Pew Research Poll: GOP losing support

[TexasLawyer]

March 25, 2007

Poll: GOP losing support
Survey finds political allegiances shifting toward Democrats, but will change last?

By Janet Hook
Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON -- Public allegiance to the Republican Party has plunged since the second year of George W. Bush's presidency, as attitudes have edged from some of the conservative values that fueled GOP political dominance for more than a decade, a major new survey found.

The survey, by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center for People and the Press, found a "dramatic shift" in political party identification since 2002,when Republicans and Democrats were at rough parity. Now, half of those surveyed identified with or leaned toward Democrats, while only 35 percent aligned with Republicans.

What's more, the survey found the public attitudes are drifting toward Democrats' values: Support for government aid to the disadvantaged has grown since the mid-1990s, skepticism about the use of military force has increased, and support for traditional family values has edged down.

Those findings suggest that Republicans' political challenges reach beyond the unpopularity of the war in Iraq and Bush. "Iraq has played a large part; the pushback on the Republican Party has to do with Bush, but there are other things going on here that Republicans will have to contend with," said Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center. "There is a difference in the landscape."

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http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070325/NATIONWORLD/703250431/-1/ZONES04

[saltpoint]

1. Good news. Now let's build on it with some hard work and get rid of

several Congressional Republicans.

Oh -- and we want the White House, too.

[sutz12]

2. The Iraq war is actually just evidence of the larger problem..

The Republican Party has sold its soul. They pandered to the religious right, then sold them down the river. They never intended to "solve" the sexual problems of America by actually voting on Gay rights and abortion, etc. Those issues were always too valuable as campaign candy to really "solve" them.

The only constituency they reliably reward is the corporate class.

[skipos]

3. Yet Dame Rudy beats most Dems in most polls

and McCain fairs well too, even though they are both warmongers.

There is no reason to think we will have it easy in 2008.

[Old and In the Way]

4. Couldn't happen to a nicer Crime Syndicate.

Without the criminal incompetence of Bush-Cheney, we could have been paralyzed and deadlocked in a 50/50 voter split for generations. When the Democrats take the White House in 2008, the first order of business is to make sure that 3 decades of crime are exposed and dealt with.

[applegrove]

5. Great stuff!