That’s because, according to Drum (who charted changes in public attitudes on issues like abortion, guns, gay marriage, taxes, and religion), “Since 1994, Democrats have moved left far more than Republicans have moved right.”
Not surprisingly, this shift is most acutely felt in rural and small-town America, which tends to be more non-college white and culturally conservative. “The [Democratic] party’s brand is so toxic in the small towns 100 miles northeast of Pittsburgh,” the AP tells us, “that some liberals have removed bumper stickers and yard signs and refuse to acknowledge publicly their party affiliation.”
Progressives sometimes lament the fact that working-class and/or rural Americans vote against their self-interest, by which they generally mean economic self-interest. To the degree their premise is correct, it comes down to culture. The materialists can’t fathom how intangibles like honor, respect, tradition, loyalty, religion, status, or identity so often trump pecuniary concerns. The truth is that not only will people often vote against their presumed self-interest to preserve their way of life, they will sometimes even die for it. This can be noble (as is the case with a war hero willing to die for his country) or even silly (think of the Americans who were so wedded to the anti-vax tribe that they would rather die than get a vaccine).
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