David Paul Kuhn and Stan Greenberg on Democrats' Alienation of White Working-Class Voters
The Hard Hat Riot of 1970 may have lost some of its historical importance in the eyes of everyone but the most astute modern day political operatives. But author David Paul Kuhn ("The Hard Hat Riot") and political strategist Stan Greenberg ("RIP GOP") make the case that any Democrat worth their salt should mark that infamous clash between college students and construction workers as the inception of the greatest electoral barrier their party has faced in the 50 years since. That is the disenfranchisement of blue collar whites, and their departure from the left was felt in the 2016, just as they may serve as Biden's key to victory in 2020. Plus, Al and James discuss Trump's latest outrages.
Show Notes:
00:00 – Intro
01:30 – The moments that define our politics
08:00 – Defining a demographic
11:15 – Racial anxiety: then vs now
19:30 – The shift in Hillary
29:30 – Who Biden appeals to
37:00 – The nuance of messaging
40:30 – Where Obama fell short
44:45 – The greatest gaff in history
49:30 – A little bit of background
57:00 - The difference between opening schools and colleges
Transcript:
Al Hunt: [00:00:00] hello and welcome to 2020 politics war room with James Carville. And I'm Al Hunt. We're proud partners with the sine Institute at American university in Washington, DC.
James Carville: [00:00:16] We have
Al Hunt: [00:00:17] quite a show this week, but first go ahead and subscribe to the podcast on Apple podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Every new listener helps.
So thank
you for being here.
We do have a really interesting and I think important program today, looking at the white working class voters, they essential component. Uh, Franklin Roosevelt's coalition and John F Kennedy's 1960 victory. And then of course, Ronald Reagan support in the eighties and Donald Trump four years ago, our two guests have thought researched and written a great deal about this.
David Paul Kuhn, author of a riveting new book, the hard hat riot at the 1970 seismic and violent confrontation between thousands of New York city construction workers and young college antiwar protesters. There was a critical moment in the move away he are using. I think he's right. From the democratic party from their parents, uh, and Stanley Greenberg, one of America's premier pulsars and social scientists who first studied the so-called Reagan Democrats in McComb County, Michigan, the huge middle and working class Detroit suburb.
He has revisited McComb and he has special insights on how this election is going to be different from four years ago. James and I hope to be walk on today. Basically you guys, we want you to, to dominate this, engage frequently with each other. Comparing observations and questions. So let me just kick off with David, the, the, the hardhat riot, which you researched and describe, and just extraordinary and often painful detail was the catalyst for working class voters in New York and elsewhere.
Starting to focus more on cultural and traditional values rather than the economic issues that had dominated for so long.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:01:59] That's right. Uh, I focused on it because I wanted to write a lesson of history after the 2016 election, I wanted to return readers. And in this sense listeners to a time that was not so unlike ours.
And in fact, I would argue, made our time and maybe allow for the perspective, the time. Uh, per permits. And if you go back this, this hardhat riot and the area encapsulates is really a microcosm. As you just alluded out to the, uh, Bri to the seismic breakup between the FDR coalition, what we can call the old left and what was called the new left at the time.
And it also helps cement Richard Nixon's blue collar strategy. Which I would argue, and I'm not alone in argument, this laid the framework for Ronald Reagan's blue collar strategy and what, you know, Stan, who is the expert on what you know, and many others terms, Reagan Democrats.
Stan Greenberg: [00:02:55] Well, I can tell you the book, I love this book, not just because, so the powerful rendering.
A cry and capturing that cry of working with people to be heard and how that kind of exploded the politics, um, ever since. Uh, but there also led me to relive the period because. Reintroduction in Narberth. Everything that I've written about has been about my starting my work with McComb County. And, you know, at the core of that was respecting working to be able to respecting whiteboard and PayPal, um, and, and why they were turning away from Democrats.
But in fact, I was actually a player, a very big player in the story that we're talking about. Cause my politics was being formed by these events. A month and that you connect to the, in the end to McComb, the I've always shared with James. And I think things with me is that the choice, whether you have a Robert Kennedy or Keene McCarthy might be like, kind of a defining choice, Um, in terms of your politics and your view of America, um, I've viewed the McCarthy world as you know, college educated, white, suburban college students.
Um, but has little to do with the kind of politics that I, that I believed in. And I believe, you know, Rob, I don't believe there's any progressive or democratic politics that doesn't have blacks. You know, as the central players reason for being central to the coat coalition. So I was for Robert, Robert Kennedy, you know, because I, you know, I believe that for me, the civil rights, not Vietnam.
For me, it was the civil rights era, you know, that was most formative. Um, and I volunteered at night in Washington, DC at the NAACP. I was at the organizing tent, uh, for the March on Washington. And so the civil rights. Sure. It, it was critically important to me. And I ended up working for the Robert Kennedy campaign.
Developing models that I'm actually wanting to go back and forth on. This allows for, you know, with David David's data, because we developed, we're a group of Harvard students working for Robert Kennedy. We, we would, in each primary, we would build in the census data. We would look at Mike Catholic, um, college-educated in every County and we'd also have Robert Kennedy's schedule.
And we would project each primary. It would be what would be the effect of his hearing in a, in a County to affect the future primary. But our, you know, Robert Kennedy's base, it was white, Catholic, 10 blocks. And MacArthur was the integrate, you know, very different, you know, coalition
Al Hunt: [00:05:56] and, and, and they take, I just to interrupt for a second and take it to David's book.
David, you really draw a great contrast, um, with Robert Kennedy and his ability to have some appeal to those construction workers, as well as African Americans, as Stan just said, versus John Lindsey, who was really, you know, whatever virtues he was, the ultimate, uh, elitist.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:06:17] Yeah. I mean, first of all, I argue, which I think is a little novel.
Listen, I'm seeing this entire book as standing on the shoulders of decades of writers and scholars and reporters. So it's hard to say what's novel and what isn't, but I argue that John Lindsey's coalition was the beta test for the McGovern coalition. And McGovern coalition is now really the democratic coalition to speak in overly simplistic terms.
