Republicans Need Latinos, So Attacking Sotomayor is "Just Not Smart Politics"
By John Aloysius Farrell, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
If you want good ethnic food in America, you no longer head for the nearest city. "The best ethnic restaurants are not downtown" but in the suburbs, says Virginia Tech professor Robert Lang. "They are in the dead strip malls from the 1950s."
And that is one reason that things are looking up for the Democrats in the wake of the 2008 elections.
We've looked this week at the 2008 results in terms of race and age. But Lang gave attendees at a Brookings Institution/American Enterprise Institute conference on American political demography an important lesson in geography last Friday.
It was a repeat visit for Lang. After sifting through the 2006 election data, he showed up at AEI in February of 2008 and demonstrated how the Democrats have maintained their base in the urban cores, and edged ever outward in recent years, threatening traditional Republican strongholds in the suburbs.
The further that the plumes of Democratic blue extended into the red Republican suburban homeland, Lang said, the better the chance that the Democratic nominee would win a purple state like Virginia or Colorado, and its Electoral College votes. As we know, that is just what happened last November.
Lang divides metropolitan areas into their urban "cores" like Washington D.C., "inner suburbs" like Arlington, Va. or DeKalb county in Ga., "mature suburbs" like Montgomery County, Md. or Fairfax County, Va., "emerging suburbs" like Loudoun and Prince William Counties in Va. or Douglas County in Colo. and "exurbs" like Fauquier County, Va. or Pinal County, Az.
Democrats still rule the big cores, where Barack Obama got 75 percent of the vote last fall, and because of increased growth and diversity are now beating the GOP in the "inner suburbs" (where Obama got 60 percent) and the "mature suburbs" (which gave Obama 57 percent of the vote) as well.
Meanwhile, the Republican hold on the emerging suburbs and exurbs is shrinking. George W. Bush took the emerging suburbs with 60 percent of the vote in 2004, but John McCain won but 55 percent of these voters in 2008. And in 2008, Obama bested Kerry's performance in the exurbs by four points, and ended up with 42 percent of the vote.
These big metro areas are the ball game, Lang said. "There are just not enough rural folks and small city people left in America in the key states that determine the Electoral College," he noted.
A key to the Democrats' competitiveness in the 'burbs is the Latino vote, which makes the initial Republican response to Obama's nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court all the more baffling. For example, it was the support of the Latino voters of suburban Florida, many of them who share Sotomayor's Puerto Rican heritage, that helped Obama take the state last fall.
Attacking Sotomayor on ethnic-related issues, said Lang, "is just not smart politics."
Here is his formula: "Density + Diversity = Democrats."
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Tags: politics | Republicans | Hispanic voters | Sonia Sotomayor
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Reader Comments
Latinos are proud of their heritage
The whole logic behind "Latinos should not be considered Latinos is they only speak English" is pure idiotic nonsense. Whoever subscribes to this idea does not know a single thing about heritage and what that means.
That's like saying that the Irish stop being Irish because they don't speak Irish Gaelic. In the US most Irish speak English and they remain Irish to the core and are proud of their Irish heritage.
Same thing goes with Latinos that Speak English as their primary language or as their only Language. You got a lot of Latinos in the US who don't speak a word of Spanish and yet they identify themselves as Latinos (i.e. a lot of the Hispanic celebrities that attend the ALMA AWARDS speak English only) and are very proud of that heritage. It's pure stupidity to claim that once they abandon the Spanish language they stop being Latino or Hispanic.
And he is a news flash to those pencilnecks that are basing being Latino on the Language alone. To be Latino means a lot more than that. Is the food you eat. Is the music you listen to. Is the books you read and how you see the world based on the idiosyncrasy that is inherent to the Latino and Hispanic heart and soul. Its the same thing that makes African Americans and any other ethnic group view the world with a unique perspective. All that and more comes with being Latino or Hispanic.
The people here who subscribe to the idea that you stop being Latino if you stop speaking Spanish are just a bunch of gibbons (especially those that write from Spain). These people are VERY resentful of any Latino abandoning the "mother language". And they are quick to "punish" them by stripping them of being Latino or Hispanic. Like if such a thing was possible. That may happen just in your inner world, fellas. But it doesn’t happen in the real world. You don't get to tell me I'm not Latino because I don't read "The Man of La Mancha" in it's original language or speak Spanish only 24/7. Screw you.
Enrique
Joan,
Being Latino is not a question of race but a question of culture.
I don´t accept that somebody who has lost the Spanish language can be called "Latino". That´s nonsense and ridiculous.
When the grandchildren of immigrants from Latinamerica or Spain become Americans (and that means becoming Anglos), then they are NOT Latinos.
I think the Latino category in America is just a political construction without any base.
There are more people of Japanese ancestry in Brazil than in America...are they called Asian-Brazilians? No, they are just Brazilians (Latinos)
There are more people of Italian ancestry in Brazil and Argentina than in America...are they called Italian-Brazilians or Italian-Argentines? No, they are just Brazilians and Argentines (Latinos)
There are 15 million Brazilians and 1 million Argentines of German ancestry...are they called German-Argentines or German-Brazilians? No, they are just Brazilians and Argentines (Latinos)
And so on....
Response to Enrique (6/19/09)
Enrique, your perspective is not one that we are used to seeing.
Your point is certainly a logical and defensible one: that being Hispanic/Latino is a question of language and cultural affiliation, not the ethnic background of your ancestors.
Of course here in America people in recent years have turned the "Hispanic/Latino" category into something that's more like race, even though all the races are present in Central and South America.
As the generations go forward and Hispanics/Latinos assimilate, how important will the Hispanic/Latino category be?
Perhaps it won't be nearly as important as everyone assumes. Many people will be partly Hispanitc/Latino in a couple of generations. Who knows if they will consider themselves Anglo, Hispanic or Black?
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