An Ode to the Twinkee

I come not to bury the Twinkee, but to praise it.

If you haven’t heard already, Hostess, the company that makes Twinkees, Ho-Hos, Wonder Bread, and other assorted products has gone out of business.

You can read about it here.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/49852161

This isn’t a simple tale of unions bad, management good. The teamsters agreed to dramatic wage cuts, but a small bakers union refused. They thought that the company’s threat to close down the plants was just that, a threat.

They were wrong. It wasn’t a bluff. Today, management laid off 18,000 workers. Now, it’s possible that the Twinkee brand could come back, under a different company. Knowing its popularity and ease to make, it’s unlikely that it will stay dead for long.

And yet…

I think this is an example of a trend long brewing in America. As consumers become increasingly health conscious, they are shifting away from consuming cheaper, iconic goods such as Twinkees and instead buying more organic hummus, all natural pinto beans, and whatever else is trendy. In my lifetime, I have seen food evolve into an identifier of class. Where you shop, what you eat, and what brands you consume are increasingly correlated with what class you identify with. The rich and the poor have always had different tastes. But call me naïve, I think that there used to be much more of a unified cuisine in America. The rich, the middle, and to an extent the poor would eat the same meat, potato, and vegetable dishes. The source of such goods wasn’t as important as it is today. Starting around the seventies, I’d say, this started to fragment.

If you are gloating, if you are one of those ever so healthy tofu eating bohemians now laughing at the demise of the calorie heavy, nutritionally lacking Twinkee, I offer a word of caution.

America was built on the backs of Twinkees. I don’t say this ironically or sarcastically. The country, wide and fierce, still in many parts wild, was gradually tamed and civilized through the efforts of dirty people, unsophisticated people, rough people. An ever increasing share of my generation would never work in a hot factory, a hell like steel mill, or in some other physically intense line of work. Machines have taken these jobs. Millions and millions of difficult labor intensive jobs have been automated or outsourced, leaving us with fields and fields of air conditioned office parks.

The people who worked these jobs needed energy, and quickly. They had neither the time, nor the money, nor the inclination to shop around for organic this, natural that. They needed calories, and they needed them fast.

Now we sit in our cubicles, having the luxury of both money and time. To those fortunate enough to have the resources available to eat healthier, to be a part of bourgeoisie, don’t look down upon the Twinkee eaters. The Twinkee eaters drive your trucks, they work your sewers, they pave your roads. The Twinkee eats clean your offices and homes, they stock your stores, they do all of those jobs that you would consider beneath you. To all of the yuppies out there, safe in your Whole Foods markets, only encountering a Twinkee when you step inside of a 7-11, to you I say join with me in mourning the death of the Twinkee. A part of America, ever so silly, ever so irrational, but ever so important to defining who we are, has died today. 

Where I Was Wrong, Where I Was Right, and Why Technology Changes Everything

            So close, and yet, so far. That’s the phrase that keeps entering my mind, one week from Election Day. After the reality of election night set in, I was initially despondent for a day. However, time heals all wounds and despite swearing off politics, I’m finding myself pulled back into it all.

            Coming into the election, I predicted that Romney would win. I am obviously wrong on that point, but I want to also address that point I made about liberalism reaching a dead end. After reading and responding to comments, I think I was only partially wrong on that front. My point still stands, but I do want to make some modifications to it. How often do you read or see someone admitting they were wrong! Intellectual humility is in short supply on both sides of the aisle, but alas, this is nothing new.

            Finally, I want to make a point on the debate over the shifting electorate and whether this election marks a new era of democratic ascendency. I think that the rise of technology has fundamentally changed the nature of the electoral game, with dangerous implications for Republicans.

Election

            Before Election Day, I explained how I was of two mindsets about the election. On one hand, Romney was leading in the national polls, despite a large oversampling of Democratic turnout. On the other hand, Obama had comfortable margins in all of the state polls. I made a final point that the cheapness of local media outlets’ polling could be skewing the results against Romney.

