In Order to Win, Edwards Needs to Change His Terminology

[On the Road]

The populism and emphasis on "two Americas" is a good message, and a lot of voters respond to it.

However, Americans are much more likely to identify with "the middle class" than with "the poor." Bill Clinton used this to great advantage in 1992. Despite his family's poverty, he began his nomination speech with "I am a child of the middle class."

Emphasizing the poor in those terms connotes altruism and helping the less fortunate. Admirable, but not enough to win a campaign. Emphasizing fair treatment for people like yourself who work hard and are getting the short of the stick is a winning platform.

I am not suggesting Edwards change any of his policies, only the way he describes them. But it is extremely important that the candidate appeal to self-interest as well as altruism.

[AtomicKitten]

1. He has to be careful not to invoke an image of class warfare.

[Fovea]

4. I think that he can do well

by noting that class warfare has been going on from the right for quite a while now.
And it is time we realize that there are far more working class than there are Paris Hiltons.

I think that declaring a real live class war is actually something working Americans would respond to, if that class war was framed around job protection, universal health, and universal educational opportunity.

[jmp]

14. Exactly

Why fear a winning battle?

[Fovea]

2. I would prefer that he reclaim the term

working class.
As opposed to leisure class.

[onehandle]

3. I agree. I don't think the middle-class gives a rat's ass about the poor.

Even though they're mostly a paycheck or two from being one of the poor.

Talk directly to the people who actually vote and tell them what they need and what you'll do for them.

[sandnsea]

5. NO Blurring the distinction of middle class is the problem

There are the poor, the working class, and the middle class who are the professionals and business owners. We need to use the correct terminology and let people know that the median income is actually down around $30,000 - not $100,000. When someone talks about tax credits to help the middle class - they are NOT talking about anything to help the majority of Americans.

[w4rma]

7. There are the poor and middle class who are the working class.

Professionals and small business owners work, too.

[sandnsea]

8. Keep muddling it all together

And keep having all the tax benefits going to the upper 10% with the bottom 50% slipping further and further into poverty because nobody is talking to their needs.

[jdlh8894]

11. $30,000 Median?

At 54 yrs. young, I have NEVER made more than $20,000/year. Yet I sustain and maintain a decent household.Tax credits don't help me,and I've never received Government assistance.I have this strange feeling that I am part of the majority of Americans.

[sandnsea]

12. That's my exact point

When they talk about middle class tax credits, they aren't talking to you (or me). Yet people like those in the OP want to call you middle class. It makes no sense. You are part of the vast majority of Americans and I am sick and tired of politicians who pretend those making $100,000 a year are the majority. They're the teensy minority and it's high time they, and everybody else, figure it out.

[On the Road]

19. Yes, But it Doesn't Require a Change in Policy

I know a lot of people in the $20k range and below and none of them think "I am one of the poor." People associate with others like themselves and tend to regard themselves as one of the crowd.

Giving a tax break to people who earn $100k is not the issue -- that is not what Edwards is proposing and he doesn't need to change his policies. AFAIC, he does need to change the way he talks about his constituency.

The term "middle class" is perfectly good -- it's worked in the past. But there may be another term that works just as well. It just has to resonate with how voters think of themselves. Not doing this is one of several reasons Edwards is so far down in the polls despite his appeal to the grassroots and activists. It is extremely important for him to find a different way of framing his policies.

[Basileus Basileon]

6. Smart analysis. Nice work. nt

[Frances]

9. I made the same point yesterday but not as well as you did today

I think middle class is the big tent that the Dems need to set up.

I think that most Americans who are not super rich think of themselves as middle class. And I think that most people who are not super rich have economic concerns. Health care costs, heating and cooling costs, transporttion costs, food costs are all going up. Every day we hear about jobs, good and bad, being outsourced.

