Now, let me take that analysis a step further.  Douthat notes that the successful protest movements of the last few years, the Occupy and Tea Party movements, both came from a place of anger at the establishment.  I will add that this anger was largely irrational.  A lot of that anger seems to come, in both cases, from a general fear that the “American Dream” is slipping away for many Americans.  For the Occupy movement, that was the fault of the 1% and big money’s control over politics.  For the Tea Party, that was the fault of the increasingly insular liberal elite who are trying to over-regulate a country that they don’t truly understand.  But a common refrain from everyone who is upset at government is that “they just can’t get anything done.”

So what is the solution to “can’t get anything done”?  Apparently, it’s to elect radicals who refuse to compromise, and get even less done.  That’s the irrational part.

See, it’s not like the Tea Party and Occupy protesters flocked towards Olympia Snowe, Lincoln Chaffee, Joe Leiberman, and Ben Nelson.  They didn’t stand up and demand reasonable compromise on health care policy and fiscal reform.  No, they dug their heals in, and through their weight behind the most intransigent, radical candidates that they could find.

If Americans Elect was really interested in compromise and reasonable, bipartisan reform on a variety of issues, they should be throwing whatever money and influence they have, not behind a new third party, but instead behind countering the radicalizing influences that already exist within the first two.

Brooks credits Obama’s resilience on his “leadership style”.  He invents a clever sounding narrative about the “ESPN Man”, as “postfeminist … hypercompetitive, restrained, not given to self-doubt, rarely self-indulgent.”  Sorry, David, not buying it.

You want to know why Obama is ahead in the polls, despite being behind on the economy?  Likability.  Obama’s likability number, that is the percentage of likely voters who tell pollsters that the president is “generally likable” since becoming president, has generally hovered in the upper 50s.  Last week, according to Gallup, it was up to 60%.  (Romney’s was at 31%.)

What does likability mean?  It gets back to something we talk about in the book.  Voters tend to vote for candidates for whom they have a positive first reaction.  Think of it this way: the more likable a candidate is, the harder that voters will work to try to talk themselves into voting for them.  Voters like Obama, and they don’t like Romney.  That means that they will look for excuses to vote for Obama and look for excuses to vote against Romney.

That internal logic, conscious or unconscious, ends up going something like this: “So yeah, the economy is bad, but maybe that’s Congress’ fault, or the fault of the big banks, or maybe Obama will get better his second term.  Besides, is Romney (Romney?  Really?) the kind of guy who would do better?”

From that perspective, this election isn’t a toss-up, as Brooks predicts.  From that perspective, Romney is in real trouble, unless some kind of game-changer comes along to dramatically alter people’s perceptions of one or both of them.

But in this case, the conventional viewpoint is wrong.

This November, we can basically divide the electorate up into three groups; roughly a third of likely voters will come from each category, more or less.  On the left, the liberals will vote for Obama no matter what.  For the most part, these people like Obama, are disappointed that he didn’t get more done, but are so scared of how conservative the GOP has gotten that they are willing to give Obama a pass on just about anything.  On the right, conservatives dislike and distrust Obama at a very deep level.  American conservatives, especially evangelicals, seem willing to believe that Obama is capable of almost any “evil”, from communism to Islam to atheism to radical black nationalism.  Then in the middle, the moderates tend to like Obama personally, but are dissatisfied with the economy and are willing to consider alternatives.

So let’s look at how the gay marriage announcement will play in each of these three groups.

Liberals tend to be pro-gay marriage.  They have generally greeted Obama’s announcement with jubilation, and my guess is that Obama will see a sharp spike in fund-raising over the next couple of weeks.

Conservatives tend to be anti-gay marriage.  But they weren’t going to vote for Obama anyway.  In fact, the irony is that most of them already believed that Obama was pro-gay marriage.  They are treating this announcement, for the most part, as much-ado-about-nothing.

Moderates tend to be anti-gay marriage, but not strongly so.  In other words, when asked (on a poll or on a ballot) they will tend to express discomfort with gay marriage, but the issue doesn’t seem to motivate them strongly to go to the polls, give money, or really affect who they do or don’t support.  Again, these are people who tend to like Obama personally–they’re just a little skittish about voting for an incumbent during a bad economy.  This announcement won’t change that logic at all.

So, in other words, Obama’s announcement probably gave him more money at the cost of basically no votes.  Sounds like a winner to me.

