GOP has trouble fielding a real GOP candidate at all - like my hometown, NYC. We have elected a few GOP mayors: Lindsay - who was a liberal and a DISASTER, and Rudy and Mike Bloomberg. All liberal on the social issues. Rudy was a great mayor - he saved the city, and Bloomberg became a Republican in order to run and win on Rudy's GOP accomplishments.
The GOP needs to replicate and solidify Rudy's success, an to do this the GOP needs to refine and communicate an aggressive URBAN AGENDA which reflects conservative principles and policies - policies which would improve our cities and the GOP nationally.
I first wrote about this RIGHT AFTER THE 2004 ELECTION - and NOTHING was done about it, and that's why the GOP lost in 2008. Here's what I wrote:
RTWT.
OF COURSE, THE LEFTIES AT POLITICO RECOMMEND THAT THE GOP MOVE TO THE LEFT ON SOCIAL ISSUES.
I RECOMMEND AN ASSERTION OF A PRO-GROWTH AGENDA.
looks a lot like the 2004 map:
The GOP carried the rural counties and most of the suburban counties but loses most of the urban counties by a very wide margin.
Obama carried the cities by more than Kerry and this is why he won.
Some of this is due to voter fraud and some due to concentrations of students indoctrinated by left-wing dominated colleges professors.
Some of it is due to vestigial voting patterns and still strong urban machines and coalitions.
BUT MOST OF IT IS DUE TO THE FACT THAT OUR CITIES HAVE BEEN DEMOCRATMACHINE STRONGHOLDS FOR DECADES AND DECADES.
Many of our largest cities are one-party towns in which the GOP has trouble fielding a real GOP candidate at all - like my hometown, NYC. We have elected a few GOP mayors: Lindsay - who was a liberal and a DISASTER, and Rudy and Mike Bloomberg. All liberal on the social issues. Rudy was a great mayor - he saved the city, and Bloomberg became a Republican in order to run and win on Rudy's GOP accomplishments.
The GOP needs to replicate and solidify Rudy's success, an to do this the GOP needs to refine and communicate an aggressive URBAN AGENDA which reflects conservative principles and policies - policies which would improve our cities and the GOP nationally.
I first wrote about this RIGHT AFTER THE 2004 ELECTION - and NOTHING was done about it, and that's why the GOP lost in 2008. Here's what I wrote:
Message to the ascendant GOP: ASSERT AN URBAN AGENDA
Looking over the electoral map (by county) one cannot help but make at least one huge conclusion: the Democrats are still the majority party most of the big old cities - most majorities are HUGE.
WHAT ARE THE REASONS FOR THIS?First, the cities have long been voting slaves to local Democrat machines. Second, the Democrats have long been the majority party for immigrants. Third, cities have long been magnets for ethnic diversity and the Democrats have traditionally been more diverse. Fourth, the urban poor have long been bought off by the largess of the liberal welfare state.All this is changing, but not enough. Clinton moved more toward the center and toward the GOP when he pledged "to end welfare as we know it." This helped Clinton at the polls.The GOP must make bigger and better overt overtures to the urban electorate, and it can do this merely by asserting its inclusive, color-blind, pro-business, anti-crime, personal empowerment (anti-welfare/anti-state dependency), school choice/teacher accountability, and low tax URBAN agenda.
RTWT.
OF COURSE, THE LEFTIES AT POLITICO RECOMMEND THAT THE GOP MOVE TO THE LEFT ON SOCIAL ISSUES.
I RECOMMEND AN ASSERTION OF A PRO-GROWTH AGENDA.
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