If the GOP had had the sense to listen to Rove and Bush, they would have come up with an inclusive approach to Hispanics, and eventually they would have been viewed - and would have viewed themselves - as culturally white, just like Irish, Italians, Eastern Europeans, and so forth did before them.

Tom Tancredo is the best thing the GOP has ever done for this country.  By shoving the growing Hispanic population into the arms of the Dems, he and his ilk have given us a real shot at a lasting majority.

I believe pluralism is a political term of art used to describe different ideological points of view.  In a pluralistic political system, different political ideologies freely enter the political discourse.

If that is the correct usage of the term "pluralism,"  I would certainly NOT support pluralism within the progressive movement as it would dilute and muttle the progressive ideology.  However, when the Democrats speak of themselves as the "Big Tent" party, they are refering to the definition of pluralism, which I gave: The Democrats have the progressives, the blue dogs, the "new democrats," the populists, the internationalists, the isolationists, etc.  If the progressive movement seeks the purge the Democratic Party of its more "right-wing," DLC elements, the progressive movement is seeking to purify the ideology of the Democratic Party. Hence, the progressives are anti-pluralist vis a vis the Democratic Party.

I think "diversity" is the more correct term, Chris.  You would like to describe progressives as racially, ethnically, and religiously heterogenous.  However, you would not like to see the progressive movement include people who are, say, Pro-Life, would you?  The latter inclusion would be a form of pluralism that I think would not be tolerable in your vision of the progressive movement.

Of course some evangelicals claim Catholics aren't Christians; Mormons also are apostate.

That doesn't mean Christians are not important to the Democratic coalition. Church is a significant cultural foundation to Black Americans. And, Hispanics are heavily Catholic.

based on your analysis, would the democratic party be better served in '08 electing the "white christian" demographic candidate (edwards) or the one that represents the future demographics (Obama)?  Put another way, are we better off electing Edwards as our nominee now or should we anticipate these demographic trends and pick Obama (or would that be getting ahead of where the public is currently at)? Or, since both will be representing the non white-christian coalition, will it really matter which we pick this time around?

The Demographic mantra of the Three RRRs.

When you fold in region, things get very interesting. White, Christian Southerners are a large PART of the reason Republicans do well in the South. But, take out the Urban centers, and you find the many parts of the country are more white, more Christian and more republican than the South.

The main political difference between Kansas and Colorado or Oregon and Idaho is that Kansas or Idaho doesn't have a major Urban center. Looking at rural and small-town Colorado or Oregon, the Republicans have quite a lot of support.

The interesting thing is that class (economically defined) is much less politically determinant than the Three RRRs. I suspect there are class-cultural factors that are more important than exactly how much money you have. That is, small-town business owners identify Republican because they view themselves as rugged industrialists who hate taxes and unions. Urban professionals identify more with liberal-cultural ideals, like environmentalism and good coffee.

are Republicans. Not me, for example. I don't want people to become less Christian; rather I want Christians to become more truly Christian and stop supporting the Republican Party and their anti-Christian policies.

The battle has to be fought within Christianity as well.

Things get really interesting when you look at the demographics WITHIN each party, as Chris dabbled with here on the white-religious vs not. I posted on Regional Differences in Democrat & Republican Coalitions a year ago after becoming completely fascinated with the Pew Typology Study "Beyond Red and Blue".

The Pew Typology study really sensitized me to the uneven regional distribution of religion, and how that affects the demographics of each party's base.

One point is that religion, one of the most significant factors for understanding political values, is not tracked by the census, so we have to look to opinion polling instead, which is less accurate and gives us less coverage over time and space.

The second point, is that State legislatures are gerrymanded by examining historical voting results, but if religion is such a significant factor in how people vote, we would like to know religious makeup and how it is distributed geographically, and how it is changing with time. I posted on Religious Gerrymandering once before:

Simply looking at Dem vs Rep voting results by district is insufficient for predicting voting patterns. Better understanding results by looking at how the Parties' coalitions and demographics are distributed by district. In other words, looking at the cross-tabs in each the district is essential to understanding why the Republicans lost in 2006, what to expect in 2008, and what strategies to use for redistricting the next time around. More than that, it helps understand the ideological trends as well.

With respect to certain Colorado US House districts, heavy concentrations of Christians in Colorado Springs and Fort Collings (South and North, respectively), go a long way to explaining Doug Lamborn's and Marilyn Musgrave's successes.

More importantly, this uneven distribution of Religious, on the one hand, and Urban on the other, goes a long way to explaining the dominance of the right-wing on Republican politics. Primarily because of such concentration Colorado has three winger Republicans and not a single moderate Republican.

It could be fatal for the Republicans; how can the moderate wing ever take back control if the religious right is so powerful and dominant in local areas?