So why do I bring this up now?  Because of a controversy here in Massachusetts involving Democratic Senate Candidate Elizabeth Warren.  Warren claims to be 1/32 Cherokee–she was actually born in Oklahoma, although she hasn’t lived there during her adult life.  Warren isn’t an official member of the Cherokee Nation, although if that 1/32 claim is true she could be.  (Native American ancestral claims can be very difficult to document, as most people who claim some Indian blood do so based on family oral histories.)  But at times during her adult life, she has listed that part of her heritage on certain official documents.

Some are claiming that as false advertising, accusing her of trumping up an Indian heritage to gain preferential treatment.  And yet, there is no evidence that she ever received preferential treatment because of that.  And she would have never had to; women of that age are rarities in law schools, business schools, and economics departments, and her qualifications as an academic are impeccable.  Moreover, there are times when I’ve listed myself as having some Native American blood–usually on medical questionnaires, but even occasionally on other documentation that allows for more than a simple “check one box” ethnicity answer.  Because while I identify as white, first and foremost, I AM proud of my Native American heritage, and don’t like completely dismissing it.

I realize that some of you may be saying to yourself “but he doesn’t look Indian!”  And I don’t.  But I am 1/32 Chickasaw.  The Chickasaw were one of the five “Civilized Tribes”, originally from the American South (mostly Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee, in their case).  They are closely related to the more well-known Cherokee and Choctaw tribes.  They were called the “Civilized Tribes”, because of the efforts that they made to consciously meld with the surrounding white cultures during the late 18th and early 19th centuries.  Unfortunately, that effort proved fruitless, as they were still forcibly relocated to Oklahoma along the so-called “Trail of Tears.”

Today, there are about 50,000 members of the Chickasaw Nation, mostly located in Southern Oklahoma (where my grandfather was born).  One of those 50,000 is my grandfather, who lives in a suburb of Dallas.  You’d think he was white too, if you saw him–although he’s 1/8 Chickasaw.  (He does have dark skin and dark hair, but no more so than most people of Mediterranean decent.)

I could be a member of the Chickasaw Nation too, if I chose.  There is no minimum blood threshold to be a part of the Chickasaw Nation, mostly because there are so few Chickasaws left; at 1/32, I would be a fairly typical tribe member in that respect.  To join Chickasaw Nation, one only has to trace one’s ancestry back far enough, which my grandfather has already done.  So why haven’t I?  Because, while I’m proud of that part of my heritage, I don’t feel particularly connected to it.  I’ve never lived in Oklahoma, or even within 100 miles of Chickasaw Nation, for any length of time.  I’ve never participated in Chickasaw culture or Chickasaw life.  I don’t feel like a Native American, and no one treats me that way.  I would feel a bit of a fraud to call myself Chickasaw based on 1/32 of my ancestry.

But I would never judge someone else for doing so–because Chickasaw Nation is so small, they are always looking to expand their membership and their influence.  I am proud of my Chickasaw heritage, as are most people with some Native American blood whom I’ve met.  And yet, each of us chooses to express that pride in different ways, at different times.

All of which is to say that ethnicity is complicated. There are millions of Americans with mixed-ethnic backgrounds.  Hispanic Americans with significant African and/or Native American blood are very common.  Most black Americans have at least one white ancestor–and a huge number of white Americans from the South have at least one black ancestor (a category which may possibly include myself, for all I know–while I’m not proud of it, I do know for a fact that some of my ancestors were Southern slave owners).  ”Asian-American” may be one check-box, but that can hide a huge variance in cultural, national, or linguistic backgrounds–not to mention that more than a few “Asians” from Vietnam or Southeast Asia may find a French ancestor hidden in their somewhere if they start poking hard enough.

So let’s not be so critical when attacking other people for how they choose to self-identify.  Identity is a complicated thing for many, perhaps even most of us.  Identity isn’t so easily defined by a “pick one’ check-box question on a survey or employment form.

“Embolden” has become a buzz word to attack the foreign policy maneuvers of political enemies here in the United States.  President Bush used to say that withdrawing from Iraq would “embolden” the terrorists–and many Democrats pushed back by arguing that in fact the Iraq War itself had “emboldened” the terrorists.  Just today Mitt Romney attacked Obama for “emboldening” North Korea by trying to engage with them diplomatically.

But what does “embolden” actually mean?  The dictionary definition is to make bold, to give someone courage or confidence.  But in the context of a strategic environment, it really doesn’t make a lot of sense.