And I just want to jump off what Stan said, because I have a scene in my book as I'm drawing that contrast between RFK and. McCarthy and McCarthy, there's this amazing moment where, I mean, I can't even conceive a politician say this today, but it's possible. We've had incidents like this in democratic primaries where McCarthy told college students that RFK appealed to the less intelligent and less educated people in America.
And I don't. And then he goes on to say something I don't mean to fault them for voting for him, but he urges them to keep that in mind. And Slessinger Arthur Schlesinger had this great. Retort that McCarthy was declaring a revolution against the proletariat. And I have to say, I think that, um, a lot of the new left inadvertently and sometimes quite advertently was committed, was really declaring a revolution against the proletariat and that proletariat, those middle Americans use the term of the day.
Uh, knew it. And they saw themselves, um, at the deepest level as just the attack agonist of the progress that came with the new left and, and, um, and that, that gets to the politics that go below the neck, which I argue. Um, I had many are really the most central politics in the making of the president. Let
Al Hunt: [00:07:53] let me just try one, one, and then afterwards James White and Stan, I, you know, we all worry about stereotypes, so let's, let's do a, you know, something definitional here.
I, you remember Alan Baron and James does, you know, it was a great political analyst who died 25 years ago. He called me one time and he said, honey, which city has voted democratic more than any city from 1936 to 1984? I said, I know this slide. Say Cleveland, Ohio. Okay, fine. So which religion has voted the most democratic in those 28 yacht Jews?
Yes. Right?
James Carville: [00:08:21] Which profession? I said
Al Hunt: [00:08:23] college professors. You said no labor union leaders. I said fine. He said, so why is it the only Jewish labor union leader from Cleveland, Ohio, Jackie presser, a Republican. And it kind of is a good, good warning of our stereotype. So tell us what the white working class is, white working class voters, how you define it and, and the, and the dangers of viewing them all as a homogeneous
David Paul Kuhn: [00:08:47] completely.
So, uh, first of all, I'm sure Stan can jump in on this. Uh, I would say this one is we have to allow for the fact that we're using a shorthand. As that is basically derived from Poland. And that is we do, we do class by education, uh, college educated and not, and we do that because education is the best shorthand I think for, and I think experts have decided for generations for class and American life.
When, because I'm writing about 1970, I'm very careful with the data. I mean, I try to back up everything I can with data, to the steps that exists. And most of that is in the notes because I don't want to bore me or readers, but. Well, since I was right around 1970, I, and I, I purposely called him blue collar whites, first of all, and not necessarily white working class, because you could be quite middle-class and not have a college education at the time or not have a four year college degree.
So I often w you know, I'm looking at college versus non college in 1970. I'm also looking at college verse. Oh, those were the four year degree versus those with some college or, or really some post high school education and no post and no high school education and those who didn't graduate high school, high school at the same time.
I mean, that, that does correlate strongly with, uh, separately, the electric by and to this day separating the electric by income. So, um, In short white working class does mean in my book or blue collar, whites, whites, certainly without a college degree and often whites with only modest post high school education at best.
Uh, and, and I think today you find that's evermore correlates with income and all the, uh, socioeconomic impacts that come with it. That lack of a college degree?
Stan Greenberg: [00:10:28] Um, yes. First of all, I, I agree on using the definition of four year college graduates and non four year degree, and then I've gone back and forth on this, but whenever I'd measure it, no, if you use income or other or other methods, it's just, it's just, it's so much more strongly correlated with behavior, um, where people are going to work in people.
It's not what people necessarily call themselves. Um, there's likely to call themselves middle class, you know, or working class, but middle class is, um, it's probably that's declining now over time. Um, but your, your own soft label for these folks was much more lucky to be middle class. When I did my McComb County, it was, uh, it was about middle class and my first book, it was middle-class dreams.
Cause that's what Facebook about
James Carville: [00:11:17] James Carville. All in their twenties when this happened. So it was Donald Trump. And I'm asking you to be a little bit of an armchair psychiatrist here, but when I read about this, his response to the current unrest seems to be just taking a page out of the hot hat. Right. Does anybody have a reaction to that?
I mean,
David Paul Kuhn: [00:11:40] I try to allude to that in the epilogue, in what I call the afterward. And I would also say that, you know what he, well, this is a novel everyone's pointed out. He's, he's constantly reaching to Nixonian politics and the late sixties and early seventies, but it's not American the late sixties, early seventies.
And what I think a lot of the articles on that comparison have missed is just how pernicious crime was. And by late sixties, America and that alone, when we talk about the quote law and order issue or law and order politics, you know, that explains a lot of why Nixon had an appeal to a large public that, um, that, uh, including many, many voters in 68, who did not vote for him.
James Carville: [00:12:25] You know, but one of the remarkable things that's happened in the last 25 years, it was some exceptions, but for the most part, there has been a dramatic decrease in urban crime. I mean dramatic.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:12:39] Absolutely. Which is why Trump is flailing when he tries to, uh, use law and order today because, uh, the potency of, I mean, there was this, I give all the data, I give all the anecdotes, but one anecdote that's amazing is this amazing, this remarkable cover of life magazine, which has you guys remember better than me was, was really a mass appeal publication.
And it has. A woman's staring out, her, appearing out her window behind bars. And it's all about how the article entire article, the cover story is about how to get the best alarm system to protect yourself. And it's almost unfathomable to see an article like that today. Um, it was really a different America and I mean, many other things about the urban decay of that time are forgotten, especially the pollution.
But the other thing is the reason I focused on New York city is as, as I talked about in the book and it's almost unfathomable to today's, uh, the, to those who've seen New York today is that New York city was actually quite. Indicative of what you could call the middle, the middle American squeeze. It was a blue collar city.
Then it was still a majority blue collar, whites and diversity was happening fast and furiously. And, um, in, in the previous decades, in New York city, but at the same time, it was still a working class town who was just starting to see it as buddy new age of. Uh, this new information economy, and it had been losing hundreds of thousands of jobs, especially for example, two longshoreman jobs at the time.
