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A little swing music: are "Office Park Dads" for real? Karlyn Bowman introduces us to the latest voting blocks a pol must reach to win.

Article Excerpt
I BLAME IT ALL on my colleague and friend at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), Ben Wattenberg. In 1970, he and Richard Scammon published The Real Majority, a book that quickly became a classic in psephology. In it, they identified the "Dayton housewife" and her concerns about social issues as the key to understanding the American electorate and winning elections. In virtually every election since, one group or another has been described as the key to victory. In 1972, "young voters" captured the media's attention, even though nearly 60 percent of the population was over the age of thirty. And 1976. was dubbed the year of the "evangelical voter" (around 40 percent of Americans described themselves as born again and a small number of them were becoming very active politically).

In 1984, "Yuppies" enjoyed the electoral spotlight, although young upwardly mobile professionals represented only a tiny fraction of voters. In 1990, for the first time, more than half of all voters resided in suburbs (up from a quarter in 1950). Winning the hearts of "suburban voters" became the key to winning elections.

The year 1992, a year that saw a record number of women run and win in the House and Senate, was dubbed the Year of the Woman. Far less attention was paid to the results in 1994, perhaps because a majority of the new women elected to the House were Republicans. The "Angry White Male" made his appearance that year, when Republicans took control of the House for the first time in forty years, although there was scant polling evidence to support that characterization. Then 1996 brought us "Soccer Moms," a clever catch phrase that basically described suburban women with kids. Democratic pollster Celinda Lake put "Waitress Moms" on the map in 1998. Another analyst...