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people like to say “if the Dems had stayed right on social policy & left on economics they'd be wiping the floor with the GOP.” The more I look into conservative organizing in the 80s the more blatantly false that seems. These orgs created the evangelical vote. (1/??)
These groups targeted evangelical voters on issues like abortion & gay rights & did so while hyping republicans from day one. The rise of these as hot button issues cannot be disentangled from orgs, churches, etc telling them to vote GOP. This is BC these orgs were (2)
Simultaneously knocking out liberal republicans. The second they activated these voters they took them to the ballot box for the GOP: church car pools, direct mailers, mens & womens “issue groups.” We forget that the Dems tried to be conservative on social issues till 2010 (3)
They stopped when they (rightly) realized that vote had been taken out from under them by very savvy operators like Weyrich, Viguerie, Blackwell, Robison, Robertson, etc. they had no “conservatives” left to try & grab. People who say otherwise have the casualty precisely reversed
Last bit: the fact is that the GOP put organized the Dems & the Dems dumbly responded by tacking right on economics and social policies. That alienated their bases & failed to win the voters they never had a chance with post-1976. They still haven’t overcome that breakdown.