And so the D industrial causation of America hits New York city before it hits America. And so in many ways, New York city was an omen of what would happen to America to this, uh, to this blue collar, white America, at least
Stan Greenberg: [00:14:21] the part of the, the part of the story with, uh, with David, there is the kind of lack or a lack of respect.
Of America, the kind of lack of respect there and visibility, particularly as you look at college students and protestors that emerged in this rebellion hardhat rebellion, but it's kind of a lack of recognition, lack of respect, Robert Kennedy, you know, it was, it was, it was. Part of his central identity and why was plausible that he could have built, you know, the coalition.
But, but if you look at what I was saying in my first McComb County study, it was listened to his voters, respect what they're saying, whether it's, I actually started with a quote from Robert Kennedy, uh, you know, which said something about racial justice and one of the people responded with no wonder they killed him.
Um, I argued he's raised us for sure, but understanding his reasons for why you acting this way. And Democrats ought to be listening to these voters as well. Bill Clinton understood that, but if you look what happened to Hillary Clinton and why Donald Trump got elected. He respected working with people that was just central message in the forgotten Americans.
And the reason why he's going off with ultra nationalists white nationalists, now that he's lost them, you know, that they figured them out pretty quickly and pulled away from them.
Al Hunt: [00:15:46] ELL. We want to talk about a lot about what's happening today. I just want to stick a little bit on, on what happened with a hard hat riot, David, you know, when your book is just extraordinary and when you read it, you look at both sides and you try to put yourselves in their shoes.
Both sides did atrocious things. I mean, the students occupying buildings, burning flags, running rough shot over people, and the hard hat workers, you know, just acting like thugs, beating up people, including women and the cops standing by, but both also thought that they were operating on a higher moral level.
Almost the students were protesting against what really was an immoral war, where Americans were dying 5,000 miles away for who know what. What caused and the hardhat workers. I think you really bring home. They're saying, Hey, we're the, we're the people who work. I mean, we work nine to five. We pay our taxes.
We raised our kids. We were the ones that fought in Wars, not you privileged sons of bankers and lawyers and everything. And the resentment was palpable. So I, you can really empathize with both sides in that, in that awful confrontation. And
David Paul Kuhn: [00:16:57] unfortunately not enough people did. Um, except, and I wouldn't know what that, the greatest attribute of RFK is that he tried.
Uh, and that's why I draw that contrast with RFK and other sort of the rising liberal, uh, new left of McGovern, Lindsey and McCarthy, uh, at this, you know, it's, it's almost hard to, first of all, I, I tried to return readers to just how important the Vietnam war was in capturing the class strife. Rocking in America, but especially the democratic party that I still think to this day.
And I include Ken burns. Recent documentary is tremendously under discussed. When we look back on the Vietnam war and it came to symbolize, uh, really in its in the most. In a life or death way that two blue collar whites, they were, they, they felt, and they largely work in Horton until 1969 by the mass media.
And then, and certainly became an object of derision for the new left, uh, that they were, they felt they were making the sacrifice and they were whether it was whether it would be war and. And whether later it would be, uh, taken on, uh, certainly racially loaded issues like school busing. It was ultimately them who were gonna, who were going to experience Boston.
So, and, and so it, a mindset starts forming not only that, the forgotten and to ride it for their sacrifice, but that it's them who have to make further sacrifices. And it's not, it's no coincidence that the first time, the term limousine liberal. It's used, it's used against John Lindsay in the 1969 mayoral race.
And that, that ma that branding of
James Carville: [00:18:33] pockets, you know?
David Paul Kuhn: [00:18:34] Yes. And I focus on Mario, Procaccino it in the book for, you know, a page because it is amazing how much the elite, New York media condescended him and most, most atrociously in a new Yorker article that I believe that if. If memory serves me right.
Refers to a time in Americans, as creatures at one point and not ironically. Um, and he, and it was a condescension that would never have been tolerated towards in those circles at that time towards African Americans or Puerto Ricans who were the largest Hispanic population in America, in New York city at that time.
And it was, it was acceptable. It was so accessible that you could write it in the best publications of the time. So, um, what I, you know, one thing to show is I, you know, One thing you see then, and you see now is, is the psychic weight of that that separates these people from the blue collar whites or the white working class from the college educated, left, and sort of the left.
That would be the, who would start coastal culture. And basically govern goes to culture and the information economy, uh, This left, uh, you know, this, this weight, this cultural weight would, would, he would even, that would even come to weigh down Democrats who were trying to bridge this gap. And it was, and I think that's been true for 50 years and it began back then.
James Carville: [00:19:58] So Stanley, let me go to you for just a second. I think the most profound gaff in recent American politics was deportable. I mean, had. Was that just reinforced everything in David's book. And what is really odd about it is that I remember distinctly in 92, Hillary was much more blue collar oriented. And bill Clinton was very skeptical of tray of NAFTA.
Something happened over there, but it's my recollection bride. Do you remember the same thing?
Stan Greenberg: [00:20:35] I was short. I mean, first of all, you're right about Hillary's history and in the internal debate, you know, particularly on that, where she was strongly opposed to it, if you never, I think she hinted at it in one of the debates once you ran for president, but the, but she was very much part of a mindset at that point.
And the deplorables, I think the working class was invisible to the whole Obama. Mmm. Clinton administration. I was, uh, I was, you know, the, both of us wrote with some passion, to what extent the Obama administration rescued the banks, but left working people, black and white. Um, we're closed at our homes and working or invisible.
We had it. We, the whole democratic party ran for a decade on let's build on the progress. Um, as working people got screwed, left behind, lost their homes again, like work, but it's also what happened to Hispanics and what happened to black Americans as well. Um, we were totally blind to what was happening to working in America.
Therefore we didn't understand Trump because they were invisible. The deplorables captured. Um, this invisibility on the part of demo,
David Paul Kuhn: [00:21:58] I would add to that. Just so people envision that invisibility, because I think sometimes it's difficult. People don't understand why are they invisible? If many of the people analyzing and on TV are white, but to the.
But the blue collar whites by now are the, are the demographic that are most foreign to those who work in our elite media. They are, they are in, in cities, from New York city to San Francisco to LA is now largely a, um, An affluent white, if not rich white demographic, poor minorities, or of course the wealthy class of minorities and blacks.
And, um, and it is the people who have left cities in recent decades. The most though, not exclusively are, these are the white working class. So they literally are the most, the demographic that they run into the least in their daily lives. And I don't think. That. And I do believe that played a significant role in, in, in the last few decades and the inattention to them.
But I also think it helps explain psychologically if I can also play armchair psychologist, that what happened in Washington after the great recession and that the, um, if you look at the data on DC, it never on political DC, which I did. Where the political class lives. They'd never had a recession.
They'd literally never experienced a recession. They were most removed from it. And I think that that, um, contributed to what I would, what I argued then and what I still believe was, uh, an unfortunate, um, an unfortunate hesitancy to emulate FTR and his motto manic focus on the economic crisis at hand.
Well,
Al Hunt: [00:23:35] yeah, I agree with that. Let me ask you this. Cause I've always been intrigued by this things began in 1970, the transformation as you write in your book there, but I love to look at 1988 versus 2008, just a couple little things. And Stan, you can explain if you take Pennsylvania state that James knows well in 1988, Uh, those OCI Chardonnay and brief Philadelphia suburbs, Montgomery and Chester and bucks, they went overwhelmingly for George Bush, 60%.
Uh, Michael Dukakis was lucky to get 37 38 in the Western part of the state, Westmoreland and Washington. Really? These are the working class. Overwhelmingly white districts. They went 59, 60% for the caucus. 20 years later, I total flip, I mean, Obama carried Montgomery and Delaware huge. And, and, and, and the Republicans carried the West.
And I, you know, I think the same thing was probably true in a number of other counties. Um, why, what happened in those 20 years?
Stan Greenberg: [00:24:39] Well, first of all, the democratic party, you know, from every year has become increasingly the party of college educated voters. Uh, if you look at the Burton and you look at Michigan and look at Oakland County compared to McComb, Your every year, Democrats did better and better.
It's part of why Robin man was able to help lead. It went back of the Congress because the suburbs just became more and more democratic. It was just an extra inexorable that Democrats, you know, that the college educated post-graduates were lining was there. And that, you know, and there were increasing proportion of the, there had a four year college degree, but the big problem.
And while we got done or Trump is that 65% of the country, 65,000 registered voters. non voters out of four year. They're great. You know, the right now, like, you know, college, non college graduates are 46% of the electorate. So you you've made this flip and it's because of the trends that moved toward God graduate.
Yep. It's been all right, but you actually. Last very dramatic erection, white word revolver.
Al Hunt: [00:25:57] So why did Obama? We all can agree that race has been a factor in the, in the Republican right-wing with surgeons and sometimes it's exaggerated, but why didn't Obama? I think he carried McComb rather handsomely both times.
Why?
David Paul Kuhn: [00:26:12] Oh, I mean, it's, it's, I think you're repeatedly the great recession. Uh, you know, I was riding into the wind at that time in those about bro. I mean, I really, I look, listen, Stan, you're the pollster of, you know, decades of experience. And I don't want to try too far in your territory, but I broke out that exit polling, every which way I looked at all the data on weekly polling.
I wrote a huge piece at the end of the 2008 campaign. When I was at Politico on how I thought there was basically argument that there was an absurd amount of hyperbole about what was, what had changed with, listen, you have to set aside the immensely historic important fact that it was the first African American to become president in a country with the original sin of slavery and are probably the first.
African minority to become president in a pluralistic democracy, frankly. So that's all exceedingly and historically important and has gotten its due and should continue on we'll. Now put that aside for a second. Everything else. All the hyperbole after that election was largely BS. And I looked at all the data.
And if you looked at when Barack Obama got his mantra, sustained his majority support made his great inroads with whites by the waist securing historic levels with white men, not seeing since Jimmy Carter, uh, when that happened, it was after the Lehman brothers. It was, it was as the great recession became something, you know, Oh, once or twice in a lifetime economic crisis.
And that was why I always felt Barack Obama's opportunity was, you know, as I, as I wrote, then you dance and, you know, quoting an Axiom, you dance with the issue that, that brought you, you danced. And I felt that that should have been the focus. And I still feel that today,
James Carville: [00:28:03] Darrell Royal said that football coach at Texas,
Stan Greenberg: [00:28:07] a lot of research that prior, right, right.
Prior. Um, for the election, my, prior to the convention, uh, with, with McComb County voters and trying to understand whether they would a vote and they had concluded at that point, you know, he was going to govern for everyone. They didn't think it was a Jesse Jackson, you know? And so the issue for them, the top issue for them was he was with was Nasta and the, uh, and the economic crisis know central to that.
Um, and they broke for him, um, as a Democrat who would fight against the corporate the way CEOs control corporation. And it was a fairly good conventional vote at that point. Cause I didn't think he was. Somebody would govern for blacks only if you look at the reelection, I think the campaign had a huge impact with Romney.
As the nominee had a huge impact on them turning against them.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:29:06] I should also give Barack Obama and his close advisors credit where credit's due. They hate Barack Obama had positioned himself for reasons that Stan just spoke of to, to be a, uh, A vote against the status quo and he had run a very smart, um, and elegant campaign.
And, and that was, that was what was one key reason he was able to, I mean, to be crass benefit when the, uh, the market crash occurred, benefit electorally, of course.
James Carville: [00:29:33] So let's talk about 20, 20, and Stan, I think you are of the opinion that Biden will do considerably better in this demographic. Uh, in 2020, can you tell us a reason for your thinking and where we all go and followed and exactly what percent you know, why, why are these voters so central to the success of the democratic party movement moving forward as it is to shrink and relative size to the total deal electric, that's still a hugely significant part of it.
So if you could talk about that a little bit, and David, I'd like to hear your. Observations.
Stan Greenberg: [00:30:16] Yeah, let me, let me go back to the definition of working class. Um, I was about to add this wrinkle, but majority of the white workers are women. And if you look at the American economy, we're working with, people are not in manufacturing and production, that's across a whole range of particularly above all service positions.
