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The 2008 campaign’s fight over ‘patriotism’

Dante Chinni

Posted: 10.27.2008 / 7:27 AM PDT

In the past few weeks of the presidential campaign, questions of patriotism and who is patriotic have popped on several occasions.

Sen. John McCain told supporters at a rally in western Pennsylvania that their home was the “most patriotic part of America.” His running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, spoke fondly of the “pro-America areas of this great nation” before a crowd in North Carolina. The conversation even got a bit ugly when the phrase “anti-American” made an appearance, during an MSNBC segment with Rep. Michele Bachmann (R) of Minnesota.

But aside from the nastiness that often comes at the end of a campaign, is it true that some parts of America are “more patriotic” than others? There are many measures of patriotism, of course, but by at least one gauge, the answer seems to be yes. And Patchwork Nation is helpful in understanding where the fault lines lie.

We took a survey question – “How strong is your love for your country?” – from the 2004 American National Election Study from the University of Michigan (the most recent survey on this topic). Looking at this question through the Patchwork Nation framework, we found some notable differences in our 11 county types.

Two types stood out for how much they said they loved their country: counties with aging populations (places we call “Emptying Nests”) and counties near large military populations and bases (places we call “Military Bastions”). In answering the question above, more than three-quarters of the people living in those types of places said their love for country was “extremely strong.”

Both of those county types, it should be noted, vote heavily Republican.

Four county types stood out at the other end of the spectrum. Counties holding the biggest US cities (places we call the “Industrial Metropolis”), counties growing and diversifying (our “Boom Towns”), counties with college students and young people (our “Campus and Careers” locales), and more-rural, small-town counties (our “Service Worker Centers”) all had less than 50 percent of people who said their love for country was “extremely strong.”

The “Industrial Metropolis” and “Campus and Careers” communities look to be strongholds for Sen. Barack Obama, while the “Service Worker Centers” and “Boom Towns” figure to be more evenly split.

To be sure, it is not easy to derive a clear meaning from these numbers. If you add the percentages of people who answered “extremely strong” to the percentages of those who answered “very strong,” all 11 county types scored higher 80 percent.

Still, there do appear to be some differences. For instance, in the “Military Bastions” counties, 100 percent of respondents answered either “extremely strong” or “very strong,” while in the “Campus and Careers” counties, nearly 20 percent said their love for country was either only “somewhat strong” or “not strong at all.”

If we are to use those figures as measures of patriotism, the lesson for the Obama and McCain teams may be this: Some places in the United States may be more patriotic than others, but the voters who will probably decide this election are not in the “most patriotic places.”

As we have noted before, the three most closely fought-over county types in November are likely to be the “Boom Towns”; “Service Worker Centers”; and the wealthier, largely suburban “Monied ’Burbs.” The vote was very close overall in those counties in 2004.

None of those county types scored particularly high on the survey question about love for country.

In short, it appears that the places where the issue of patriotism may score highest are already part of the GOP base and will almost certainly vote heavily for Senator McCain. (For the record, however, McCain’s patriotism statement in western Pennsylvania was made in Allegheny County – an “Industrial Metropolis” locale – while Governor Palin’s was made in Guilford County, N.C. – a “Monied ’Burb.” Both counties voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004.)

In all the patriotism talk, however, it should be remembered that a question about “love of country” is just one way of looking at patriotism. A different question in the same survey asked, “How important is being an American?” It got different results in many of our county types.

For instance, more than 62 percent of the respondents in “Campus and Careers” counties said it was “extremely important.” That number was higher than in our “Military Bastion” counties, where about 56 percent said it was extremely important. Again, though, every respondent in our “Military Bastion” counties said it was either extremely or very important.

Why were the answers different on the two questions? It may have to do with the respondents’ interpretations of them. “Love for your country” may be thought of as standing by one’s nation (particularly in a time of war), while “how important is being an American” might be thought of as an individual having opportunities.

Those different interpretations may be one reason why the issue of critiquing patriotism has become largely taboo in the US.