            I was wrong. But I was only wrong about one critical point. The 2008 Democratic turnout, far from being a onetime anomaly, did not go away. It was replicated in 2012. Romney won independents, but independents and Republicans weren’t enough to overcome the democratic turnout wave. I thought we’d have a D+3 or +4 electorate, which means that registered Democrats hold a three to four point advantage in terms of total makeup of the Election Day electorate. The initial results suggest that it was D+6 electorate, an outcome unexpected by many forecasters and pundits, including myself. Had I correctly gauged turnout, I would have been right. But then again, so would everyone else.

The End of Liberalism

            A week or so before Election Day, I made a post concerning what I saw was an intellectual dead end for liberalism. I thought that on social issues, the war was already over with the left having won. However, on the fiscal front, I argued that the welfare state was in danger, with no money to expand, or even fund, it and a middle class entirely resistant to tax hikes.

            The passage of gay marriage referenda in several states, the reelection of Obama, the legalization of pot, and even the passage a large tax hike in California for people making over $250,000 would argue that not only was I wrong, but I was severely wrong (to borrow a turn of phrase from the Mittster). I also had several commentators make some well reasoned points to which, after I called for criticism, it’s my duty to respond.

            On the social issue front, these resent results only prove the core of the argument that I previously made. The younger generation has moved decidedly to the left on various social issues. The left has won the culture war. I tried to make that point, and election night further proved what I had been saying. Where I was wrong, however, and where many people rightly raised issue, was on the implementation front. A culture shift does not immediately translate into a political shift. The translation of what people believe into what is law takes time and effort. Most importantly, this struggle provides political energy. A part of my original point was that because the left had won the culture war, the Democratic Party could no longer gin up social issues for momentum and would have to look to other areas for supposed oppression to fuel its base. This contention, I now feel, is wrong. The Democrats will have, for the immediate future at least, the social issues card in its hand, ready to be employed at any time. I made the mistake of assuming that a victorious battle meant a victorious war. Just because the battle may have been won, that does not mean that the war is over. The current generation of Democratic activists still has the real and imaginary struggles against oppression to chew on.

            Where I was totally right, and where nobody raised issue with, was on the fiscal front. Election night didn’t change this. There is no money left and if entitlement spending is going to remain where it is, taxes are going to come up on the middle class. Note, I ignored the upper class. You can raise taxes on the rich all you like, but it’s still not enough. Obama presented a false choice, entitlements or low taxes on the rich. The American people chose the former. But just because a choice has been made does not mean that reality, that math, has been altered. Confiscate all of the wealth on the rich, and you still run up short. The long term structural deficit of the US bodes ill for the welfare state. Of course, no one wants to debate this point. Finances, economics, and deficits are boring, dismal. Gay marriage, pot legalization, and birth control are all issues that are heavily driven by emotion, with facts taking a back seat to people’s impulses and moral sentiments. This isn’t so much of an indictment of these issues, but rather is a statement as to why they predominated the election debate when our country nears the financial apocalypse.

Technology

            So what happened on election night? Democrats came out of the wood work. Did the country suddenly make a huge lurch to the left over the last five to six years? I’d argue that while the country has moved leftwards, the election results of 2008 and 2012 can be more attributed to a different story, one that I haven’t seen commonly discussed. Technology has fundamentally changed the makeup of the American electorate.

            Where the Obama campaign succeeded, and how Obama managed to win, was by brilliantly pulling in unlikely voters to the voting booths. You can read more about this here. Simply put, the Obama campaign devised a way to bring people to the polls that normally don’t go and stay home. If they just did this in 2008, you could argue that it was a fluke. To do it again in 2012, after the economy is in a terrible position, shows that they have devised something to get Latinos, blacks, and especially young voters to the polls.

