We have seen the opposite in France, with the decline of the communist party, replaced amongst the popular classes by not voting or voting for Le Pen's National Front (now the strongest party of all amongst blue collar workers). So there is something to your point.

I agree that it is better to have these votes tothe extreme left than to the extreme left, and I agree with Marek above that you get some pretty nasty stuff (populist and nationalist, and usually protectionist and corporatist).

To me today, the most relevant distinction in politics today is between the social-liberals and the national-populists, i.e. the educated, urban, richer centrists (the bobos) and the rural and/or blue collar/employees poorer traditionalists and nationalists (the dittoheads). Very arrogant of me, of course, until you realise that the bobos win few elections...

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes