Educated Voters Turned on Bush In November 7th Election

By Sherwood Ross

The Democrats got their 7-million vote victory majority November 7th, enabling them to retake control of Congress, in good part from educated voters who think for themselves.

Voters, particularly those with post-graduate degrees, have been educated to analyze issues and were among the first to see through the web of lies spun by the White House.

Those who initially bought Cheney’s line, for example, he knew “for a certainty” Iraq had WMD, learned over time when none were found they had been lied to, got angry and got active.

And if evangelical Christians remained in the Bush camp might it be too much of a stretch to suggest it’s because they accept what a political authority tells them just as they accept the Bible on faith? It’s in the “Bible Belt,” after all, where Bush is strongest.

It’s not that college-educated voters are unswerving Democratic loyalists. If the Republicans put up another Abraham Lincoln, they’d get my vote, too. But Americans will not tolerate blatant liars forever. And after six years of his lies, more and more voters, starting with best educated, have come to regard Mr. Bush as a pariah.

Bush is now so unpopular his congressional backers were scuttled by mere association with the word “Republican.” As columnist Robert Novak wrote November 9th in the Washington Post, “Republicans lost almost everywhere the president campaigned during the past week.” Added the Post’s David Broder, the only New Hampshire Republicans to survive were those not on the ballot.

Over the past six years, what has made people vote as they have? In the 2000 national election, states with low-levels of college graduates such as West Virginia(15.1%), Kentucky(18.9%), and Louisiana (19.6%) all voted Republican.

States with highest percentages of college graduates---Connecticut, (36.8%), Massachusetts, (36.6%); and California, (30.6%) voted Democratic.

There were exceptions to this but they were just that, exceptions: Colorado, with a population of 35.5% college graduates went for Bush. And Wisconsin, where only 25% of the population holds a college degree, went for Gore.

But if you added up all the “Red” states in 2000, you’d find, on average, only 24.7% of their populations hold a college degree. And if you averaged the percentage of “Blue” State college-educated, you’d arrive at a figure of 31.2%. That’s a significant difference.

Massachusetts, which probably has more universities per acre than any other state, voted strongly Democratic that year. South Dakota, with many fewer universities, was Bush Country.

According to ABC News of Nov. 14, “College graduates voted 53-45 percent for Democrats---the Democrats’ best margin in this group in exit polls since 1982.” ABC added, “voters by a 14-point margin were more apt to say they were voting to show opposition to Bush(36%) than to show him support(22%)…the anti-Bush voters were great enough in number to make the difference for the Democrats.”

There are political scientists who believe voters’ college education plays little, if any, role in how they mark their ballots. Professor Thomas Holbrook of the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee says there is “some correlation” between voting and education but “level of education is not among the important factors.”

Holbook thinks “party identification” is far more important as is whether people consider themselves liberal or conservative, and many political scientists agree with this. Might it be possible, though, the more college-educated voters a State has the more likely it is to vote Blue?

One group that does correlate closely with voting Blue are holders of post-graduate degrees. In the 2004 election, Kerry got 55% of those who had done postgraduate study compared to 44% for Bush, although Bush that year won among college graduates, 52% to 46%. Since then, however, enough college students stopped believing the White House line to give the Democrats a 7 point majority.

It’s also been noted more women than men are voting Democratic but the reason may not have to do with gender. As political scientist Thomas Schaller of the University of Maryland has written, “Women, who are already a majority of college graduates and law school students, continue to further feminize the American electorate with each passing election cycle.” (Italics added) Might the reason be women are now better educated?

As for religious belief, it may not be that wealthier religious churchgoers, say, Episcopalians, vote one way and less affluent Baptists vote another. Rather, consider that how one votes may have more to do with whether the religious believer accepts the miracles of the Bible on faith. There are millions of church-goers who take the Gospel literally. If they believe a miracle because the Bible says so, might they not also believe the political gospel preached by the White House?

Fundamentalists, said to form the backbone of the religious right, predominate the geographic area stretching across the mid-South from Virginia through Texas.

This is where the Republicans roll up their biggest majorities. My evidence is anecdotal, but my travels suggest patriotism is defined by many in this region as whatever the president says patriotism is. They are “God and country” people, even when the country is off-track and it's getting harder to believe God advises the president.

Dr. Thomas Schaller, an associate professor of political science at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, has written “poorer whites vote more Republican” and “the South remains, as ever, the most religious region of America.” He describes it as a region of “NASCAR men” who are “white, non-college educated, rural, married Christian men.”

In the 2004 election, President Bush got 78% of the white evangelical/born-again vote compared to 21% for Kerry.

My belief is voter disgust with a lying president starts among those individuals best able to see through a web of political deceit. It only makes sense those holding post-graduate degrees, particularly Ph.D.’s who have written dissertations requiring considerable analysis, are likeliest to lead such a charge. And as the better educated tend also to be “opinion molders” and more politically active, they are well prepared to sway others.

Red states and Blue states that have traditionally gone for one political party may not remain that way in 2008. Just as Americans suffering from the Depression swept the Republicans from office virtually everywhere in 1932, so every state could go to the Democrats if public disaffection with Mr. Bush runs deep enough.

I could be wrong. Voting patterns may correlate with skim milk consumption or the purchase of economy cars. But if education teaches people how to develop inquiring minds and evangelical religion teaches people to accept literal truth from authority, the ability to think for oneself may be the key to how people vote, rather than party affiliation or income. It’s critical thinking on the part of people with inquiring minds that shattered the neoconservative bubble in 2006.
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(Sherwood Ross is a Charlottesville, Va.-based public relations consultant to political candidates and newspaper columnist. Reach him at sherwoodr1@yahoo.com)