Um, and if you look at what happens to Donald Trump, yep. You had a revolt that was successful with both men and women. One white women by 27 points in 2016, but that's margin dropped by 13 points and 18. Um, and we've been running close to even with the women, because the fact is if you go across every demographic, black, Hispanic, millennials, if the women have a huge majorities against Trump, And that plays out in the work in the white working class.
Um, and if you are breaking even close to break, even, which is what we're showing now in polls with white workers of women or a majority. Mmm, yeah, just a very different election. And you hadn't 16 where the revolt was carried by both men and women.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:31:30] I mean, there's no doubt. I would just jump on that.
There's no doubt. Uh, Donald Trump is most vulnerable with women, whether college with let's talk about whites for a second, with college educated white women and a non college educated. So in other words, whites went white women of all levels. You also see movement as Stan could talk too, though, with men.
I am, I would say right now I looked at the data. I looked at recent polls. I looked at what breakouts there are. And you know, it's clear that Trump appears about. 10 points weaker with the white working class, but that's also how he looked in generally in the pre pre election polling of 2016, it appears that Biden's doing a few points stronger.
I would say my take with Biden is that he has a great deal of unrealized potential, uh, with the white working class. And there's clearly immense movements away from Donald Trump with college educated, whites and Biden. Performance at historic levels with college educated whites with, as a Democrat. And, um, Trump is weaker with them and, uh, you know, it, it obviously all disregards the fact that, you know, Trump has not minded the very voters that I sh you know, not paid attention to the various voters that made his election.
And I think that it's. He misunderstands why they backed him. And he's not the first president to do that, but he probably does it to a greater degree than any I can recall
Stan Greenberg: [00:32:55] if you look at 16, the difference was not the scale of the margins with white whiteboard. They were huge in the bowl. You know, prior to the 16 election, what the most of the polls missed was the, how big a proportion of the electorate, how much, how much motivation was driving up?
Whiteboard does registration and turnout really shaped the election. Margins were very strong. It grew a little bit stronger at the end, but the very big margin with white men in particular, but also was there for a long period.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:33:32] That's a great point and pollsters are compensating for that. That's a great point.
Stone
James Carville: [00:33:36] let, let let's assume I got a text. It was Mike Donlin and he said, James, uh, vice president Biden is listening to your podcast. He wants to know what David and Stan thinks you should do going forward. And this election and don't don't he gets out of horse. I don't have such a text with just a zoom.
I did give him some advice, guys, different advice.
Stan Greenberg: [00:33:57] Well, Yeah, a number of ways. Number one, respect working people, you know, the whole deplorables, the mindset with said, because it was comfortable and fundraiser to say it, it wasn't just a slip. You know, it was, it was an overall point of view. Nobody respects working people.
So his entire life, he needs to show it. And every evidence. Probably to do it when you're having to have virtual, you know, campaign. So first and foremost, you respect working people that, you know, that will be due to break, you know, in itself. And then he also unique United democratic party. Um, you still have a lot of young people, millennials, gen Z, you know, who have not warmed up at the Biden.
It's not a working class issue specifically. Um, but poor, you know, part of the broader need to consolidate, uh, and engage Democrats.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:34:51] I agree with all that, I would also say that, um, people have been advising Democrats to do this for a long time. What's different is Joe Biden is in a unique position because.
Of his history, you know, where you sit is where you stand. And I think that it, you know, a lot of politics does go back to the Greeks and, you know, we Sophos and doesn't work and people, you know, judge the principles and person beneath the politics. And I, you know, not always, and we can talk about Trump, you know, as a caveat and why he's so generous to most every thing.
But I would say that, um, by doing this. Particularly positioned because of his biography and because he's because of his nonjudgmental tone generally, and he's just not a judgmental guy, um, to make historic headway with the white working class and help really rebind RFKs dream. If I can go there for a second, I mean, this is such a, this is a long standing problem.
That's profound in, you know, I am my book focuses on this, the era of the late sixties, early seventies for a reason, because if you like. I always look at platforms. And if you look at the democratic platform in 1972, as I point out in my book, they, the job section led with youth unemployment and then it mentioned farmers.
And then it, I amazingly, it's talked about substantial unemployment among aerospace technicians, teachers and other white collar workers. But at the time, the majority of their, of the democratic base is blue collar. So you just, you see that the, the disconnect between the, the, the, the party elite forming then, and the party elite now, and as you guys have talked about, you know, white working class voters, there's still more than four and 10 voters and, uh, and their weights in, in the presidency and making the presence and even more so in the, in, in who.
Governance Congress is immense. And the greatest thing Democrats can do to alleviate purple state Democrats with our presidential candidates burden is for the left to take away some of the cultural baggage that they're constantly forced to shoulder. Well,
Al Hunt: [00:37:00] I, I think, you know, Joe go into stance point.
Joe Biden has. A tremendous advantage, Stan, I think in the task that you lay out, because it's who he is, it's natural. He doesn't have to work at doing that and whatever her real beliefs were before. I, it's not just the deplorables. That was one of the worst comments of all times. But I remember that opening Hillary Clinton video, the day she announced in 2015 and there were, it was well done.
And there were couples all over America. There was an elderly couple and there was a younger couple and there was a gay couple. And there was a couple of color. The one thing you never saw in that video were what really you would look at as working class couples. I don't think that would be Joe Biden's opening message.
Cause I think as, as you say, it's who he is.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:37:44] I also think Biden like RFK. I don't want to overstate the comparison. Okay. Dangerous RFK has achieved mythology in, in, especially among political reporters, but yeah. But I didn't like RFK has some leeway with black voters in that he, you know, one reason RFK could talk about clown common plight in 1968, which was not a fashionable point of view, by the way, in the, among the punditocracy the reason he could talk about what was, uh, the common plight was because he had credit on civil rights with black Americans and, you know, That.
And so he could appear tough. He, he was seen as tolerant enough to appear tough on crime. And again, crime being a heavily racially loaded issue in the late sixties, much more so than even today. Um, but at the time, but I would say that Biden's opportunity is similar and that he, if he has a chance, Uh, to, if you can ignore Twitter and if he can ignore the naysayers because of his standing with African Americans, I think he has a real opportunity to talk about the common plight of African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, at least working class Asians.
