[Marxism] The U.S.elections and the working class [Was: turn to industry...]

["Joaquin Bustelo" <jbustelo@xxxxxxxxx>]

Mark Lause: "Actually, these statistics from the 2008 election don't tell us
that white voters in these low income, low education categories mostly
opposed Obama.  They were the group that sat out the election in the highest
proportions last time, a category blacks tended to occupy." 

The statistics recently circulated in the news media about participation in
the November elections are mostly garbage. They are derived from the census
bureau's household survey for December where every four years they ask if
you voted. Invariably this shows that 5%-10% more people claim to have voted
than actually did.

That said, I wasn't trying to construct some argument about what white
workers did or did not do. It is extremely difficult to create such
arguments convincingly NOT JUST due to the very high abstention rate in US
elections, but the varied causes of that abstentionism. They include the
"friction" that must be overcome to vote, which is variable depending on
gender, economic stratification, family structure and so on,  which then
combines with the reality that these are all STATE elections, i.e., this
last time around voting was not the same act in California or New York AS in
Pennsylvania or Ohio as in Alabama or Mississippi.

In "battleground" states a person might have felt much more motivated to
vote as their individual vote might make a meaningful contribution to the
victory of their preferred candidate, even though numerous practical
difficulties were involved. That same person may not have felt motivated
enough to vote in the other states I mentioned, where the election outcome
was a foregone conclusion.

Similar considerations arise in the (relatively extremely few) sharply
contested elections for lower office. (U.S. politics is really a lot of
local single party regimes and the places where there are genuine, viable
choices between the two parties are few and far between). 90-some percent of
office holders run unopposed or with only token opposition.

But combine all these factors and what you get are very inhomogeneous
electoral conditions throughout the country, and what you're doing is
perhaps not as drastic as comparing apples to oranges, but certainly at
least oranges to tangerines, lemons and other citric fruit.

ALL THAT SAID, my main concern in the post I placed on the list was to show
that it was not true that the Obama vote represented some sort of action by
the working class using what was perceived as a readily available vehicle
(no matter how unsuitable or even illusory).  As the evidence I provided
showed, "race" trumped class across the board in the presidential election,
and age also, in a less dramatic way. What seems to be evidence of "class"
differentiation is in reality illusory because Blacks and Latinos are so
heavily concentrated in the lower income and educational groups, which are
used as a proxy for class.

So the class differentiation that shows up as a result is a *statistical*
artifice, not a social or political phenomenon.

Joaquin


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