The Impermanent Republican Majority

Back in 2004 Karl Rove boasted of a permanent Republican Majority. That, of course, was before many Americans opened their eyes to the folly of the Chimperator's fools errand in Iraq and before GOP policies tanked the U.S. economy and nearly triggered another Great Depression. The GOP strategy focused on the red fly over states and the so-called exurbs of major cities. With the collapse of the housing market and rising gas prices, those same exurbs with their "Mcmansions" are no longer such a hot commodity. Indeed, many homeowners now find themselves trapped in the exurbs with upside down mortgages. Meanwhile, more people are headed back to the more liberal center cities. A column in the New York Times looks at the likely ongoing collapse of Rove's strategy. Here are some excerpts:

[T]here was no more jaw-dropping figure from the 2004 presidential election than this finding from the nation’s far-flung metropolitan frontier: George W. Bush carried 97 of the nation’s 100 fastest growing counties. . . . . New century America was pulling young families and newly middle class immigrants to the far exurbs, creating a vibrant new habitat for the Republican Party.

Many of the cities, at least some of the more hollowed-out and aging urban cores, were written off as inconsequential. The new electoral game was in the places where farm fields were being plowed under for asphalt. In Karl Rove’s strategy for a “durable Republican majority,” as he called it, lasting at least a generation, the exurbs were a key component of his master plan.

After a monumental housing collapse, and eight years of less-predictable changes in where Americans live, that thinking has been thrown out.

[N]ow the population boom to the exurbs is over, at least for the moment, according to Census Bureau figures released earlier this month. An analysis of those numbers done by William H. Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, found that growth in the cities, and densely-populated older suburbs, has eclipsed that of the exurbs since 2010.

For political strategists reading the fine print in county-by-county population shifts, Frey’s point is one of several reasons to junk Rove’s majority scenario. Among the factors driving the urban growth spurt are a desire by young people to live closer to the urban core than the urban frontier, high gas prices and the toxic housing and lending environment. More American live alone than ever before — about 33 million people, 28 percent of all households — and most of them live in cities.

All of which bodes well for Democrats, the urban party. Obama won 21 of the 25 largest metro areas in 2008. Among population clusters in swing states, he carried the Denver metro area by 17 points, Las Vegas metro by 19 points and Orlando, the fastest-growing urban area in Florida, by 9. He also won the Tampa-St. Petersburg area, by five. Each of these showings were big moves for Democrats.

By winning the urban vote — which made up 30 percent of the electorate in 2008 – in such a lopsided manner, Democrats could afford to lose rural areas, which were 21 percent of the overall vote. When Sarah Palin talked on the campaign trail about the “real America,” she was referring to a shrinking one.

The trends since the housing collapse have made older suburbs denser, and thus more likely to vote Democratic in the minds of some strategists. Racial diversity, and the need for more government services and infrastructure, tend to make the older suburbs more like cities in their voting behavior, said Ruy Teixeira, who has written extensively about changing election demographics.

Teixeira has been predicting an emerging Democratic majority since 2002 – based on voting trends of young people, ethnic minorities and white, college-educated city dwellers. . . . The new population figures have only fortified Teixeira’s view. At the same time, turnout in this year’s Republican primary has been dominated by aging white male voters, not exactly a roadmap for the future, given the trends.

But before these Home Depot-cluttered counties can be painted blue, some caution is in order. It’s misleading to think the exurban frontier is closed, or even emptying out. What has settled down is the growth rate. . . . . Low interest rates, stable gas prices and a bounce back in the housing industry could bring fresh life to the far fringes.

Still, for Democrats, the geography of tomorrow is the urban renaissance – a boundary that now includes big parts of suburbia.