RSS Feed MenuThe upcoming 2010 congressional elections have the feel of 1994. Speculation is rampant of a Republican takeover of Congress.
In 1994, the Perotistas, — the supporters of 1992 presidential candidate H. Ross Perot — played a crucial role in the GOP’s capturing both houses of Congress. The Perotistas gave voice to the dissatisfaction of independents and moderates with Bill Clinton’s embrace of Midnight Basketball and Hillarycare.
Now, the Tea Party movement is providing the rallying cry against government bailouts for bankers, stimulus for social workers, and President Obama’s healthcare proposals.
Despite their similarities, the Perot and Tea Party movements are not identical. The Perotistas seemed like folks with slide rules and pocket protectors. In 1992, Perot ran well in California (21 percent) and Massachusetts (nearly 23 percent), in part because both states possessed high-tech and defense industries.
Perot’s backers evoked images of Richie Cunningham’s father on Happy Days, and the men looking at the consoles of NASA’s Mission Control. 57 percent of Perot’s 1992 voters were middle income, earning between $15,000 and $49,000, and 29 percent of his supporters were upper middle class, earning more than $50,000 annually.
The Perot pitch was empirical and practical. Emotionalism was not the mien of choice. Perot-ism was more an indictment of government waste and politicians than an attack on government itself. Perot-ism was about charts and balance sheets, and about better government — not no government.
Perot-ism was less about ideology. Perot supported the imposition of a gas tax and curbs on Social Security. In his 1992 campaign, Perot brought on veteran Reagan hand Ed Rollins and former Jimmy Carter aide Hamilton Jordan.
Perot voters were not wedded to either major party. Perot challenged both George H. W. Bush and Clinton. In 1992, 18 percent of self-described liberals and conservatives voted for Perot, while Perot garnered 21 percent of moderates and won nearly 19 percent of the overall vote. By contrast, polls show that the Tea Party weighs heavily Republican or Republican-leaning independent. Generally, Perot voters were moderate to conservative middle income independents.
Perot was pro-choice and supported government funded abortion. Perot’s supporters generally worshipped less frequently than the average Republican. Perot ran relatively well among white Catholics and mainline Protestants. In 1992, Perot garnered 14 percent of the Hispanic vote.
Perot finished second in Maine (30 percent) and in Utah (27 percent). He also ran particularly well in Idaho, Kansas, Montana, Nevada and Wyoming. Perot made strong showings in Arizona, Nebraska and Washington State. Perot picked up 23 percent of the vote in places like Vermont, Colorado and Rhode Island, but ran poorly in Alaska.
Although economic anxiety helped propel the Perotistas, one did not sense that its adherents were on a downward trajectory.
The Tea Party has a different feel. The Tea Party Convention was held in Tennessee, a state where Perot only scored 10 percent in 1992. Instead of a businessman, Tea Party icons are Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin and Ron Paul. Instead of complaining about government bloat, the Tea Party sounds a raw grievance about government itself.
Unlike Perot-ism, the Tea Party movement carries the whiff of the Confederate or the secessionist. Last April at a Tea Party rally, Texas Governor Rick Perry mused about Texas seceding from the Union. Earlier this month, Palin teased about secession. A South Carolina legislator now seeks to ban paper currency issued by the federal government as legal tender.
Still, the Tea Party is not strictly regional. It played a prominent role in Scott Brown’s Massachusetts victory.
The Tea Party appears more emotional and romantic than the Perotistas. Tea Partiers frequently don Revolutionary War era clothing — and every now and then strap a firearm over their shoulders. The Tea Party summons a spirit of an American volk, and demands a return to a constitutional arcadia.
Palin’s speech to the Tea Party Convention and Beck’s speech to CPAC helped crystallize the Tea Party. Palin attacked deficits and bailouts, and declared the primacy of the Tenth Amendment, which reserves authority to the States and the people. Separately, Palin stated that the Tea Party and the G.O.P. were compatible, and that a third party was not needed.
