The Big Difference in the Presidential Race

In baseball it is said that that every team is guaranteed 54 wins and 54 losses. It is what the team does with those remaining 54 games which determines success of failure for the season.

The same is true in Presidential politics. The Republicans are guaranteed a certain amount of votes from their base and the Democrats are guaranteed a certain amount from their base. It is how the undecideds, independents and centrists vote that will determine the next President. Ted Van Dyk makes the historical argument in today's Wall Street Journal that John McCain has a much better shot at winning these key votes from the so-called Reagan Democrats:

Hillary Clinton became the presidential candidate of Reagan Democrats -- plus over-50 women of all outlooks. Barack Obama became the candidate of more socially and educationally elevated Democrats -- plus African-American voters.

Will Mr. Obama, at the upcoming Democratic convention in Denver, be able to bring Reagan Democrats finally home? I am not counting on it. His Republican opponent, John McCain, has a maverick reputation and an appeal to Reagan Democrats that Mr. Obama will find difficult to match. The Democratic Party platform is still filled with the single-issue, single-interest and social-issue planks that have plagued it since 1972.

The classic winning coalition for Democrats is the 1960 John F. Kennedy coalition which included Catholics, Jews and Protestants, whites, African-Americans and Latinos, both better- and less-educated voters, labor-union members and academics. The 1960 Kennedy platform -- built around a strong national defense, assertive foreign policy, economic growth and social justice at home -- is still the platform most likely to attract Democratic voters of all outlooks, as well as independents. JFK's promise to "get America moving again" is what Americans are looking for in 2008.

It can be argued (an argument I've made many times in this space) that JFK's 1960 platform of "a strong national defense, assertive foreign policy, economic growth and social justice at home" is now the defacto Republican platform while the Democrats have devolved into a platform of peace, love and (mis)understanding of reality.