It is arguable whether the USA is a Center right country or a Center Left country but

[Winterblues]

it is quite clear the great Majority is somewhere in the Center. Just like Obama. I am not sure if he is Center Right or Center Left but I know without any doubt he is Center. By being so very much in the Center he will win over the Majority of Americans on virtually every issue..While I am disappointed in a few things I wish he would ahve done and didn't, I am pretty sure he is going to be a very successful President and America will be a much better place for him..Now the next major battle is going to be on Energy/Climate issues. Let's hope on this one he is Center Left....

[NJmaverick]

1. This is going to be an unpopular post as you are reminding people

of facts they like to ingore.

[mmonk]

2. We are a very conservative country as far as the government goes.

Most likely, the most right leaning one in the West.

[JohnnyBoots]

13. We have a Far Right Party and a Center Right Party.....anyting else is fringe.

Sad to say, but true. Mainly due to willfull ignorance and an extremely under-informed, lazy populace. Pass the cheetos and turn on Glen Beck....is NASCAR on yet?

[laughingliberal]

29. Can't disagree at all

Far Right and Center Right and a disengaged populace. People don't tune in to the political realities until something affects them directly. Then it is usually just the soundbite riddled MSM.

[laughingliberal]

3. He may or may not win over the majority of Americans

It will not help if he continues the march towards towards greater disparity of wealth. And it will not matter where a person's political ideology lies, the working and middle class will be destroyed regardless of their political affiliations. We should be taking a hard look at Cap and Trade and asking ourselves why Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and the whole cast of characters is lobbying to have it passed. Not saying it can't work but could we please investigate the pitfalls before we're in the middle of another bust?

[Winterblues]

5. Let the debate begin

What is amazing so far in this Administration the ONLY debate is between Democrats/Liberals. The Right has refused to participate even the slightest..

[laughingliberal]

8. The far right has gone off the scales in their hatred

The center right is well represented by the current power. The center left is getting a bone now and then. We are all, except the very wealthy, at the mercy of a system which doesn't work for the average person anymore. Some who are still doing, ok do not think it is that bad yet. But the pain started at the bottom and is creeping up. First, the poor were abandoned. Then the working poor. Now the working class and, to an extent, the middle class. Each step up the socio-economic ladder is moving down a notch except those at the very top. Today's working class is tomorrow's poor. The middle class will soon be working poor. I don't know what the answer is but the first step is to start reversing policies which continue to funnel the money upwards and to drastically revamp a tax system which favors the wealthy and punishes work.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. Actually you are using the messaging of the Political elites

who profit from this thinking.

In truth when you poll Americans they are well to the "left" of the accepted boundaries from the elites, but with the sly use of propaganda people are convinced that the country is center (which at the policy level is truly center right under any poli sci analysis that is honest)

Ain't propaganda great?

Classic example, people have wanted single payer health care for over three generations, but that ain't gonna happen until the people actually demand it and break away from the propaganda.

And there are many other issues that when you poll the population in an honest way, well it is way to the left of the accepted political dialogue.

Will he be successful? I am sure, the political elites will make sure that is the message that comes out, and that is independent of the reality... don't worry, before you know it even GW Bush will be restored to great success. Alas the power of propaganda and a message machine.

[EOTE]

27. Thank you.

Our government is far, far more conservative than the country in general. On issue after issue, the populace doesn't buy into the government's position. 70+% of the country wants single payer, but it's not even on the table, can we truly say we have a representative democracy? It's the Frank Luntz's of the world trying to convince us that the country is center-right. I'm amazed that so many here buy into that tripe.

[DainBramaged]

6. Maybe if OUR pundits started using Repig tactics, i.e. proclaiming we are a CENTER LEFT Country

instead of NOT contradicting them or allowing them to simply get away with the propaganda time after time and putting into the pea brains of the proletariat that we are a center Reich country, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

[laughingliberal]

9. People who hang their identity on a word like conservative or centrist, et al

will not be persuaded by a label, especially one they think is their enemy like "left." We need to establish where the problem lies, the destruction the corporate takeover of our country is reaping on average American citizens. I believe our best bet is to focus the populist rage on the continued bailout of the wealthy at the expense of all of us. Is difficult to make our case with a president of our own party continuing the trend. So, we are left with, "Yes, but we don't screw you as bad as the Republicans." Persuasive, huh?

