A Wedge for Me? Or Thee?

Quick question.  What is a "wedge issue?"  The answer, according to Jonah Goldberg, is any issue the Democrats don't want to talk about.

In his book What’s the Matter with Kansas? Thomas Frank insisted that Republicans only know how to win on divisive wedge issues that distract voters from their “real” interests. This amounted to McMarxism — a dumbed-down, mass-market version of the old socialist notion of “false consciousness.” Liberals like Frank assume voters are too dumb to know what they should care about.

Like the Keystone XL pipeline.  Right now, the White House is in high dudgeon that the eevil Republicans have put the Keystone XL pipeline and its 20,000 jobs on the payroll tax holiday bill.

And I agree.  It is monstrous for the Republicans to be raising the false consciousness of the white working class with the mirage of jobs, jobs, jobs, when anyone who knows anything knows that the only way to save the planet is to put the kybosh on fossil-fuel development and shovel money at Democratic crony capitalists and their solar panels and wind farms.

But there's a bigger problem for Democrats than the bitter clingers of the white working class.  It is the disappointed hordes of young voters that voted for hope and change in 2008.  Voters under 30 voted 66 percent for Obama back then, but they seem to be experiencing buyer's remorse.  I wonder why.

According to Carl Cannon, only 32 percent of under-30s approve of the president's handling of the economy.  All is not lost, of course.  The president still leads a generic Republican among 18-29 year olds by six points.  But you can see that the 66 percent is out of the window, and also the enthusiasm.

This is good news.  For Republicans there is nothing better than for a whole generation of youngsters to put their faith in a charismatic leader and have their hopes cruelly dashed.  Now those young folks will be receptive to our message.  This is not rocket science, folks.  When government controls everything then young people must join the end of the queue.  Because young people don't have much political power.  It is much better for young people to rely on their energy and youth than upon Uncle Sugar.

But here is more.  It looks like President Obama's class warfare campaign is coming up a loser.  The Gallup Poll announces that "Fewer Americans See U.S. Divided Into "Haves," "Have Nots"".  Gallup asked people whether they thought the nation was divided into Haves and Have Nots.  Back in 2008 Americans split 49% to 49% on this.  But now the Is Divided camp has declined to 41%.  And here is the kicker.  When asked to say whether they felt they were part of the Haves or the Have Nots, 58% said they were Haves, and 35 percent said they were Have Nots.  And Americans' self identification has not changed much over the last ten years.

I continue to think that we ain't seen nothing yet when it comes to the election of 2012.  It is going to be a watershed election.