One thing that concerns me is the rights and roles of women in this divide. (I think you're on the money BTW). If you look at Non-White/Non-Christian groups like Somali-Muslims or Hispanic Catholics there is a strong anti-choice sentiment there and much more traditional gender roles.

I'm wondering how we avoid a cross-fire between key constituencies on both sides of the divide that ends up shredding women's health care freedoms and women's gains in areas like equal pay, equal access to sports, jobs, etc.?

A sociological analysis of class as measured by income provides a better grip on the determinants of future political alignments than race, ethnicity or religion, as far as I am concerned.

Most voters vote their pocketbooks, with the exception of low-information voters and voters who are mesmerized by political propaganda. As more voters in the U.S. see downward mobility on their horizon in terms of their class status, i.e. the prospect of moving from being middle class to the working class to the working poor to the impoverished, greater numbers of the electorate are going to vote their pocketbooks.

The anti-terrorist scare tactics employed by the Republican Party to entrench itself in power is wearing thin as voters see the writing on the wall in terms of their increasingly precarious personal finances.

The overriding importance of class versus race, ethnicity and religion applies to domestic U.S. politics as well as international conflicts like the so-called clash of civilizations between Islam and Christianity.

Very often, attempts are made to conceal the economic class warfare that is ravaging the U.S. and the international community of nations under smokescreens like these, which are designed to deflect attention from economic policies to ethnic, racial or religious cleavages.

For example, most experts outside the U.S. attribute the conflict between the al Qaeda movement and the U.S. not to religious, ethnic or cultural differences but to the economic deprivation inflicted on Muslim populations as a result of U.S. actions in the Middle East to obtain cheap oil from dictators and oppressive monarchies.

Another example is the politicized Christian right in this country which, as has been well-documented, was the creation of Republican strategists bent on building an electoral base for the large corporations and wealthy individuals that were using the Republican party to get a stranglehold over U.S. government as well as the economy.

The Christian right and its fundamentalist issues have been exploited and misused by the Republican party to deflect attention from the excessive profit-taking that has been occurring in the U.S. and throughout the world by the large corporations that provide the party's core financial support.

They have used the party and its right-wing electoral base to hi-jack control of the U.S. government via campaign financing and force completely unregulated free markets on everyone, wrecking indigenous economies and livelihoods everywhere, here and abroad.

It is very important to see through these ploys and the pseudo-religious smokescreens that they use to conceal their underlying economic objectives.

A good example is the Bush/Cheney invasion of Iraq on behalf of the oil interests that are an integral part of their careers in and out of politics. The invasion was driven by economic motives above all else, with WMD's and democracy-building serving as the smokescreens. The facts of their ploy are amply documented by Michael Schwart's recent piece, The Struggle Over Iraqi Oil. As soon as the U.S. troops were on the ground, they headed for the oil pipelines and the Iraqi oil ministry to get control of these assets. Every major American envoy, from Bremer to Khalilizad to Crocker, has had as their first mission getting an official Iraqi government signature on the oil agreement granting control over Iraqi oil to Western oil interests.

Not too suprisingly, obtaining this signature is one of the "benchmarks" the U.S. is trying to impose on the faltering Iraqi government at the cost of even more American and Iraqi lives.

Fortunately, for the Iraqis, they have refused to have any of the smokescreens pulled over their eyes that Americans have had pulled over theirs. The vast majority of Iraqis and the rest of world public opinion, for that matter, have do doubt whatsoever that the primary U.S. motivation for invading Iraq was to turn control over its oil assets to Western oil interests.

If Schwartz is correct, no such agreement will ever be implemented, so universal is Iraqi determination to keep U.S.-backed oil interests from getting control of Iraqi oil.

What all this points to is the need to connect the economic dots and focus on the declining class status and income of those who are being ruined by predatory economic policies and practices, here and abroad.

These relationships are the real drivers of what happens in politics and how people are going to vote in the future. More and more voters are understanding these dynamics, and those of us who are attempting to psyche out the political lay of the land in the future would do well to keep them uppermost in our minds.

I have long thought of the "culture wars" in these terms -- between those who see themselves as the "us" and those who want the war to just stop -- and I think your writing from two years ago is an incredible prediction of the role Obama would come to see himself playing in our nation's political history.

This is why I'm conflicted, we've got the cultural injustices, but we've also got material injustices. Which is more important? Which comes first? If we do away with the culture wars will material progress become easier? (I think so.) If we solve the material issues first, will it make cultural issues easier to move past? (Maybe...)

I think we have more of a moral responsibility to solve the material problems, like poverty, healthcare, the middle-class squeeze, etc., (as well as the material injustices, such as discrimination, which arise from social issues). The end of the culture wars may take more time than work, as old racists die off and young pluralists grow up.

I think the charge you have laid out is a good one, to represent our mission in terms of social issues, but it may be a better measure of success than it is a cause for action.