And of course the white working class. And I think that that very few Democrats have had that opportunity because it's, it's because Biden, as you all have talked about, has the biography for it to be believable.
Stan Greenberg: [00:39:10] Let me, let me build on, build on that because when you go, when you go back. To McComb County.
And while Bama was winning, you had a working class that was really angry, that CEO that sold out their own companies, huge compensation, outsourcing jobs, abroad, supporting these trade agreements that were killing their own company. And what is, what is a common thread? Here is an anger about corporate America dominating politics.
It's not, you know, it's not just the identity being blue. It's also, what's happened to politics where corporate big money dominates politics. That means it doesn't politics. Doesn't work for working people. And Donald Trump has. Just to play that on such a scale, um, that he know he's broken the whole, he had on working people in the midterm election, but could he be even bigger,
James Carville: [00:40:07] terrible mistake.
Obama was listening to Tim Dighton and Eric Holder and not going after any of these bankers. I think that just drove people nuts. That they can just walk there, you know, got away with it and make them I'm sure if you look back on it, they had to do it economics, not a morality plate, but it's almost like they enjoyed doing it.
And I think I asked what people felt and that cost us a lot.
Al Hunt: [00:40:33] They didn't have to do a change, not written, you know, you're first of all, you're right. I think they I'd give them a, a, you know, a 95 on how they rescued us from the abyss, but you're absolutely right. The one thing they didn't do. And, you know, you saw that when you talk to people, uh, in places like Western Pennsylvania, Michigan 16, nobody who was a big shot suffered.
Nobody went to jail. No one was prosecuted. And I think to bring it up to it, when I read these stories like yesterday about all these special fat casts are getting federal monies now, and no, one's gonna look at it. And I think Trump Stanley could suffer the same problem. Uh, this time this could be a real rip off.
Stan Greenberg: [00:41:11] Absolutely. I mean, tarp, uh, The bailout of the banks was perceived to be Obama's main economic policy. Um, and it came, it came with bonuses and no accountability and nobody going to jail at the same time, nothing was done about mortgages and people, uh, you know, uh, you know, Bankruptcy. It was so clear and it was such anger that defined the Obama presidency and economic program.
And so this is a, we are, this is very alive and everything I've seen, the Biden campaign is actually focusing on that economic corruption, you know, center centerpiece. And so there's like every reason to believe that they, you know, they see the opportunity.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:42:00] I mean, if I can say something a little controversial jumping off what's being said, I actually, as important and deplorable Hillary Clinton's deplorable comments were because it, it felt true because of the decades behind that comment, to those who are the target of it.
Um, I actually think Hillary Clinton gets a little too much. Blame compared to Barack Obama for the position the democratic party was in, in 2016 to allow for a candidate to run and make historic inroads with the white working class. And I think it's the, the reasons are that, uh, Barack Obama had an historic opportunity for, you know, after the great recession and while he, he saved and they, they deserve full credit for helping to stave off a prolonged crisis.
Um, they moved to healthcare and as important as healthcare is, and as important as it is to the economic stability of, of, of middle and working class people, um, I, it wasn't, it was not a program focused on cost, which is often where they're hit most. And I think if you, and it certainly, as I was writing that, and if you looked at the data to many lower and middle class whites, uh, they felt they were bailouts for the big wigs and bailouts for those below them economically, but that they were all over again.
Just put to the side and told to fend for themselves. And then you would read these awful articles about blaming down in the elite media. Like, Oh, maybe it's testosterone for the guys who are losing their factory jobs, or maybe it's, uh, they should just move. And, you know, it's as if it's so easy to uproot your life.
And it was just, uh, I just think that there was a lot of missed opportunity there and I don't think, uh, recent historians have grappled with it fully.
Stan Greenberg: [00:43:43] In real time game Carville and I've tried to persuade the white house, um, that they are missing working people or the class that's ongoing. That's going to shape the midterms in down-ballot and into Greenberg.
And I wrote an op ed, New York times after the second election. Is Barack Obama responsible for the democratic philosophy
Al Hunt: [00:44:04] stand McComb County votes today? How does it go?
Stan Greenberg: [00:44:07] I'm not going to say without, I think Biden will do very well.
Al Hunt: [00:44:10] Well now there's that is that over 50%
Stan Greenberg: [00:44:14] probation on hope I've not been, I've not, uh, I've been on a whole, I'm totally going back and I'll go back soon to get my own reading, but there was a look at what happened in the midterms.
Um, Republicans got flooded. Right. Mmm. Well, I'm looking at the statewide numbers right now, providing to the midterm numbers, right. I think, you know, Democrats,
James Carville: [00:44:42] so let me just make a point, but culture and hard permeated deplorable comment that the thing that people don't realize is she had said that. Six or seven times before and nobody on the staff, uh, secretary Clinton, this might be a better way to reframe that.
I mean, everybody
David Paul Kuhn: [00:45:10] thinks that the
James Carville: [00:45:10] point is it. I know it, that was a mistake clearly at Obama reaction to the financial, you know, to the. Bankers was, was, was a mistake, not going after him, but it that's so much too much little pushback for that in high end levels of democratic strategy. And somebody has got to like take somebody's goddamn consultants and throw them up against the wall.
Like, what are you thinking about out there? Yeah. W why do you think you can do this?
David Paul Kuhn: [00:45:43] Absolutely. And that that's a key point. No one flagged that comment. And if there were other Democrats around her at the time, including mr. Carville here, uh, and, and Stan, uh, I don't think, uh, that comment would have made it past the first use.
And it's, it's, it's a striking example for what a captures that the elite of the party has not retained consultants, enough people around them that have kids. Clear bonds to that, to this part of
James Carville: [00:46:10] America. You know, I wrote a piece when the campaign started, I said, my advice is to put your campaign headquarters in Buffalo.
And if you think it's a gimmick, you know, we've been when we were, if you're in Brooklyn, Oh your Georgetown, everybody that you see, if you go around, thanks like you did. And if they're a Jew in that whole Brooklyn mentality, And I, I went to that headquarters and it just the culture of a campaign and the people around it just means something.