            I want to focus on latter group, young voters. The old conventional wisdom about young voters was that though they leaned sharply to the left, they never voted. Youth voters were full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. How did the Obama campaign manage to turn out the youth vote in huge numbers in 2008 AND 2012? Arguing that the youth became more liberal avoids the issue. The youth circa 1968 were close to being communists, but Nixon got elected. The question is not one of ideology but turnout. What changed? Technology.

To see what I mean by this, let’s take a gander at a little European country called Switzerland. The Swiss government was faced with a problem of constantly declining turnout in their elections. Making voting easier, by shifting to a mail in ballot system, did nothing to fix this. Turnout was much lower in the cities than in the small villages. Why? After some thought and research, an answer was found. The social prestige to voting drives people to vote. As Derek Thompson of the Atlantic puts it:

People like being seen voting,..., but we also like being seen having voted. Theoretically something signalling to our community that we've already voted should create the same feelings of social cohesion, civic duty, and belonging. And that's where the "I Voted" sticker comes in.

The "I Voted" sticker is a signal and an advertisement. It binds people together in solidarity and reminds others to join the group. Tens of millions of people will vote in every presidential election whether there are free stickers or free cookies. But beyond these intrinsically interested (and, possibly, more informed) voters are countless more citizens who need motivation to show up at the ballot box. 

The rise of the internet, and social media in general, has created an enormous social pressure on young people to vote. Think back to before the internet. Your contact with the outside world was limited through direct social interaction, the radio, and television. Now, you have smart phones, social networks, text messaging, internet forums, and the like to keep up the pressure to vote. If you were a 25 year old in 1980, you could feasibly get by without paying much attention to the election. Now, a quick glance at your facebook newsfeed shows the constant pressure people are under to make up their minds and vote. A generation that is always connected, always online, is a generation that will vote. The civic duty to vote has been replaced, or perhaps supplemented, by the social pressure to vote.

            My generation has been thrown into the political forum. No longer is the forum separate from the marketplace, separate from the church, separate from the bar, separate from the school. All of these formerly divided and separate public and private spaces have been amalgamated, like metal in a hot furnace, into an always loud, never ceasing, cacophonous political arena of total war and scorched earth. We can no longer ignore the forum, as technology has brought the forum into every part of our lives. There is no longer any respite from politics, except for ignorance. The youth vote, for better or for worse, is now an intractable, inseparable part of the electorate. Let us all hope that the constant noise of technology brings to us not only knowledge, but wisdom as well. 

Dane’s Handy Dandy Guide to Election 2012

 I would be seriously amiss if I didn’t post a pre-election post.

I don’t know if it’s the coffee or the election, but I am on edge. I have a nervous energy today that’s given me an extra spring to my step but also a growling stomach. It’s a tradeoff I’ll take.

For the benefit of all of my loyal three readers (hi, mom!) I thought I’d post a guide for the politically non-informed as to what’s going to happen tomorrow.

Who’s going to win? My gut tells me it’s Romney, but narrowly. That said, I’ve become completely bipolar on the issue. It’s as if my brain has split into two. On one half, I am completely convinced that it’s extremely unlikely for the Mittster to lose. On the other half, I don’t see a possible route for victory for team GOP. There are two realities at stake at this election but with only one of them being true. Let me explain the logic for each.

Mitt Wins:

The polling data that’s come out has told several stories. Though each poll is different, when aggregated together, we can build a semi-coherent narrative for this election. In the summer, Romney had a slight edge. Come a series of gaffes, including the now infamous 47% video, Romney started to seriously falter in September. With this, the punditocracy declared the Romney campaign dead. And then came the October 3^rd debate. Everything changed. Overnight, Mitt rallied into the lead for national polls. At one point in time, he opened up a seven point lead on Gallup. Then, with hurricane Sandy, the polls tightened again. With election day tomorrow, Mitt has a mere one point lead in both the Gallup and Rasmussen polls.

