Although it isn't the point of his column today at Real Clear Politics, Michael Barone touches on one of the perennial perplexities plaguing progressives. His point is that Americans want earned success, not a handout.
Mead makes an even stronger point when he writes that "for large numbers of voters, the professional classes who staff the bureaucracies, foundations and policy institutes in and around government are themselves a special interest." One, he adds, that acts "only to protect their turf and fatten their purses."
This helps explain why majorities continue to oppose the Obama Democrats' stimulus package and Obamacare. Democratic elites thought these laws would be seen as helping ordinary people. But they aren't.
They are seen as special interest legislation that helps politically favored constituencies. Which, as my Washington Examiner colleague Timothy Carney has documented, is an accurate view.
I think the larger mistake the Obama Democrats have made is that they suppose ordinary voters want government to channel more money in their direction.
There it is. Books have been written that explore why the liberal message doesn't resonate. Think of Thomas Frank and What's the Matter With Kansas. The presumption, that ordinary voters want government to "channel more money in their direction," has liberals are asking themselves, "Why aren't they more like us?" The question is quickly dismissed, though, so obvious that it's just the stupidity of the little people.
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