To see why, imagine a game of chess.  At any given point in a chess match, there are a small set of moves that will move a player towards success, (good moves) and a larger set of moves that will move that player closer to failure (bad moves).  So now White does something to “embolden” Black.  Black, now that they are “emboldened”, starts playing more aggressively.  But remember, neither the set of good moves nor the set of bad moves has changed.  Will being “emboldened” make Black play better?  If the his aggressive behavior causes him to pick a good move, then maybe.  But aggressive behavior could just as easily cause Black to make a bad move–to allow his aggression to cloud his reason or cause him to underestimate White.

So imagine that North Korea has become “emboldened”.  That doesn’t change the underlying situation, or affect whether or not building an intercontinental ballistic missile is a good idea.  They will either make a good move or a bad move, and they will do so based on the international strategic environment and on their own internal preferences.

To claim that “emboldening” your enemies is a bad thing, you have to assume that they are currently making a strategic error out of an irrational fear–and that the boldness will cause them to overcome that fear.  It means that Romney is essentially saying “North Korea ought to be pushing forward with development of an ICBM, because we all know we aren’t going to do anything, but until Obama came along we were successfully bluffing them!”  Except I don’t think Romney actually believes any part of that.

Words have to have meaning for us to effectively communicate with each other.  When politicians use words like “embolden” to attack their opponents, it strips those words of their meaning; they become weapons to beat each other up with, instead of tools to facilitate understanding.  That, in turn, just makes it a little bit harder for us voters to educate ourselves and make semi-informed choices.

*In both 1988 and 2000, the incumbent here refers to the previous Vice President who was in the race, and running in large part on the backs of the previous administration.

Okay, at first glance, that list would seem to make Santorum’s claim seem preposterous. In particular, note that Bush the Elder won in 1988 and lost in 1992–how could the same candidate be a conservative in one election and a moderate in the next election?

Well, what does it mean to be a “conservative” candidate? Ronald Reagan, by Santorum’s logic, was clearly a conservative candidate. And relative to the political spectrum of his time, that is certainly a true statement. And in 1988, Bush ran on Reagan’s coattails; his campaign was clearly a “four more years” campaign, even though the name at the top of the ticket was different. But in 1992, Bush was running on his own record–a record that was, in a couple respects at least, more moderate than his predecessor. So by Santorum’s logic, Bush ran as a conservative in 1992 and as a moderate in 1988.

Although if that’s the definition of conservative we are using, then we run into trouble trying to explain McCain’s loss in 2008 and Dole’s loss in 1996. McCain had a long history of being willing to work with Democrats on certain issues–one could argue that this makes him a moderate candidate. But in 2008, McCain abandoned most of the positions that had previously earned him a “moderate” or “maverick” label, and ran as a conservative.

Bob Dole was certainly more conservative than McCain; he was known as a GOP loyalist and a strong conservative, although he as a long-time and powerful Senator he had certainly compromised with Democrats on plenty of issues over the years. Maybe by Santorum’s definition that is enough to make him a moderate. But when he ran in 1996, he clearly ran as a strong conservative.

So, is “conservative” a personality trait? If so, Bush in 1988 is an exception to Santorum’s claim. Or is “conservative” a statement about policy positions at the time of the election–in which case Dole in 1996 and McCain in 2008 are clearly exceptions. Or is it a little bit of both?

And then there is the sticky issue that President Obama brought up in a recent speech to the Associated Press: by 2012 standards, Ronald Reagan would clearly not be a conservative–in particular because he repeatedly supported bills that raised taxes and appointed Supreme Court justices who were pro-Roe v. Wade. So if we are calling Ronald Reagan a “conservative”, then we clearly mean that to be relative to the policy debates and politicians in office at the time. By those standards, Bob Dole was clearly a conservative–and George W. Bush was clearly NOT a strong conservative. After all, Bush’s “compassionate conservative” agenda (including No Child Left Behind) and his immigration agenda were clearly to the left of many within his own party.

In short, “conservative” isn’t a word with a lot of inherent meaning. And yet Santorum isn’t dumb to use that line. His language is clear enough to resonate with his supporters, and his basic message (that nominating a moderate doesn’t make you more likely to win in November) is both true and valid.

