Let's Factcheck Campaigns and Elections Magazine
From this piece (gated) in Campaigns and Elections magazine:
Since most Republicans live in rural America, where they are less likely to have broadband Internet, “we’re not fighting with a fair piece of the pie,” [“Republican Internet strategist David] All says. [Carol] Darr [a professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School] also points to differences between the parties. “The people who are white and working-class tend to be Republican, particularly those who are white, working-class, and religious.” She characterizes Democrats as “ostensibly being the part of the poor and working class, but they end up being the yuppie party and most people at universities tend to be Democrats.”
Percentage of Republicans who live in rural areas: 24%
[Source: 2004 American National Election Survey]
Percentage of Republicans who have Internet access: 77%
Percentage of Democrats who have Internet access: 69%
[Source: 2004 American National Election Survey]
Percentage of Republicans who do not have broadband access: 21%
Percentage of Democrats who do not have broadband access: 21%
[Source: November 2006 Pew Survey. Lack of broadband access is defined as someone who uses the Internet at home via a dial-up modem.]
The claims that “most” Republican live in rural areas and that Republicans have less access to high-speed Internet access are easy to verify. Too bad no one did.
Comments
What does it say about the fight they are engaged in if they are fighting with pieces of pie?
Posted by: Ethan | December 11, 2007 09:53 AM
John,
The implication of your comment is that I was responsible for the misinformation that was contained in the article.
I was not. Go back and check what I said: (1) that Americans who are working class and white, and particularly those who are working class and white and religious, tend to be Republicans; and (2) that academics in universities tend to be Democrats.
All best,
Carol Darr
Posted by: Carol Darr | December 11, 2007 10:17 AM
Ethan, it's a really messy fight, apparently.
Carol, both of those points are true. But are Democrats really "the yuppie party"? Don't they actually represent lots of working class and poor voters? (In the 2004 NES, Republicans tend to have a higher average income than Democrats.) And, most importantly, are these generalizations about the parties explanations for the point of the article: the alleged "digital divide" between Republicans and Democrats? (Or did C&E take you out of context here?)
Posted by: John Sides | December 11, 2007 10:44 AM
Let me bring some data to this question. Again looking at the 2004 NES, among those who say they are "working class" (a notoriously bad measure, but one that addresses the question at hand) and white, 27% say they are Republican, compared with 25% who say they are Democrats. Bringing independents who lean to one party or the other into the mix, actually tips the balance in favor of the Democrats, by a margin of 46% to 42%. These figures look almost identical if we only look at those people who say that religion is an important part of their life.
Using other measures Larry Bartels has come to the same conclusions.
The major point is that when we look at the data we can see that some common conceptions of the political landscape are flat out wrong.
Posted by: Adam Berinsky | December 11, 2007 11:19 AM
John,
My thoughts about the class divide between Dems and Republicans are summed up by a quote that I've always thought was attributable to Ambrose Bierce (but I can't find it in his "Devil's Dictionary):
"The problem with the Democrats is that they say they're for the poor and they're not; and the problem with the Republicans is that they say they're for the rich, and they are."
All best,
Carol Darr
Posted by: Carol Darr | December 11, 2007 12:45 PM