Sunday, April 19, 2009

4 Electoral Groups & 2 Power Blocks

This is a follow up to my previous post -- Four Economic Flavors.

I've changed the name of the far right political block to "social conservative" (was "Republican"). So now I see the following four electoral blocks, each with about 25% of the electorate:

  1. Social Conservative
  2. Economic Conservative / Libertarian
  3. Moderate
  4. Progressive

Obama is firmly in the "Moderate" group, which is where the much of the power lies. Speaking of power, here are 2 powerful special interest groups:

  1. Wall Street
  2. Military-Industrial Complex

Is this a reasonable description of where power and opinion lies in our country? What could change the balance for better or worse?

4 comments:

legacyguy said...

Dan, I like the change in name from "Republican" to "Social Conservative". I believe it is more precise. In addition, you don't use the designation "Democrat", so it's more parallel in organization.

I would add as special interest groups "Medical Insurance/Pharmaceutical", "Environmental/Stop Global Warming", "Business", "Labor","Israel", "Right to Choose (Abortion)", and "Gun Rights".

Detroit Dan said...

"Gun Rights" is certainly a formidable force, and yes "Israel" is a powerful interest group. Good follow up.

What could change the balance of power in our direction? I guess it gets back to your argument that we should try to push the center farther to the left. The social conservatives will probably keep their 25%, but the econ conservatives/libertarians and moderates can be moved, I would think.

We may have to pick our battles. Say, concentrate on health care first, before going after the military-industrial complex...

legacyguy said...

Defense Secretary Gates has already taken on the military/industrial complex with his defense budget proposal for next year. With his foot in the door, perhaps we can squeeze some more reforms through the opening.

Health care and energy policy will be the first big battles. Big Oil and Big Medicine will align against us. Much will be tested this year as to how powerful the lobbyists remain under Obama.

Detroit Dan said...

I still think the economy will remain sh*tty and get sh*ttier, which will greatly complicate Obama's life. However, I'm now convinced that the Republicans are a spent force for the foreseeable future. So Obama's got some running room to try a few different moves and see what works...