Most often, you see those statistics used to decry the state of American democracy. And certainly, I believe that Democracy is stronger when more people participate (although there are many ways to participate in a democracy without voting–letter writing, protesting, etc.). But what you see less often is a look at how the people who vote (“likely voters”) differ from the population as a whole. In particular:

Age: Likely voters tend to be older, on average; Americans are more likely to vote as they grow older. This trend has long been noted; I could make up reasons why this might be the case, but to be honest I don’t really know.

Partisanship: Likely voters tend to have slightly more extreme views, and are more likely to be a member of (or be loyal to) a single political party. Think of it this way: if you bother to be an active Republican, are you likely to forget to vote on election day?

Income: Likely voters tend to be slightly richer, on average; Americans are more likely to vote as their income rises.

Education: Likely voters tend to be more educated, on average; Americans are more likely to vote as their education increases.

News Consumption: Likely voters tend to be somewhat better informed, on average; the more you know about politics and current events, the more likely you are to vote. Income, education, and news consumption are highly correlated with each other, and it is difficult to parse their variable effects.

Community Involvement: Likely voters tend to be more involved in community organizations (churches, social clubs, athletic teams, unions, etc.). This most likely has to do with both the kinds of people likely to join these organizations, as well as the social pressure within them to vote on election day.

These differences matter, especially when we add them in with another fun fact about electoral turnout: the best way to make sure that someone goes and votes is to ask them if they are going to go vote. That works for everyone, Democrat, Republican, or Independent.

These differences are one reason for the strong partisan divide within Congress. Hardcore partisans (on both sides) almost always vote. The masses in the middle might only show up if there is a particularly interesting race, the weather is nice, and they don’t have too much going on at work that day. This means that candidates who consistently appeal to the extremes are more likely to get elected, especially to Congressional races (which tend to be less publicized and less well attended).

Moreover, candidates themselves are more likely to have been a hardcore partisan before the election (because most people who run for office were interested and active in a political party before they ran). And once a candidate decides to run, they need to appeal to their partisans in order to get the volunteers and money necessary to win.

So imagine a race between two candidates: one a hardcore Partisan, the other a Moderate. Which candidate is more likely to get more donations and volunteers from the base? The Partisan, all else being equal. Now, normally we might think that the moderate should do a better job of appealing to independents. But many of those independents won’t vote. Which independents are most likely to vote? The ones who get asked. Which candidate has the most volunteer to ask the question of their friends, family, neighbors, and appropriately-leaning independents? The Partisan. Who is most likely to win the election, all else being equal? The Partisan.

Likely voters are similar to average Americans–but not identical. And those differences have a huge influence on the politicians and policies that govern us all.

In Romney’s case, he has had a similar problem to Bush in terms of appealing to very conservative evangelicals, and so he could choose a candidate who had that cache (like Rick Santorum, for instance).

Regional Influence:
The other main historical reason that vice presidents have been chosen is for regional appeal. Sometimes because of their accent, demeanor, or past, have trouble appealing to voters in a certain region. Of course, as politics has become less regional over time (in particular with the end of the Jim Crow era) this has mattered less and less over time, and so you have to go back awhile to find a good example. Probably the most famous example of the last 60 years was Massachusetts native JFK’s choice of the Texan LBJ for Vice President in 1960, although regional popularity was certainly a factor in John Kerry’s (Massachusetts) choice of John Edwards (North Carolina) in 2004 or Michael Dukakis’ (Massachusetts) choice of Lloyd Bentsen (Texas) in 1988. Apparently the lesson here is that presidential candidates from Massachusetts have trouble appealing in the South and need Southern running mates–and you can make the same argument for Mitt Romney. That is one of the reasons people are promoting Nicky Haley (South Carolina) and Marco Rubio (Florida).

Shore Up a Weakness:
Interestingly, the last two people who actually were Vice President were chosen for neither of those reasons. Joe Biden and Dick Cheney were both long-time Washington insiders, chosen to lend an aura of gravitas to the candidacies of younger, more vibrant, and relative outsider candidates. These were security blanket picks: “yes, I may be new, but I have this old hand here to help me through the rough patches.” John McCain and John Kerry were trying (in part) to do the opposite thing, although the logic was the same: Sarah Palin and John Edwards (respectively) were vibrant, young, attractive, and charismatic. The goal was for them to bring the vibrancy and youth-appeal that the candidate lacked.