And, you know, if you had to go to a pizzeria and eaten good Buffalo, that's a lot different than eating pizza in Brooklyn. I'll promise you. Pizza by the bed in Buffalo guys. Let's let's,
Al Hunt: [00:47:00] let's, let's take this to the next four months, just as a final part here, because what I mean, I think what you both are saying is that Biden starts with a.
A clear advantage Stanley, you wrote the other day that I'm sorry, this is not 2016. His advantage is far greater than any edge Hillary might've had at this comparable time. Um, what is there, if you lay awake at night, is there anything you see that could go wrong?
Stan Greenberg: [00:47:27] I, you know, I'm awakened genuinely, um, on weather.
Trump can be dislodged from the white house. So I, for me thinking through scenarios, I'm on our competitor, hold on to the white house for me, my biggest worry. You know, what I, what I, what I wrote in that piece is we are, we're happy to make sure that we just go for the thing is possible when take advantage of every opportunity to get a maximum wind that makes it.
Hard, maybe even impossible, but then to steal an election that's been lost so dramatically because it's just a scale of winners as necessary. But also though, if I look at risk, you know, if I look at Trump and I look at Biden, Obviously you have constantly will say things have slips, you know, that will offend some group.
And then we'll come. We looked early in the, you know, in the primary process and the debates, you know, what happened all the time, the sort of Prescott that happened all the time, but then I had Trump natural. Yeah, I think from the Bible is going to do is going to be the risk to him. How does that measure on that?
The two big issues managing the economy? Do I think the economy is going to still have digit unemployment, massive unemployment. We'll come November. Where do I think the economy is going to be surging ahead? Which is the higher probability. I think the country's gonna have control of the pandemic coronavirus.
Where's it going to look like? It's still not under control. Yeah. If I look at every one of the really big, I think Trump chase is more at risk. Well, for me says, just go for the biggest possible election. Make sure we don't have per the close. Yeah,
Al Hunt: [00:49:25] for a final thought, but let me ask you this. Just stretch your imagination for a minute, David.
And one of the interesting figures you wrote about in that 1970 confrontation was George Daley. One of the construction, uh, leaders. Uh, wouldn't you think George Daly's granddaughter would be politically today.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:49:44] They're watching. I'm guessing they're watching they last week I was on Tucker Carlson and they wrote me, I got a text right away from his daughter that she saw me on Tucker.
So, uh, they're fans they're there. I would say that they watch Fox news and, and they many would, I don't want to talk particularly about anyone at guests, their politics. It's a very private thing, but it's clear that that people in her world are much more likely to Sue that part of long Island, which is still blue collar.
We are much more likely. To support that blue collar white are much more likely to support Trump and much then sort of anywhere in the five. Burroughs with the exception of Staten Island. And, um, and I would say that there's there's, they are where we're, um, Joe Biden's opportunity is that, you know, but I think the part of that opportunity and the ambition and the strategy that could, you know, win put Democrats, especially in Congress in a better position is, comes with some humility and, and, and that this is a 50 year problem.
And, you know, I, there's a reason. I end the book on the 72 convention, 72 campaign because that's 72 convention. The delegates were diverse by sex and by race. But you know, nearly four in 10 of the delicates had attended graduate school, which is like tenfold, the share of graduate degrees. At the time, the average wealth of the delegates was twice the typical Americans.
There was just very little attention to what had been the central focus of attention of the democratic party for during the FDR coalition. And I think that that. Foretold, what is still a problem for the democratic party? And it, Joe Biden is in a unique position because of his story and because of generally who he is to help ameliorate that, that long standing historic wait that and problem that albatross on the democratic party.
James Carville: [00:51:31] So David. Give me a little bit of your biography, tell people where you grew up and where you went to school. How does this guy come up with this book? I think the most perceptive or some politics central, get me a little bit of who is David Paul, Kim.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:51:45] Uh, the most I spent most of my youth in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the suburbs of Milwaukee, um,
James Carville: [00:51:50] wow County
David Paul Kuhn: [00:51:51] in the North shore, but in the part of, uh, I grew up, I was in Glendale, which at the time you would say was much more.
Catholic much more, um, Reagan voter, parent children of Reagan voters, and, but right near Fox point and Bayside, which are, uh, which were certainly the college educated and much more affluent, uh, parts of, of what is the North shore suburbs of Milwaukee. And, uh, and I think, and then I went to, um, I went to, uh, University of Wisconsin, but I didn't go to Madison.
I went to a Claire just by accidents. They had the only world religions major, and I was interested in religion then. And they had a very good journalism program. So I went there and, um, got, uh, got financial support to go there. And I think that looking back to be honest, I think that that was deeply formative and me realizing that even as I moved, spent years in Washington and New York city and she, she areas, I would say of those places.
To sort of really keep me tied to what I still think is the F the potential FDR coalition, and really voters who have been disrespected and forgotten by both parties and the powers that be, um, in America.
James Carville: [00:53:08] So Stan very quickly tell us about where you grew up in your childhood and your parents. What was your socioeconomic status?
Stan Greenberg: [00:53:16] Um, I, we, I grew up in Washington, DC, even not in this judiciary self on engineer, but didn't have, did not have a college degree. Couldn't get a very strong job. We lived the number of years in all black neighborhood, uh, when moved to a kind of work kind of lower working class. Jewish neighborhood? No, ma'am no member of my family had gone to college yet.
Uh, the, um, was part of the desegregation, uh, and Boston, uh, in Washington, DC after the Supreme court decisions, um, the, um, um, went to Miami university in Ohio. Um, to college, he went to Harvard graduate, uh, graduate school. Um, I said that formative for me was, um, I believe, um, you know, living in an all black neighborhood, but also the civil rights movement was my first politics before the Vietnam war.
Um, and that came together when, when the, you know, the antiwar candidates and you then have to choose your politics when I was, uh, you know, at Harvard, but I'd go into Miami, go to a state school, you know, before that.
James Carville: [00:54:23] Right. Okay. That just works. I think it's very important that our listeners or subscribers or whatever, they all know something about the people who've just making these brilliant point after point after point.
