Democrats are losing rural votes not because of what they propose but because rural voters identify more with the Republican Party. “Democratic” ballot initiatives do well in rural, but Democratic candidates don’t.
In politics these days, it’s not as much what is said as who says it. Urban voters are getting more Democratic and rural voters more Republican.
What we can see now, however, is that Democratic candidates are paying an “identity penalty” in rural counties, they are losing votes not because of what they propose but because of the “D” that sits beside their name on the ballot.
Party is largely about identification these days, not policy. Okay, here's an example...Imagine walking down a hall of a large building. There are gatherings happening in two separate rooms. You can look through a door and see the people in each group. You size them up, seeing what kind of clothes they wear and imagining whether they would be the kind of folks you’d want to spend time with or have your children visit. You make a judgment, pick a room and go in. You join a team.
That’s how political parties are chosen. It’s about identification and social solidarity, not issues. And that identity is strong and divided by geography. Rural residents went in one door and urbanites went in the other.
Identity is not something that people easily give up. (Have you ever convinced a sports fan to change his or her team?) Like someone asking me to switch being a Georgia Bulldogs fan to a Florida Gator fan. Not happening!
And so the “identity penalty” Democrats pay in extremely heavily Republican areas might be too great to overcome. Candidates might do better if they run as independents rather than as Democrats in particularly “red” states.