But within those headline, national polls, another story was emerging. The gender gap, with women voters long having favored Obama and crew, closed. In several polls, Mitt was running even with women, and ahead of Obama for men. Independents, the most crucial election bellwether group, were backing Mitt in 10, 15, and 20! point margins.

Plus, there are the fundamentals. The economy is in the toilet. The Middle East is not as keen on us as we earlier thought. The signature piece of Obama’s first term agenda, Obamacare, is disliked by pretty considerable margins.

Add to all of this Gallup and Rasmussen polls that show an electorate MORE Republican than in the 2010 election, and you have a near guaranteed Romney victory. Though Romney could conceivably lose the electoral college and win the popular vote, the chances of that happening are slim. You don’t win independents in such huge margins and have a fired up base and have the fundamentals on your side and lose.

Therefore, the logic of a Mitt Romney win assumes that the national polls are right. If Mitt Romney wins independents and has a large Republican turnout, he wins the elections, state polling be damned.

Obama Wins:

And here is the catch. The state polls. There’s been numerous state polls released, and they haven’t been good to Romney. Just one poll has shown Mitt up in Ohio, a crucial state. For the other battleground states, there has been a consistent small but noticeable Obama lead.

The logic behind an Obama win goes like this: it is highly unlikely, and damn near statistically impossible, for all of these state polls to be biased, and biased in favor of Obama. The national polling be damned. The election is determined by the electoral college, and Obama still has a large lead in that count. Even granting that the south goes back to Romney, Romney has to win a significant amount of the states he is now behind in.

Democratic enthusiasm may be down, the argument goes, but it’s not down that much. And, despite conflicting reports, Obama has a large early voting lead in some crucial states such as Ohio, Nevada, and Iowa.

Mitt could still win, but it’s increasingly unlikely. All of the prediction models based on polling data (e.g. Nate Silver, the Princeton model) give it to Obama. The London sports bet makers, give it to Obama.

So What’s Really Happening?

The fundamental problem with predicting this election is that both sides have logical, coherent, and empirically backed arguments as to why their guy is winning. Unlike in 2008, when the right placed all of their hope in a non-existent Bradley effect of saving their asses from the blue wave, there are legitimate reasons, and factual data to back these reasons up, as to why Mitt Romney may be winning.

The question then becomes, what do you believe, the state polls or the national polls? If you believe the former, Obama wins. If you believe the latter, Romney wins.

Here is a final clue that might offer some insight. It’s an argument that once I read, I became convinced that Romney will win (BUT I STILL HAVE MY DOUBTS! ARGH!)

Why are we getting divergent findings? It may have something to do with the likely voter model.

Polling, contrary to popular belief, can have weight and import. It’s not mere alchemy. But in order to do that, you need to survey lots of people. And, to do that, you need to pay lots of money. Polls are very expensive and the more people surveyed, the higher the cost for your polling organization.

Polling firms have another problem. Not everyone who responds to a poll is likely to vote. If we poll 1,000 people, and get their preferences, that still would tell us very little about the election outcome, because having a 100% turnout is near impossible in America. Usually, for Presidential races the turnout is around 55%-65%.

Thus, not only do polling firms have to poll a lot of people to get any sort of statistical significance, they also have to run a likely voter screen. This is a double edged sword for polling firms. On one hand, the tougher the likely voter screen, and the better your results are. On the other hand, the more people you cast out of the net, so to speak, the lower your actual polled pool becomes.

So, returning back to our original dilemma, I think what is happening is that colleges, newspapers, and the like are doing polling on the cheap. They aren’t paying the necessary monies to have a good sized likely voter pool. Look at the sample sizes, and you’ll see polls with only 800-900 people surveyed. They can’t afford to have a strong likely voter pool, because the poll will be whittled away to statistical significance. National polling organizations, the ones reporting a Romney lead, CAN afford to have a strong likely voter sieve, because they have the money to poll more people.