Trump Did Not Break Politics
But 96 percent of House incumbents won re-election in 2014, and the Republican majority — despite its own 71 percent disapproval rating on Election Day — expanded.
.. Underlying the old rule was a bigger one: the “median voter theorem” — the idea that the views of the typical, middle-of-the-road voter, as expressed through elections, drove parties and politicians.
.. It’s not much of a theory at all anymore. Well-organized interest groups like the National Rifle Association and the National Education Association as well as large donors and ideological warriors on both sides have more clout than the median voter because they are organized and focused while most people aren’t.
.. Consider another once-useful guideline, which dates to the 1960s: Americans are “philosophical conservatives but operational liberals.” That is, we hate the idea of government, but we value the benefits we get from government — and politicians act accordingly.
.. Restrictions on voting, along with aggressive redistricting, reduce the influence of the median voter. Campaign war chests (including “super PACs”) scare off opponents, from within their own party as well as the other. By crippling civil-society institutions such as unions and community groups, which organize middle- and lower-income voters, they sometimes avoid being held accountable.
.. And by recasting politics as a winner-take-all conflict between wholly incompatible ideologies and identities — as most of the presidential candidates have done — they help to closely align party and ideology, so that those who identify as Republican will always vote Republican and vice versa. When politicians know more or less who will vote and how, they can ignore most voters — including their own loyalists.