Bruce alerted me yesterday to a poll which shows that for the first time since 2005, more Americans “have a favorable than unfavorable opinion” of the GOP:
The really good news for the GOP is that the uptick continued even after the fall elections. Indeed, the party’s negatives have continued to slide since then — during a time when the media coverage hasn’t always been favorable.
If elected Republicans continue to hold the line on federal spending and stand firm to the ideals espoused by Ronald Reagan, expect those numbers to hold up — if not improve.
Shooting for the stars there…
Certainly understandable given most Americans’ extremely short attention spans, generally poor knowledge of politics and current events, and human beings innate aversion to being associated with failure. You guys have been out of power for two years, Obama has failed to solve any real problems, of course you’re rebounding. But the GOP still personifies everything that’s wrong with American politics and are sure to wear out their welcome again soon enough.
This also means that you should be able to recognize the tea party foolishness for what it was – a whiny group cry over a lost election and nothing more. As soon as Republicans aren’t the marginalized outcasts, it’s all “Look at how well the GOP is polling! YAY!” I thought you guys were really upset with the Republicans? Wasn’t that the point?
#2: “You guys have been out of power for two years, Obama has failed to solve any real problems, of course you’re rebounding. But the GOP still personifies everything that’s wrong with American politics and are sure to wear out their welcome again soon enough.”
That’s funny. I thought “failing to solve any real problems” was “everything that’s wrong with American politics” (especially when the politician in question promised to solve ALL of our problems).
So, basically what you’re saying is, Obama’s policies have been an abject, undisputed failure so the GOP has made some gains, but ultimately Americans will grow tired of the GOP again and recommit to the Democratic Party for more abject, undisputed failure? Is that pretty much it?
“This also means that you should be able to recognize the tea party foolishness for what it was – a whiny group cry over a lost election and nothing more.”
Sorry, I don’t. And I don’t expect to. Of course, you can continue to call the group irrelevant, whiny sore losers if you want. I expect that your assessments of the group will have as much of an effect on the 2012 election as it did on the mid-terms.
Even trying to bump off a congresswoman didn’t do any good.
The majority of people think both parties suck. It’s nice that the GOP is viewed to suck a tiny bit less than the Dims… but being viewed as just a tiny bit less scummy than the other guys isn’t much of a good sign.
At least Levi acknowledges that Obama hasn’t solved any real problems. I would add that Obama and the Congress spent a couple of trillion dollars not solving any real problems. Can we say that they may have made things worse?
Of course Levi has to insert the obligatory boilerplate about the Tea Party tantrum because, you know, the people who do most of the country’s work and pay most of its taxes should, in the liberal view, just STFU.
It’s interesting to think about what was going on in 2005, when the numbers dipped. “The economy” was booming (housing bubble), so people had few complaints there. But the Bush administration was floundering in Iraq (this was before the Surge), and the Left was very active spreading its “BUSH LIED!!!(tm)” lie.
Oh come on – you’re seriously going to claim every hard-working American as a tea partier? Everyone I know thinks the tea party is a stupid joke, and all of us are gainfully employed. This is one of the most annoying characteristics of conservatives, this hyper-inflated ego which tells you that you’re the hardest workers and that you never complain and that you have to pick up the slack of everyone like me, who is of course a lazy welfare queen that wants to coddle the terrorists.
Expanding on the tea party, it was a rebranding campaign that kept movement conservatives on the reservation when the Republican brand was in tatters.
That’s it.
If there was any sincerity behind these little performances, we would have been seeing tea parties during the Bush years. Or the Reagan years. Obama is not the first President to run a deficit in the past 30 years, but he is a Democrat, and that’s what mattered to the tea party, despite all of the hysterics about the deficit. Sure enough, the first move of the Republican Party after the midterms was to add a tremendous amount to the deficit in the form of completely unnecessary tax cuts for rich people. Are the tea partiers up in arms about this? 6 months ago, increasing the deficit was the work of socialists and subversives, but the GOP is back in the House and all of a sudden it’s no big deal? Do you see how that kind of stuff compromises the credibility of the tea party movement?
The fundamental contradiction of conservative thinking is that the government is this inherently bumbling monolith, full of conniving, ambitious charlatans, which we should be suspicious and mistrustful of with regards to domestic issues, that somehow morphs into this virtuous global benefactor on the side of and freedom and justice when it comes to foreign policy. That means that when our government tries reform healthcare, the government is full of liars who want to control people’s lives and build a socialist nightmare, and it means that when our government invades Iraq, the government is ensuring global safety and defeating our enemies and battling on the side of righteousness.
This doesn’t make sense to me. If government has a bunch of innate characteristics that make it terrible at managing the domestic economy, shouldn’t those same characteristics make it terrible at executing foreign policy? If we can’t trust the government to regulate the economy, how can we trust the government to wage a war of aggression?
I can’t believe that conservatives are still taking issue with the liberal argument that Bush lied us into the Iraq war. I’m not exactly sure why this is such a sensitive spot for you guys, what do you have at stake? Do you feel like it would undermine our moral authority? Do you want to believe that the person you elected to office is so virtuous that he wouldn’t lie? If it could be conlusively demonstrated to you that Bush lied us into the Iraq war, how would that change your thinking?
For what’s it worth, I think Barack Obama is a liar. I think that a good chunk of the Democrats in Congress are liars. That doesn’t exactly phase me – it’s disappointing to be sure, and they won’t be getting my vote or support, but I don’t have to fool myself into thinking they’re being completely honest all the time. I suspect that what’s different about myself and most Republicans is that Bush’s lies have resulted in lots and lots of dead people and war crimes.
And again Levi trots out his big book of lies.
“No one was complaining about spending under Bush’ – Lie
“Bush lied us into Iraq” – Lie
And now this. ” Everyone I know thinks the tea party is a stupid joke, and all of us are gainfully employed.”
Funny, everyone I know thinks the government will take Healthcare and treat it with the same openness and transparency as Social Security, Medicare, and the Postal Service.
My anecdotal evidence is bigger than yours Levi.
*yawn* keep repeating those lies Levi, trying to make people think they’re true.
Your idol Goebbels would be proud of you.