What’s the Matter with White People?

Back in 1980 Ronald Reagan rode into office on the strength of what were then called “Reagan Democrats.” Blue collar, less educated, middle class workers who, until Reagan, were part of the New Deal coalition.

Today, many of these voters are lost to the Democrats. And while President Obama certainly has done better with them than Al Gore or John Kerry, the culture war issues and the societal changes that they reflect, continue to drive a wedge between those voters and the Democratic party.

Joan Walsh, editor at large for Salon.com, and an MSNBC political analyst looks at this changing political landscape in What's the Matter with White People: Why We Long for a Golden Age That Never Was.

My conversation with Joan Walsh: var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); try { var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-6296941-2"); pageTracker._trackPageview(); } catch(err) {}