Like Bush and Obama, Romney doesn’t have much governing experience in Washington (or anywhere else, being a one-term governor). But Romney’s campaign has been run on the principal that his business experience is most important, and so I don’t expect him to choose an insider. It would be reasonable for him to pick a candidate to shore up his foreign policy credentials–Condoleezza Rice seems the most popular option among those who think that Romney will go this route–but this strikes me as unlikely. Of course, interestingly Romney also gets tagged with being “dull” or “cardboard” image, and so he could also try to bring in a popular “rock-star” type running mate, which is one reason why many people think that Marco Rubio would make a good choice

Independent Appeal:
Finally, candidates choose running mates to appeal to key independent constituencies. Interestingly, this isn’t done nearly as often as you might think. The two that jump out at me are Bob Dole’s choice of Jack Kemp in an attempt to appeal to social moderates and John McCain’s chose Sarah Palin in an attempt (in part) to appeal to moderate women. Notice neither worked, and I think there is a reason for that.

After all, voters don’t really vote for the Vice President; they vote for the President. A young candidate might choose an older running mate to make the president look more competent. A Northern candidate might choose a Southern VP who will have an easier time raising money or recruiting supporters in the South. A candidate who isn’t trusted by a particular group of his base might chose a running mate to appeal to that part of the base. But in all of those cases, the point of the choice is to make the candidate look better to a group of people who were leaning towards supporting the candidate anyway. Independents are different. Independents don’t seem to really care about the running mate. McCain may have been trying to signal to independent women that he cared about them, but at the end of the day voters were voting for (or against) McCain, not Palin. And on issues like economic or social policy–it’s the candidate’s issues and values that people will tend to associate with the running mate, not the other way around.

So Romney could choose a Chris Christie (to appeal to working-class independents), but I’d recommend against it.

That being said, Florida has now, officially, broken me. And I’m not even talking about the Stand Your Ground Law, which has gotten so much attention lately. No, the law that has raised my hackles, as far as the material in the book is concerned, is the recent restrictions on third-party voter registration.

So imagine that hypothetical person teaching civics to high school seniors. Most (but not all) of the students will be over age 18. It is a very reasonable thing to talk about the upcoming elections. It is an equally reasonable thing to encourage the students to vote and to participate in the democratic process; as we argue in the book, voter participation is key to creating a strong democracy.

In Massachusetts, like in most states, the teacher could print off a bunch of voter registration forms, hand them out to the students in class, wait while the students fill them out, collect the completed forms and mail them to the registration office. If the student made any errors or lied on his/her form, the registration would be deemed invalid. If someone registered who wasn’t going to be 18 before the next election, that form would also simply be discarded.

In Florida, (similar laws exist in New Mexico and a few other places) that would be illegal. The teacher can still distribute the registration forms in class, and encourage the students to fill them out. Of course, unless the teacher collects those forms, most of them will then end up in trash or crumpled up in the bottom of a backpack only to be discovered next May. But the teacher can’t collect them and mail them unless they first register as a Third Party Registration Organization. To that requires that the teacher fill out two separate forms. The teacher would be assigned a number that must be put on all registrations, or they will be discarded and the teacher subject to fines. The state of Florida will then post the teacher’s contact information online in a publicly available spreadsheet. If any contact information changes, the teacher must inform the state of Florida within 10 days, or be subject to fines. Registrations must be post-marked or delivered in person within 48 hours, or the teacher will be subject to fines ($50 for each late registration)–so the teacher can’t do this on a Friday, because most offices aren’t open on the weekends. If there are any errors on the forms, or if a minor’s voter registration was submitted by accident, the teacher is open to criminal liability.

That sounds completely absurd to me. Supposedly the purpose of these laws is to prevent voter fraud; but if there is a fraudulent application, just throw it out, especially given that Florida already has pretty strict voter ID requirements. That doesn’t explain why the person who delivered a form filled out by someone else has to be held criminally liable.

Instead, whatever the intent of the laws, they will have the affect of reducing registration (and therefore turnout)–and more importantly of discouraging politically active behavior. Democracy benefits when people feel free to participate in the political process, which includes registering to vote and also helping other people register to vote. Because of a couple high-profile cases of enforcement of these laws, however, they have had a chilling effect on that kind of participation. People who might otherwise have participated in the democratic process don’t because they don’t fully understand the law. As a spokesperson for Rock the Vote told the New York Times about why they are curtailing efforts in Florida: “It’s a real shame. We just cannot put those high school teachers at risk.”

For the good of our democracy, these laws ought to be repealed.