In a post over at Aaron's Rantblog there's a reference to "Plaid Golf Pants Republicans" in a post about the nefarious left-wing blogger Kos, "Two decades ago, there may have been a couple of plaid-golf-pants relics in the GOP..."
Unfortunately, many Democrats and especially African-Americans, still see Republicans in this way. They imagine rich Republicans sitting around the bar at their favorite country club sipping on drinks and discussing the latest stock report while the rest of the country goes down the drain. I suppose it's a testament to decades of political advertising and spin that has painted this inaccurate stereotype...
Dean Esmay in his post titled, The Party of The Rich? provided an excellent analysis of party demographics from the 2000 election that defies the stereotype:
The poorest regions of the United States by and large trend Republican. That trend's been growing over the last few decades. This reached its most obvious zenith (so far) in the closely-divided election of 2000. Despite all the class-warfare rhetoric used by the Democratic candidate, Al Gore, he mostly won his very slim popular margin by winning three types of voter: affluent urbanites, affluent New Englanders, and black people. Bush, on the other hand, built his electoral victory on a much broader and more inclusive campaign that did not seek to divide people by race or class, and won voters in much larger and more diverse regions of the country--the poorer regions especially.
Dean took this map and compared the voter outcome to the prosperity of that particular region of the country. The most urban and affluent areas voted for Al Gore while the poorer areas of the country voted for George Bush.
An analysis of campaign contributions found here notes that in 2002 the big money donors were to the Democratic Party:
Among donors of $10,000 or more, Democrats out-raised Republicans, $140 million to $111 million. Among donors of $100,000 or more, Democrats raised $72 million to the Republicans' $34 million. And among the most generous givers - those contributing $1 million or more - Democrats far outdistanced Republicans, $36 million to just over $3 million.
A 2002 article over at Tech Central titled, South Park Republicans points to a growing group in the Republican Party:
The most important South Park Republicans are not famous. They are the millions of people of every age, race, sex, and religion that generally agree that government spending is usually not the best way to deal with the nation's problems. Many of these individuals can tell you why Ayn Rand should displace some other authors in high school literature classes. They know firsthand from endless hours at the DMV, at the post office, and preparing income tax forms that government wastes time and money. They know a nation cannot tax its way to greatness.
Then there's the NASCAR Dads who favor Bush and the Republican Party. This is yet another group not known for being wealthy.
Yes, there are still those who hang out at the country club, only attend the right schools and live in elite enclaves, but they're just as likely to be Democrats.
