This begins a series of articles explaining one often overlooked reason why
environmentalism appeals to so many affluent homeowners who would otherwise
be staunch Republicans. Following this introductory piece, I'm going to look
at some illustrative examples of environmental brouhahas over golf courses.
-- Steve Sailer

Analysis: Range Rover Republicans' Revolt
By STEVE SAILER, UPI National Correspondent
<A HREF="http://www.vny.com/cf/news/upidetail.cfm?QID=193161">
http://www.vny.com/cf/news/upidetail.cfm?QID=193161</A>

LOS ANGELES, Calif., June 11 (UPI) -- The public's high regard for the
environment has proven one of the larger political obstacles for former Texas
oilman George W. Bush.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll on June 5 found the president with a 55
percent overall approval rating. Yet, only 41 percent of the public favored
his handling of environmental issues. An earlier Los Angeles Times poll found
Bush's environmental stances even less popular in the megastate of California.

These are not just Democrats who are pro-conservation. Republican voters
often go green too. A 1999 poll of probable GOP primary voters by Zogby
International found 93 percent endorsed "protect environment" as a goal for
the president, the same number as said he should "encourage family values."

Yet conservative Republican intellectuals long have denounced the ecology
movement for appealing primarily to the upper middle class. Attacking this
pet cause of the well-to-do, however, can be self-destructive for the GOP,
because affluent property owners traditionally have been a key part of any
conservative party's voter base.

For example, many conservative pundits have declared Californian
suburbanites who objected to the building of new power plants near their
homes to be "NIMBY's" (Not-In-My-Back-Yard) who deserve to swelter in the
dark during their state's power crisis. Yet it can be self-defeating for
Republicans to make fun of homeowners who worry about protecting from
pollution their investments in their expensive backyards. One might think
that the GOP would see itself as the natural party for voters with expensive
backyards.

Not surprisingly, in the 2000 election Bush did not do particularly well
among America's better-off voters, winning only about half their votes in his
battle with Al Gore, author of "Earth in the Balance," a staunchly
environmentalist best-seller. According to the Voter News Service exit poll,
he won only 54 percent of the voters who make more than $100,000 annually. He
also received just 54 percent from those who call themselves "upper-middle
class." Among the 4 percent who consider themselves "upper class," Bush took
only 39 percent. And he won only 44 percent of those with post-graduate
degrees.

What's behind this Revolt of the Range Rover Republicans? Why do the
propertied classes now so often favor conservationism over the GOP's
anti-environmental brand of conservatism?

One answer that the Bush administration appears to have had a hard time
grasping is that homeowners often use environmental laws to thwart new
developments in order preserve their investments in their own property.

Conservative activists like to think of themselves as preserving property
rights from meddling environmentalists, but other property owners are often
among those most intent on having the government meddle.

Say you invest a large fraction of your life savings in a hilltop home
blessed with what might literally be a "million-dollar view." Then, the owner
of the undeveloped property down in the valley below your house announces
he's selling his land to a power company so it can build an enormous
generating plant right in your line of sight. This could reduce the market
value of your million-dollar view to about $1.98. No matter how rock-ribbed a
Republican you might be normally, this threat to your net worth could well
induce you to give a donation to the Sierra Club and ask them if they could
please go find some rare weed or bug on your neighbor's land so that you can
then sue under the Endangered Species Act to block this unsightly development.

Economists call this an "externality" or "spillover effect." What someone
does on his own property often affects the well being of other property
owners. Pollution is an obvious example. Yet, even just building new homes on
farmland can drive down the price of nearby existing homes by increasing the
total supply of homes available.

What property owners think of laissez-faire property rights tends to depend
on their self-interest, which generally varies with the degree of existing
development.

Owners of undeveloped land generally oppose restrictions on their freedom to
build on it.

Homeowners in the middle of nowhere frequently find it in their interest to
let their neighbors have fairly free rein in developing their land. That's
because higher population densities would raise their own property values by
making it economically feasible to bring to their district such amenities as
paved roads, sewer lines, and shopping.

As density increases, however, a turning point is typically reached. After a
certain point, adding more housing density would hurt the property values of
current homeowners. Then, homeowners often start to try to impose development
restrictions on the owners of nearby empty land.

This logic suggests that support for environmentalist candidates like Al
Gore would be greater in heavily developed suburbs than in rural areas.

Judging from the famous "Red vs. Blue" map of 2000 election results, that
turned out to be true last November. Although Al Gore won a narrow plurality
of the popular vote, George W. Bush won counties covering about four-fifths
of the land area in the lower 48 states. Bush, with his anti-environmentalist
views, did much better in counties where the typical landowner would benefit
from new developments. In contrast, the staunchly green Gore did best in
already crowded regions. Gore's counties have about five times the population
density of Bush's counties.

Exit polls showed the GOP candidate's vote development levels increased.
Bush won 59 percent of vote in rural areas and small towns, but only 49
percent of the suburbs. In small cities, Bush took 40 percent of the vote,
and in big cities just 26 percent.

This is not to suggest that support for the ecology movement stems solely
from cynical and self-serving motivations. Still, people often find
themselves emotionally favoring what is in their financial self-interest.

To flesh out this rather theoretical perspective, upcoming articles in this
series will consist of a tale of three golf courses. The first will tell of
the 30-year struggle between a family of real estate developers wanting to
build an oceanside golf and housing project on Southern California's
exclusive Palos Verde Peninsula and their wealthy neighbors who have used
environmental laws to try to maintain the exclusivity of their homes.

The second article will portray a mirror image struggle by homeowners in
Studio City, Calif., hoping to use conservation laws to keep an existing golf
and tennis facility from being turned into an old folks home.

The third will depict the construction of a new golf course built without
any environmental restrictions whatsoever on an Indian reservation outside
San Diego. This will show how much cheaper and less elitist golf, like
housing, could be without so many conservation lawsuits. Of course, the
wealthy find expensive golf and housing much less of a burden than the
non-wealthy, which helps explain Bush's mediocre performance among the
affluent.

-- Copyright 2001 by United Press International. All rights reserved.