Beck’s CPAC speech was an emotional brew of confessional, jeremiad and altar call. Beck recounted his own alcoholism, spoke of retching in the morning, and urged the G.O.P. to have its own “Come to Jesus moment.” Perot was not one to share his feelings.
The cultural differences between the Perotistas and the Tea Partiers may also lie in the personas of the 1992 presidential election, and in the technologies and results of the 2008 election. 1992 was a contest between competing elites. Clinton was a Rhodes Scholar, Bush a millionaire Yalie, and Perot a billionaire Navy graduate. Each candidate attempted to find a base of support that in part mirrored him.
The Perotistas were a top-down movement funded by Perot. In contrast, the Tea Party is a grassroots effort that uses the same technologies that enabled Obama’s victory, technologies unavailable in 1992.
In 2008, Obama won those voters earning under $50,000, a majority of voters earning over $200,000 and a majority of college graduates. Obama ran even among middle income households, but lost the white working class by 18 points.
As president, many of Obama’s policies have tilted towards Obama’s base — the poor and the rich. Many feel that the president has forgotten Middle America. The Tea Party is their response.
PracticalGirl // Mar 2, 2010 at 11:54 am
Not sure if the Perot voters were quite as obtuse as many in the Tea Party movement, who seem to have no rationale for their votes except “not that guy”.
Texas Gov primaries today. A snippet from an article that typifies this problem NOTE: Here’s a voter who votes against a successful, sitting GOP Governor because of something that never happened, yet votes FOR the Tea Party candidate, ostensibly because she is inarticulate in offensive positions…And this seems all too typical.
“Kevin Merritt, a 31-year-old Frisco software developer who cast his ballot
shortly after polls opened at 7 a.m., said he considered voting for Perry before
finally going with Medina. He said he liked Medina’s goal to lower property
taxes and disliked Perry’s support of a now-dead project to build a huge system
of toll roads.
“I’m a pretty conservative guy,” Merritt said. He said he was concerned during
the campaign when Medina suggested the U.S. might have been involved in the
Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, but listened to the entire interview and felt she
just didn’t articulate her point very well.”
AP story referenced.
http://www.charter.net/news/read.php?rip_id=%3CD9E6D77O0%40news.ap.org%3E&ps=1018&sc_cid=
DFL // Mar 2, 2010 at 12:33 pm
Perot voters tended to be disaffected Reagan voters, peeled off by Perot because of disgust with the first Bush. Tea Partiers tend to be disaffected Bush II voters. Their commonality is that they abandoned one of the Bush presidents. I can’t blame them. Maybe the Republicans will learn that the Bush family is very bad news for the Republican Party.
teabag // Mar 2, 2010 at 1:25 pm
White,Old,Racists.
eriback // Mar 2, 2010 at 1:40 pm
The Perot people voted for Republicans. The Tea Partiers will create a host of NY-23 scenarios, helping elect more Democrats.
rbottoms // Mar 2, 2010 at 2:13 pm
As president, many of Obama’s policies have tilted towards Obama’s base — the poor and the rich.
Hey bub, me and everyone I know a decidedly middle class, actually slightly on the higher edges because dollar amounts in California are high, but then everything costs more out here too.
So, yeah ending the Iraq involvement only affects the poor people who signed up for college benefits and ended up in a war and those of the Southern persuasion with a family tradition of being in the military.
For those with incomes under $200,000 your taxes went down and the cheering section for doing even more to ease the burden on billionaires left town last November.
When HCR ultimately passes it will be middle people who can finally switch careers or geography tp go where the jobs are without fear of losing coverage.
Scrapping wasteful Pentagon programs, who does that help… panhandlers?
Not going to war with Iran… boring.
And yes flying a plane in IRS buildings may be one way to increase construction activity locally, but I don’t recommend it. I am sure the far right wing can come up with better solutions than that.