I'll turn it back over to Al I knew this was going to be a great show. It exceeded any expectation that I have. I don't honestly say this, but humility or something. I don't think you get more insight. In American politics possible. And you got in the last hour on his show over to you Al
Al Hunt: [00:54:54] well, I wouldn't concur.
Totally. And I would urge all listeners by the hard hat riot by David Paul Coon is really great. And all of us are waiting for Stanley Greenberg's returned to McComb County so he can tell us what's going to happen. And that Stan, one thing that, that, that County has doubled in size in 50 years and the politics and the demographics aren't much different.
So what you find out there will be an interest to us all.
James Carville: [00:55:18] Albert tell him about the Robert drew movie, because they talked about Robert Kennedy a lot, but tell David and Stanley about that film.
Al Hunt: [00:55:24] If you guys haven't seen crisis. You really ought to it is a unblend stand as a RFK person. You would, it captures RFK.
Uh, they got these filmmakers got total access to Robert Kennedy and George Wallace during the Alabama. A desegregation confrontation while I was staying in the school house, or even to the point of where they were in the oval office, filming a session with Robert Kennedy, the president top advisors. And it really, you, you appreciate Robert Kennedy and new, if you haven't seen it.
James Carville: [00:55:59] Right. And da piggyback was a young assistant director and you can, it's a war room is you can see the similarities in the cinema verite, where it was shot. It's
Al Hunt: [00:56:09] called crisis. Have you seen it, David?
David Paul Kuhn: [00:56:12] I have not. And I just wrote it down. So I'm going to
James Carville: [00:56:16] Bravo drew. Robert drew is the director. It's so revenue, you can't it's like the godfather
David Paul Kuhn: [00:56:22] I'm I'm excited.
It sounds amazing. It's I always love discovering new media
Al Hunt: [00:56:27] where you guys have given us so much. I'm glad we can give you a little bit at the end, but as James said, this has been an absolutely fascinating show. Uh, I've learned a lot. James has learned a lot and I know all of our listeners have David and Stan.
Thank you so much right there.
David Paul Kuhn: [00:56:43] It was really, really my pleasure. Thank you.
Al Hunt: [00:56:53] James, do we want to just get out on this incredible hire? Do we have two or three minutes to
James Carville: [00:56:59] look at, break out, talk about a few bullets.
Al Hunt: [00:57:01] I want, you know,
James Carville: [00:57:02] They're hearing something for the money.
Al Hunt: [00:57:04] Yeah. One thing I was outraged by anything. Trump does. I thought this insistence yesterday, that colleges open, I think that's different than schools of, well, we really want schools to try to open to the extent we can.
Younger kids don't transmit this quite as much. It's going to be different. As Bouchie said in Casper, Wyoming than it is going to be in New York city or Houston. But you want to do everything you can. I mean, these kids are young. Uh, the school lunch program is essential to a lot of the lower income kids, colleges and universities are different.
And for Trump to bully them to open and also limit the, say, foreign students can't attend those schools unless they're taking a course in person. They can't do it online was just, it just shows he doesn't give a goddamn about the health or the lives of these people. This is all for his political purposes.
Are we shocked? Of course not. But it's just another example.
James Carville: [00:57:58] I mean, I've told LSU I'm not. Yeah. You know, the 76 in October has no weight that I'd go to teaching a class. Right, right. I mean, no way. And a lot of faculty in it or not going to go in, but any of the schools, you know, I mean, this thing is it's difficult, really difficult going forward.
Al Hunt: [00:58:19] Social distancing. And 20 year old college students, uh, are mortal enemies. That's just not why you go to college to socially distance. James, you had a thing about Mary, about Mary Trump's book that you think is going to be a big deal.
James Carville: [00:58:33] Yeah. Right. This is the way that people viewed it to five takeaways from very Trump book.
And the big news is he got somebody to take an sat. Because every journalist commentated everything, you know, I'll be forced to get a good and a good drug are the financial stuff. He screwed his brother out of some money and people will say rich people always do that.
Stan Greenberg: [00:58:57] One thing
James Carville: [00:58:58] in there is that he mocked his daddy when his dad had Alzheimer's every person in the world.
I mean, every person. Has had experience or is going to have experience with this kind of thing. And they know it. And it's just, to me, it's a prime example. If somebody takes away cheating as the sat, as opposed to being a big takeaway is opposed to his daddy or inherited $600 million from, he turned on him.
How many turned on Roy Cohn when Broadcom got aches, right? You can say that's Trump in broad cone and it's a bridge Manhattan lawyer. And this man out in people, dis if, if this is brought out in the right way, this is going to cut, man. I mean, I know, I think about my mother had it. Uh, everybody, I mean, it's just, you just, it's part of life.
And what kind of son of a bitch would mock his own daddy? God, man, it's the sickening in again, I go back to the cultural problem with people involved in high end politics. They just talk to each of them and that's, that was a problem with pillars campaign. It's a problem with Obama's high end and his administration.
And I have any, you know, I'm sure there. Get people to say, it's not true, but you know, it is. And the allegation is going to
Al Hunt: [01:00:30] hurt him.
James Carville: [01:00:30] I that's what
Al Hunt: [01:00:31] I I'll be stunned. Of course it was true. Uh, and that's what he is. And, uh, there's more to come. Listen. This has been really a, we've had an hour, uh, that I could, we could have had four hours.
It was just so good. Uh, and James, you stay you're out in the, Shenandoahs still stay safe. Give Mary a hug. And I want to thank everyone to listen to your 2020 politics war room and follow the show on Twitter at politics, war room and more and more people have been emailing us. So we hope you'll do that.
Politics war room@gmail.com as politics, war rum@gmail.com. Tell us where we're right, occasionally and also where we're wrong. If you have a comment or question for us, we appreciate the feedback. Thank you for subscribing. Please rate the show. Be kind. And tell your friends who are excited to see some change in this election that we think we're going to be in the forefront of telling you about that.
Tell family members or any friends to tune into politics. We're wrong. We'll talk to you next week. Stay safe and stay healthy. James, have a good weekend. .