"Poll Data: GOP Fast Becoming Rump Party
By Eric Kleefeld -
November 21, 2008, 10:26AM
If some new poll data is to be believed, the Republicans might be in for a long time in the wilderness. Let's take a look at the numbers.
The new Gallup poll shows that the Republican Party as an institution has a 61% unfavorable rating, with only 34% favorable.
And the numbers have only gone downhill since the election -- in October they were at 40% favorable and 53% unfavorable.
But it actually gets worse for the GOP from there.
A separate question in the data set showed 59% of Republicans saying the party needs to be more conservative, compared to only 12% who say the party should be less conservative.
So not only is the pool of Republican voters shrinking, but the ones who remain are really nuts.
We could be seeing the emergence of a pattern common in democracies, when a ruling party is turned out of power in a landslide:
The folks who are left to pick up the pieces are often the most extreme elements, and are in fact the least fit to actually clean things up.
The best examples of this are probably the UK Labour Party after they were beaten by Margaret Thatcher in 1979, the Conservative Party after Tony Blair finally ousted them in 1997, and over here the Democrats when they lost in 1980 and then nominated Walter Mondale in 1984.
Hmm, can anyone say Palin/Bachmann in 2012?"
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6 comments:
Eric fails to include the 1974-76 cycle in his article. The GOP got their rump handed to them in those elections. But in 1980 they were back, in the White House, and in control of the senate. All it took was four years of bad economic news, and a foreign policy blunder or two.
I'm hoping we're out of this recession long before the 2012 election!
I live in Minnesota, and Michelle Bachman is one of ours. She's kind of a type of Evangelical wife; very well dressed and styled, and not stupid, but she has this kind of fragile, thin veneer. If that gets cracked, then the woman becomes very vunerable and subject to panic.
Were I advising her, I'd tell her to stay out of the churches for a while and spend more time in some small town bars, learning to relax.
The Republicans lost in 1976 for one reason and one reason only and that was the pardon of Nixon.
Carter came to office and brought all his buddies with him who knew absolutely nothing about Washington and ended fighting with their own party members as much as they did the Republicans thus they ended up being one totally ineffective administration.
Obama is a VERY smart guy and he reaching out to all the subgroups that exist among the Democrats and he truly plans on governing.
He will definitely hit the ground running...
I think it's strange, Gordon, for you to characterize Bachman as "fragile."
I wouldn't call a woman fragile who had the cojones to say on national tv that Democratic members of Congress should be investigated because they may be anti-American, and then go on to imply that Obama himself could also be anti-American.
I wouldn't call that "fragile." I call people who talk like that loonies.
She's unbalanced and a real rightwing nut. No sane or thoughtful member of Congress talks like that, except those (on both sides) who are members of the lunatic fringe.
She may be one of yours, but to the rest of the country she's a nut.
She was thoroughly made fool of by Chris Matthews, and rightly so.
By one of ours, I mean that she's from Minnesota. The place where I live; not where I'm from.
I can't see how a side that loses an election by a mere 52.8% to 45.8% even when they ran a tired old man is a small "rump" of anything.
@tao: "The Republicans lost in 1976 for one reason and one reason only and that was the pardon of Nixon."
That is way over simplistic. There were other reasons, too. You also can't underestimate the power of the image of the candidate in the age of television. The age of television was in full flower then. Carter looked more cool than Ford on TV, even if was less than the difference between how Obama and McCain looked.
"He will definitely hit the ground running..."
True.
I hate to be contrary and I am perhaps far more centrist than this blogs taste but Pat Buchanan has really mellowed. I MEAN REALLY MELLOWED!!!!
He is a regular guest on Joe Scarburough's show on MSNBC and he seems to have gone awfully soft.
I get the impression that he is a huge fan of both Hillary and Obama.
Just a bit of background; I have every reason to be wary of the guy as he was a big time Jew hater and that makes me his target.
I certainly hope he's left being a jackass behind as he's been a great commentator recently.
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