CentristNYer // Mar 2, 2010 at 5:25 pm
GOProud // Mar 2, 2010 at 4:46 pm
“Wow, the smae ol’ tired trolls out in force on yet another FF thread?”
Your paranoia really knows no bounds, does it?
Moderate // Mar 2, 2010 at 6:15 pm
Still, the Tea Party is not strictly regional. It played a prominent role in Scott Brown’s Massachusetts victory.
1) Do we have any geographical breakdown for Tea Partiers? I mean, it’s plausible to me that they’re clustered in the South, if just because that’s where most conservatives are.
2) I’m not sure how much of a role they played in Massachusetts, outside of campaign donations. Brown disavowed these guys. Whatever role they played, I wouldn’t call it “prominent.”
GOProud // Mar 2, 2010 at 6:38 pm
CentristNyer whines: “Your paranoia really knows no bounds, does it?”
Paranoia? Either you don’t know the definition of the word or your brain stem isn’t engaged in this thread, CentristNyer, and you’re still shooting blanks from the cheap seats.
Let’s review, eh? We have an article noting the differences between the Tea Party Movement of today and the United We Stand movement in 1994. Then we have comments from farLeft nutjob trolls. The best would be FF’s poster boi of the troll movement here, namely TeaBagged’s comment at #3 with the nearly unintelligible “White,Old,Racists” line. I guess for troll TeaBagged, that’s an improvement over an earlier thread “contribution” where he misapplied a Hitler analogy.
When you’re ready to leave the troll sandbox and chat with the adults, we’ll let you out. Until then, play nice with fellow-trolls TeaBagged and rbottoms, ok?
SFTor1 // Mar 2, 2010 at 9:38 pm
Good luck with the Tea Party contingent under the GOP tent. It’s hard to think of any better way to have independents run for the hills.
CentristNYer // Mar 2, 2010 at 11:38 pm
Thanks, GOProud, for proving my point. Again. Every single one of your hysterical posts — including your last one — rails against some imagined invasion of “far left trolls.” That’s a pretty textbook definition of paranoia.
Seek help.
GOProud // Mar 3, 2010 at 9:19 am
CentristNyer, I can appreciate your choice to remain in the sandbox with the FF farLeft trolls. It’s a perfect venue for someone who fails to grasp even the most obvious and simplest truth.
No imagination needed in underscoring the farLeft troll here. You included. I’d ask you to seek some help… why is it that someone, like you and the farLeft fellow trolls, need so badly to be heard they post on a site that was dedicated to advancing the conservative movement and restoring the GOP to majority power?
I’d no more spend time posting comments on HuffPo, MYDD, DemocratsUnderground or DemocratTrollBridge in order to rail against their uninformed opinions. So why do it here? You’re far, far, far afield from anything that would remotely constitute “relevant”.
sinz54 // Mar 3, 2010 at 10:04 am
SFTor1: Good luck with the Tea Party contingent under the GOP tent. It’s hard to think of any better way to have independents run for the hills.
Not necessarily.
The fact that the antiwar protests against invading Iraq were organized by real nut jobs like Code Pink and incorporated Communists, “truther” conspiracy theorists, and other assorted human trash didn’t stop sincere middle-class Americans from joining those protests. They found common cause because the stakes were so high.
Ditto for the antiwar protests against the Vietnam War.
The Tea Party protesters are no more nutty than these antiwar protesters. And like them, if the stakes are high enough, lots of sincere middle-class Americans will join.
SFTor1 // Mar 4, 2010 at 3:52 am
Don’t think so, Sinz:
One thing is to march against a cause, another is to watch a Republican candidate offer the red meat to these people that they seek.
Seems that the Republicans need to build a platform that makes sense to most Americans. That is not possible if you need to placate the views of the Tea Partiers. They may express legitimate grievances with the mess in Washington, but they have nothing to contribute towards responsible national governance.