From True Blue Liberal
By Eddy

Have you ever tried to talk to a Republican? How about a staunch Republican? Did it give you a headache because, damn it, it was like beating your head against a brick wall?

I’ve tried. My brother is a diehard Republican (the only one in our entire family). Even he has agreed that we can’t talk about politics. He thinks I’m wrong, I think I’m right and every time we would talk (aka: argue) politics, by the end I just wanted to scream: Why can’t you just listen to reason!

Now, I know it’s always easier to argue with family. No matter how nasty it can get, they’re still family but I’ve had this experience with other people. (A high school friend, also republican, comes to mind. She would not accept that the U.S. should NOT be torturing people no matter how much effort I put into explaining why this was a very bad, very un-American thing to do.)

Recently, I discovered from Scientific American that in these situations, it’s possible that neither of us were listening to reason (ugh, even now I absolutely want to refute that– my political positions make sense and are based on cold hard facts). However, it appears likely that my brother, my friend, you, and I may suffer from confirmation bias.

confirmation bias, whereby we seek and find confirmatory evidence in support of already existing beliefs and ignore or reinterpret disconfirmatory evidence.

(I think most Republicans have raised the ignore or reinterpret disconfirmatory evidence to an art form. We are the reality based community).

Now, this is where things get really interesting.

During the run-up to the 2004 presidential election, while undergoing an fMRI bran scan, 30 men–half self-described as “strong” Republicans and half as “strong” Democrats–were tasked with assessing statements by both George W. Bush and John Kerry in which the candidates clearly contradicted themselves. Not surprisingly, in their assessments Republican subjects were as critical of Kerry as Democratic subjects were of Bush, yet both let their own candidate off the hook.

The neuroimaging results, however, revealed that the part of the brain most associated with reasoning–the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex–was quiescent. Most active were the orbital frontal cortex, which is involved in the processing of emotions; the anterior cingulate, which is associated with conflict resolution; the posterior cingulate, which is concerned with making judgments about moral accountability; and–once subjects had arrived at a conclusion that made them emotionally comfortable–the ventral striatum, which is related to reward and pleasure.

I think that this study, in conjunction with a recent poll, really argues in favor of a the Democratic strategy I’ve seen expounded on liberal blogs for ages now (but I have wondered what is being done to implement this):

1) Don’t waste volunteer time with self-identified Republicans; they really aren’t going to listen (to reason).
2) Talk to the folks that are registered Democrats, especially ones that may not have voted recently (I assume that information is available from somewhere for each district etc?)
3) GOTV–especially women.

There was a link, to a link, of a story (sorry!) at Firedoglake

From the WaPO The survey’s results suggested that an old challenge — the gender gap — could pose a renewed threat to the Republican hold on Congress. Although men split about evenly when asked which party they planned to back for Congress in November, women preferred Democrats by nearly 2 to 1– The Democrats already had a women problem — in 2004, 20 million unmarried women did not vote. That was a group that favored John Kerry 2 to 1 and could have put him over the top. If there has been any significant GOTV effort by Democrats with regard to this group, I haven’t seen any evidence.

Think it’s not that bad? I have three sisters, one of whom is married (unlike myself) but like myself politically active (at least we’ve always voted). However, our other two sisters considered themselves Democrats as far as we could tell and yet had NEVER VOTED. Not once. November 2004 they cast their first votes and only because we hounded them (and I do mean that– I think I called my sister every few days for months).

Why do I think that this fMRI study and poll are important for designing strategy for the Democratic Party? Why do we have to keep restating (what most would agree is) the obvious?

Simple: effective use of volunteer time and results.

I flew to St. Louis, Missouri from my rabidly red home state before the Nov. 2004 election and while there I volunteered for the Kerry campaign. The city is predominantly Catholic and many areas are firmly republican, democrat or a blend of the two. I spent the day going door to door in one of those mixed areas. The Republicans were polite but firmly in the Bush camp; others bordered on rude. Several republican households actually took the time to speak to me, until the question arose of whether Kerry would repeal Roe v. Wade (as if he alone would wield the power). As soon as I said anything other than the yes they wanted to hear, I was kindly asked to leave while they affirmed their Bush vote (so long as Bush is going to stop abortion– ).

With the Kerry supporters I smiled and thanked them in advance for helping take our country back in November (didn’t play out the way we planned). During the nearly six hours I walked, I remember only one person who was undecided. She didn’t want to talk to me though. She accepted the Kerry literature that I had and said: I’ll show it to my husband and see what he says when he gets home– but I know he’s voting for Bush.

I can’t tell you how depressing that day was and not because there were more Bush than Kerry voters-it was probably close to fifty/fifty. It was depressing because these were registered voters, democrat or republican. It was an upper middle class area, they were active politically, planned on voting, and had already decided their vote for president. On that day, the Kerry campaign wasted my time.

I would have been better off visiting registered democrats who hadn’t voted in recent elections, phone banking, registering women to vote (i.e. GOTV), anything but what I actually did.

So, there we have it. Scientific evidence that we’re not likely to convert Republicans to (reason) Democrats. That leaves get out the vote efforts directed at registered Democrats and registering new Democrats, particularly women–and then getting them to vote as well.