The Two Americas: Our Current Political Deadlock and How to Break It

Stanley Greenberg has written a deeply researched, extensively footnoted, highly readable indictment of our current political state, and we should be humbly grateful for it. From the preface, where he observes the press "...prefers the politics of character...." to reporting anything of substance, to the afterword, in which he presents the two scenarios he developed in the previous 300 pages to his focus groups, Greenberg holds very few cows sacred and presents a relatively even-handed treatment of the current political deadlock. However, I give you fair warning: If you, the reader, are not of the liberal persuasion, this book may irritate the starch out of you. Remember, I said "relatively even-handed." Also remember, I'm a liberal. Greenberg starts out with a short review of the last 200 years of political history, showing us that one-party domination is the rule rather than the exception. He devotes much attention to the last fifty years, in which no party has dominated, and even greater attention to the last 25, from the Reagan Revolution in 1980 to the bitterly contested and still controversial 2000 brouhaha, and on to the beginnings of the 2004 campaign. (Incidentally, I was reading the section on President Reagan when he died and for the first few days of our national mourning period. I was struck by irony: the facts in Greenberg's work versus the hyperbole issuing from every talking head on television.) Greenberg's liberal bias is highly evident in this section: he is far too easy on President Clinton. I laughed out loud at "...[he] advanced his proposals for gays to serve in the military, thus dramatically illustrating the breadth of the principle for America's ever-expanding rights." Oh, puh-leeze. The "don't ask, don't tell" policy was hardly a milestone in civil rights. The author goes on to discuss the makeup of each party's core voters, or base; to present hypothetical, occasionally foul-mouthed, and often amusing "secret planning sessions" in which potential party strategies are plotted; and in the final sections, to propose a plan for each party to break the deadlock and pull the majority of voters in line with its political views. Footnotes and graphs and "chalk talk" illustrations abound throughout. Greenberg writes in clear lucid prose, plainly setting out his premise while using minimal political jargon. While the book is meaty and dense with facts, the only dry thing about it is Greenberg's somewhat sardonic wit. It is a surprisingly funny book which should be read by every voter, regardless of political party.

A comprehensive blueprint for thoughtful, responsible discussion and for the pivotal decisions that are ours to make at a critical juncture in American politics in an age of globalization. An essential, engaging handbook of political strategy perfectly timed for the 2004 elections. Read this book sooner rather than later.

Everything the other reviewers have said about this book is true, and then some. It should appeal to anyone with enough curiosity to get beyond the standard boring "liberal vs. conservative" pap we get from what passes for analysis on TV. Although Greenberg is clearly on the Democrats' side, that's no reason for Republicans to ignore this book - it's full of interesting insights for both parties. I find myself wondering (March 2004) how all the groups Greenberg describes are reacting to the current campaign themes - outsourced jobs and gay marriage amendments. If you're planning to really get into the upcoming bloodbath, this book will make it a lot more interesting.

This is the book "du jour" about how to win Presidential election, and how our nation is now almost perfectly split between Republicans and Democrats. Each party accounts for about 46% of the voters. So, to win the White House you need to attract independents and swing voters. Our most recent two-term Presidents understood the importance of appealing to such voters. Reagan appealed to the "Reagan Democrats" in the eighties. While in the nineties, Clinton the ultimate new Democrat centrist, balanced the Budget, generated economic and job growth, and thus preempted Republican economic platforms. Nowadays, appealing to the 8% independents is very difficult because their value system does not fit within the two party system. Their values range from the classic socially liberal/fiscally conservative to the iconoclastic socially conservative/fiscally liberal, and anything in between. Greenberg's framework is really helpful in getting a Presidential candidate to earn a majority of the independents and swing voters. His information is extremely detailed, and emanates from cluster analysis. This is a statistical method that is increasingly popular in Presidential campaign strategy. You aggregate the general population in numerous clusters or groups sharing similar behaviors, voting patterns, value systems, education, income, and what have you. Greenberg illustrates several different examples of such clusters within cities such as Tampa or Seattle, or state as Iowa. Each cluster is given a different colorful name such as Tampa Blue, Seattle Eastside Tech, and Heartland Iowa. Each cluster can have subclusters reflecting more specific demographics such as the Super-Educated Women (Democrat loyalist) or Privileged Men (Republicans). The old motto "information is power" is truer than ever. This upcoming Presidential election is the battle of the demographic statistical databases. And, according to Greenberg and other sources, the two parties are again about even. The Democrats have acquired a database of 158 million voters dubbed "DataMart." While the Republicans have a database of 165 million people named "Voter Vault." These databases have over 300 "lifestyle variables" allowing the database managers to forecast voting patterns, and effectiveness of political campaigns. Armed with Greenberg's type of information, a Presidential candidate can now customize his message(s) to these various clusters of swing voters. Thus, the art of political eloquence nowadays is to target your speech addressing specific issues to your local or regional audience without contradicting yourself from one town to the next. The Presidential candidate who best understands the data, customizes his speeches with effective issues, and implement the best strategy will win more swing voters and win the overall election. Within the Democratic Primaries, Kerry and Edwards understand well this sophisticated game. Dean and Clark who had surging early successes in po

We Democrats look forward to another presidential election, hoping and indeed desperately praying that our man, whoever he turns out to be, does not have the kind of tin ear for the American people that has made us lose six of the past nine Presidential elections. And we know that, with Bush, we now have opposing us the slickest and most cunning political machine in most of our lifetimes, fully backed by a massive right-wing media propaganda machine that is absolutely willing to lie, distort and subvert democracy in every way it can get away with to continue and expand conservative right-wing power. For Democrats to have any chance to come back, either in the presidential election or as the dominant political party, then, one absolutely vital question must be answered: Why are so many obviously good and decent people willing to vote Republican, even if it is against their best interests--even if, deep down, they know they are being lied to? And what can and must Democrats do to turn the tide?"The Two Americas" explains what has happened, and offers the answer. America, it explains, is precisely split down the middle. Thirty seven percent of the voting population are loyalist Republicans, and another 37 percent are loyalist Democrats. Incredibly, another eighteen percent are split down the middle as "leaners," nine percent leaning toward the Republicans and nine percent toward the Democrats. So what we have today are two parties who play to equally-sized coalitions of passionate partisans, ignoring the most important issues of the day and turning off the rest of the electorate. The Democrats, for their part, have become an enclave of African-Americans and sophisticated urban post-moderns (with Union families thrown in), tone-deaf to the issues and cultural beliefs of working- and middle-class America. The Democratic Party also has consistently been too timid, refusing to describe, much less fight for, a comprehensive vision that would offer a true alternative to Reaganism.If you are a Democrat, this book will introduce you to the other half of America, the people, from blue-collar workers to heartland farmers, who don't see the world the way you do. This book, based on thousands of hours spent talking comprehensively to 15,000 Americans across the country and across the political spectrum from 2001 to March 2003, is a document of incomparable value. It's as if a doctor has finally thoroughly examined a patient and found the reason he is inexplicably wasting away. Let's hope, for the sake of all our futures, that the patient will listen.