[elleng]

7. The answers REALLY DEPEND on how the questions are asked.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

10. The govt. is center-right, the people center-left.

Roughly.

[Echo In Light]

12. Ostensibly, yes. But one need take into account decades of pro-RW/business propaganda

... and National $ecurity State propaganda. And of course this rhetoric is never accurately identified and labeled for what it actually is and represents.

w/o that powerful variable at work on the public mind I suspect far more people would cast themselves as "loony" left ;)

[laughingliberal]

14. Yep. I believe there are people who agree with some policies which we would call left

who have been convinced they are moderate or center right. Conversely, there are a lot of very right leaning people who think they are moderate. The distortions have left people confused as to who is who and what is what.

[Echo In Light]

17. In my forty yrs the most incredibly frightening thing for me is to behold just how easily....

.... and seamlessly the perceptions of hundreds of millions of people can be manipulated by the most obvious deceptions.

[laughingliberal]

28. Indeed

It's really not new. Hitler convinced an entire nation they had a common enemy within in the form of the less desirable members of society. We now have much more sophisticated means with which to promote the propaganda. So, how much harder is this to fight against?

[Echo In Light]

11. Majority Support for Single-Payer

http://www.healthcare-now.org/another-poll-shows-majority-support-for-single-payer/

http://www.wpasinglepayer.org/PollResults.html

Poll: Strong majority of Americans still ‘favor’ a public option:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/12/10/public-option-still-popula/

[Golden Raisin]

15. One more big, 9/11-esque

domestic terror attack and see how "Center" the country is. The shift to the right will be immediate, dizzying --- right up to and including (God forbid) President Palin.

[Echo In Light]

18. Palin aside, I'm sure what you allude to is a very real contingency/COG plan

[Armstead]

16. The "center" is a meaningless construct .

Usually the "center" is a projection of where the person who is defining it wants it to be.

Someone who is primarily liberal and progressive believes that is where the public really is in their hearts and minds. Someone who is conservative or libertarian believes the same about their ideology.

It is true that politics is (and sorta has to be) be based on basic templates of right and left and liberal and conservative, as those represent the differing set of values and beliefs that tug at individuals and society.

But most people, including liberals and conservatives, are not consistent on every issue. And often they have mixed feelings within specific issues.

I for example, am really liberal about protecting the environment and quality of life. But I don't think some poor schmuck ought to be penalized if he builds a deck on his house too close to an arbitrary border of a wetland by mistake. Is is that a liberal environmnentalist point of view, or is that a libertarian point of view? Is that where the "center" is on the issue? Depends on who you ask.

In a larger scale, in a couple of "red" states that went for Bush, voters also voted to raise the state's minimum wage. So they voted for a conservative president, but also voted for a liberal economic and social policy.

How to reconcile all of that? That's what the perpetual tug of war of politics is about.

But claiming the "center" is at some fixed point on some imaginary political spectrum is just a framework created to justify our own particular beliefs and ideology.

[phasma ex machina]

21. +1 "What we see depends mainly on what we look for."- Sir John Lubbock nt

[Echo In Light]

23. We tend to identify things prior to actually beholding them

[Jamastiene]

22. Great post. n/t

[Romulox]

24. "The center" = the ideology of those in power. nt

[Armstead]

26. The same theory, writ large /nt

[Democrats_win]

19. On the environment, he's like Bill Clinton on NAFTA: supports bush's bad idea.

George W. Bush supports Cap and Trade just as his father supported NAFTA. These are both catastrophically bad ideas. Clinton took NAFTA as if a relay baton and ran with it. Looks like Obama will take W.orthless Bush's cap and trade and run with it too.

Cap and trade won't help the environment but will hurt America. Hey, it was supported by W.orthless Bush, that alone should be enough to demonstrate that it is a bad idea.

[Luminous Animal]

20. What is the center?

If you are going to claim that the great majority is somewhere in the center, you need to define what the center is.

What is center left on Energy/Climate issues?
Welfare?
Unions?
Health care?
Abortion?
Gay marriage?
Marijuana legalization?

[cbdo2007]

25. I think that 10% are far right and 10% are far left.....everyone else is mostly in the center

and can be influenced and should be fought for.

It's just that the 10% on each side that are the farthest right/left are the loudest.