The Economist is journalism par-excellance.   Other folks put NYT, NPR or the BBC up on some weird pedestal (needless to say I am NOT a big fan any of these orgs) - for me, it's the Economist.   This recent story is a perfect example of why - they sent their agents to sketch a portrait of Red & Blue America by visiting Nancy Pelosi's true-blue San Francisco and Dennis Hastert's true-red heartland hometown.  They emerge with fascinating Blue/Red insights that surprise even myself - someone who has spent a LOT of time in both places -

...Ms Pelosi's district, California's eighth, is more or less coterminous with San Francisco, the bluest, most liberal city in America. Mr Hastert's district, Illinois's 14th, is deep scarlet. It begins in the suburbs 30 miles (50km) west of the Chicago Loop, and then stretches out through miles of cornfields to a point just 40 miles short of the Iowa border.

Where the Economist really earns it's Kudos is their spot on description of San Francisco politics.

San Francisco, by contrast, is anti-growth. Whenever it has looked as though its expansion might become dramatic—as in the 1970s and the 1990s—anti-growth activists have come up with referendums to squelch it. They say the city cannot expand without sacrificing its legendary beauty: 777,000 people are enough for a bit of hilly land that occupies just 47 square miles (122 sq km) at the tip of a peninsula.

Well, maybe. Much of San Francisco is indeed stunning, but some would profit from redevelopment. A lot of the city's housing consists of nondescript houses and some districts, particularly south of Market Street, are downright tawdry. At least part of the anti-growth lobby seems more concerned with thumbing its nose at business than with preserving the past.

...But San Francisco now has one of the lowest proportions of families with children in the country (it has more dogs than children, say some). Almost 70% of the population is single.

...Only 35% of San Franciscans own their own houses, compared with a national average of 70%. At the same time, rent control both freezes rental housing and institutionalises an anti-growth mentality.

Alas, political activism does not necessarily make for a well-run city. San Francisco's political arrangements are dysfunctional.

And, being the good international publication that they are, they hit a homerun with "what does to this mean to the world" -

The bigger lesson has to do with America's political future, not just nationally but also internationally. Most foreigners are at ease in Ms Pelosi's America. They know San Francisco from films or even personal experience: tourism has been the city's biggest industry since the early 1960s. Europeans, in particular, feel at home with the city's compact structure, leftish politics and permissive atmosphere. Mr Hastert's America, on the other hand, is a mystery.

...the Democratic Party as a whole is not necessarily doomed in suburban America, [but] the San Francisco version of the party assuredly is. Democrats can survive in the land of mega malls only if they make their peace with mainstream America—if, that is, they adjust to the priorities of people who own their own homes and go to church on Sunday.

And that, my friends is one of the root problems the Democrats face.   They need to make peace with the middle class, often white, often male, progressively affluent, taxpayer who's taken on the responsibility for funding his own house, lifestyle, and is generally a good law-abiding citizen.  

He doesn't want to be lectured about why illegal aliens need more benefits - especially - in his eyes - if they haven't done the work and played by the rules like he has for a lifetime.  He has a sneaky suspicion about what some welfare mothers are really like.   I'm not saying that all Democrats are elitist, messiah-complex snobs (or, for that matter that Republicans are much better; or that middle America is always correct).   I'm just saying that the Dems have a tactical image problem they face in fast-growing places like Hastert's district.