oldfart
Older than dirt
OK I normally stay out of the politics forum getting enough controversy in economics. But something is happening in the political landscape that has me wondering. I'm a veteran of the civil rights movement of the '50s and the anti-war movement of the '70s and have a couple of friends that do political polling for a living. Even here on the Redneck Riviera there is a sense that something has changed.
Recent polls indicate that the voters are fed up with both parties and Congress in general, but they are more incensed with Republicans. What I know of political polling is the first rule is to filter out folks who have made up their minds one way or another and are not going to change. Most elections are decided by the 20--25% of probable voters who remain. So it really doesn't matter what members of the Tea Party or MoveOn.org believe, except for things that influence turnout; and turnout motivation is an emotional response determined in the last week or so, not gauged a year in advance. So people being mad at Congress, or the political process, or the recent ugly results of the government shutdown by themselves are pretty much a wash.
What is not a wash is an impression that many voters among that 25% have reached a tipping point in being pissed off, and they are switching from "a pox on both your houses!" to "throw the rascals out!" directed at Republicans. This can be seen by comparing the drop in Obama's numbers (2% or less) to the drop for House Republicans (15%) and in the polling in Republican Congressional districts showing a shocking number as being competitive in a race between the incumbent Republican against a "generic" Democrat. In short, I think this last debacle may have been the last straw for many people.
The problem for Republicans is that shifts like this are damn hard to reverse. They become self-reinforcing. Obama starts looking more sympathetic to these people as the Paul Ryan types look more aligned with the Ted Cruz types. Given that the Tea Party base seems to be primed to primary everybody to the left of Attila the Hun (Thad Cochran; really?) the Republicans themselves are likely to drive this trend with their own rhetoric. It seems a lot like the Democratic disarray in the 1968 and 1972 elections. Come to think of it, a lot of the Second Amendment folks act a lot like the Weather Underground and Black Panthers in the early '70s.
Maybe I'm all wet and this is wishful thinking, but I don't think so. We are not talking about a large number of people here, just enough to tilt a lot of races. That the number of competitive races for House Republican incumbents might be 80--100 rather than 20--30 also implies that a number of Democrats who are vulnerable in the House may be much lower than current estimates. I'm not predicting election results here as much as I am noting that the profile of a competitive race may be sliding Democratic. Whether I am right or not, we should know in the next six months as candidates have to declare, organizations have to be funded, and as continuing polls will show trends. At least I know what I will be looking for.
Recent polls indicate that the voters are fed up with both parties and Congress in general, but they are more incensed with Republicans. What I know of political polling is the first rule is to filter out folks who have made up their minds one way or another and are not going to change. Most elections are decided by the 20--25% of probable voters who remain. So it really doesn't matter what members of the Tea Party or MoveOn.org believe, except for things that influence turnout; and turnout motivation is an emotional response determined in the last week or so, not gauged a year in advance. So people being mad at Congress, or the political process, or the recent ugly results of the government shutdown by themselves are pretty much a wash.
What is not a wash is an impression that many voters among that 25% have reached a tipping point in being pissed off, and they are switching from "a pox on both your houses!" to "throw the rascals out!" directed at Republicans. This can be seen by comparing the drop in Obama's numbers (2% or less) to the drop for House Republicans (15%) and in the polling in Republican Congressional districts showing a shocking number as being competitive in a race between the incumbent Republican against a "generic" Democrat. In short, I think this last debacle may have been the last straw for many people.
The problem for Republicans is that shifts like this are damn hard to reverse. They become self-reinforcing. Obama starts looking more sympathetic to these people as the Paul Ryan types look more aligned with the Ted Cruz types. Given that the Tea Party base seems to be primed to primary everybody to the left of Attila the Hun (Thad Cochran; really?) the Republicans themselves are likely to drive this trend with their own rhetoric. It seems a lot like the Democratic disarray in the 1968 and 1972 elections. Come to think of it, a lot of the Second Amendment folks act a lot like the Weather Underground and Black Panthers in the early '70s.
Maybe I'm all wet and this is wishful thinking, but I don't think so. We are not talking about a large number of people here, just enough to tilt a lot of races. That the number of competitive races for House Republican incumbents might be 80--100 rather than 20--30 also implies that a number of Democrats who are vulnerable in the House may be much lower than current estimates. I'm not predicting election results here as much as I am noting that the profile of a competitive race may be sliding Democratic. Whether I am right or not, we should know in the next six months as candidates have to declare, organizations have to be funded, and as continuing polls will show trends. At least I know what I will be looking for.
