2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: If Bernie is courting progressive voters, why Liberty University? [View all]BainsBane
(53,035 posts)said Sanders didn't like to engage in the "cultural wars." It was in the context of a discussion about his position on gun control and, I believe but am not 100 percent certain, Black Lives Matter. His core concern is uniting the middle class and working class, and he has openly lamented the loss of white voters to the Democratic party, while complaining African Americans vote based on race.
His supporters are upper-middle class and middle-class white people, but many who fall in the upper level don't see themselves as such. If the poor and subaltern generally found his message appealing, more of them would support him.
Here is a chart of income division in America, household income.
That some here might think $150-$200k for a household income constitutes struggling does not make it so. It is in fact the upper 5-10 percent of Americans, and therefore upper middle class.
But the hopes and dreams of todays educated class are based on the idea that market capitalism is a meritocracy. The unreachable success of the superrich shreds those dreams.
Ive seen it in my research, says pollster Doug Schoen, who counsels Michael Bloomberg and Hillary Clinton, among others. If you look at the lower part of the upper class or the upper part of the upper middle class, theres a great deal of frustration. These are people who assumed that their hard work and conventional success would leave them with no worries. Its the type of rumbling that could lead to political volatility.
Lower uppers are doctors, accountants, engineers, lawyers. At companies theyre mostly executives above the rank of VP but below the CEO. Their comrades include well-fed members of the media (and even Fortune columnists who earn their living as consultants).
Lower uppers are professionals who by dint of schooling, hard work and luck are living better than 99 percent of the humans who have ever walked the planet. Theyre also people who cant help but notice how many folks with credentials like theirs are living in Gatsby-esque splendor theyll never enjoy.
http://business.time.com/2009/02/04/the-revolt-of-the-lower-upper-class-begins/
Now, I understand you believe your own worldview and experience is absolute truth and anyone who diverges from that is a liar. That does not make it so. It rather shows an inability to consider a frame of reference outside your own as legitimate. That you think the poor should support Sanders does't mean most of them do. His rallies suggest otherwise. They are overwhelmingly white, and the incomes of white people in America skew about 10x higher than people of color, which makes it terribly convenient for white people to tell AFrican Americans all they have to to is address "economic justice" (which is not in fact justice for all)
and racism will disappear. There is no evidence to suggest that point.
Additionally, that people complain about inequality as recent phenomenon and hearken back to a time of "real Democrats" indicates their views are tied to the decline of the white middle and upper-middle class. The country was founded on inequality and has perpetuated it throughout its history. Those days of "real Democrats" were also days when the majority were denied equal rights and lived in poverty, but the white middle class prospered at the expense of the many.