[sandnsea]

13. Did college tax credits help you?

Those were for the "middle class". I can tell you they didn't help anybody I know. They sure didn't help me. You have to have enough money to pay for something before you can use a tax credit. When politicians talk about tax credits to help the middle class, they aren't talking about the majority of median income folks. They're talking about those between median income and rich - the $100,000 a year income middle class. If you don't understand the terminology, you can't understand why you never benefit from any of the economic policies implemented.

[Frances]

15. When I went to college back in the early 60s,

I had a gov't loan (National Defense Education Act). It was a direct gov't loan and I had 10 years to pay it back. As I recall, the interest rate was about 3%. For every year that I taught school, one year of the loan was cancelled.

My first cousin also attended college with this loan.

Lister Hill, the Dem senator from Alabama, co-sponsored this bill.

Back in the days when the South sent Dems to Congress, they did do some things for regular folks. The present Repubs only help the super rich.

[sandnsea]

16. Back in the 60s

Times have changed. If you use these loans, you end up with tens of thousands in debt when you finish college. I don't even understand the interest calculations, it changes all the time. The Clintons promised help with the rising costs of college and the need to constantly retrain to be able to compete in the global economy. They gave us $1,000 tax credits, whooo, how helpful.

I can't say anything about southern dems because it's called region bashing. I'll just say most of them are worse than Clinton.

[Frances]

17. The Repubs saw the loans as a way to give money to the

corporate lenders.

I spent hours helping my daughter analyze her loans when she graduated. The lenders had made several "mistakes" and it was hard to correct them. I couldn't go in person to talk to the lenders; I had to do so on the phone. Eventually my daughter consolidated the loans. She's still paying the consolidated loan off.

I wish she had had the same program I had.

[sandnsea]

18. Clinton created the Direct Loan program

instead of increasing the amount available through guaranteed federal programs. Hillary wants to eliminate the guaranteed federal loans altogether.

What middle class do you think his proposed "college opportunity" tax cut helped?. Who do you think can use a $10,000 tax deduction?

I wish things were different too, but I don't think it's the southern Democrats who are going to save us. I don't think continuing to pretend these programs are for anybody but the $100,000 "middle class" is very bright either.

[Frances]

20. I think you misunderstood me.

I didn't say the southern Dems were going to save us. I just said that in their day the Southern Dems did more for poor people than the Southern Repubs who took their place are doing. Both the Southern Dems pre-Voting Rights Act and the Repubs who replaced them were/are either overt or covert racists. I don't like racists period. All the same, the Southern Dems had some redeeming qualities that the Southern Repubs lack.

I was not making an argument for or against Southern Dems today.

[Uben]

10. I disagree, he needs a drastic change

....if he is to turn the polls around. I want to hear some promises if he's elected to bring home the troops, help start post-administration impeachment of Bush and Cheney, eliminate earmarks, enact health-care legislation, vetoes of any budget that is not balanced, penalize corporations for off-shoring, and reduce trade deficits by putting the same tariffs on imports that other countries impose on us!

Dammit, it's time these politicians start turning things around and bring us back to the industrial power that made America great.
It's time we spent some money on our own people and quit worrying about trying to save the world. Why should we pay for their bad choices? I want a president who is intelligent (unlike the damned 60 yr old third grader who is currently occupying the whitehouse). A man/woman that is not afraid to piss people off by doing what is neccessary to bring this country back to it's former glory. It has to be someone who can make sure the immigration laws we have are enforced and make it a very, very harsh penalty to hire any one in this country illegally. They need to make college educations more affordable for American kids and forget about financing foreign students before Americans.

Why can't we have a candidate who mirrors these views? Give me back my country! Screw Iraq! Screw Iran! We have to stop fighting wars for other countries like Saudi Arabia and Israel. We can sell them the weapons to do the job themselves and put OUR people back to work. If they are too timid to fight, then they suffer the consequences. We lost over a half-million men in our own civil war, a dear price, but the freedoms it bought are still cherished today. These bastards giving away our freedom need to be exiled to a country where they are oppressed so they can experience what its like to lose their freedom!


I'm not holding my breath for anyone to step up and do these things, though. We need a hero, not a Nero!