Rasmussen has distressing news for Democrats today. The Rasmussen Generic Congressional Ballot has Republicans up by 12 points over Democrats among likely voters.
Republican candidates have jumped out to a record-setting 12-point lead over Democrats on the Generic Congressional Ballot for the week ending Sunday, August 15, 2010. This is the biggest lead the GOP has held in over a decade of Rasmussen Reports surveying.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 48% of Likely Voters would vote for their district's Republican congressional candidate, while 36% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent. Support for Republicans is up two points from the previous week, while support for Democrats dropped three points.Republicans have led on the Generic Congressional Ballot since June of last year, and their lead hasn’t fallen below five points since the beginning of December. Three times this year, they've posted a 10-point lead. Prior to this survey, GOP support since June 2009 has ranged from 41% to 47%. Support for Democrats in the same period has run from 35% to 40%.
It's not hard to see why when you look at how progressives frame the paramount issues. On the subject of Social Security, which is predicted to go broke in 2037, New York Times opinion writer Paul Krugman weighs in with his analysis of its problems
Conservatives hate Social Security for ideological reasons: its success undermines their claim that government is always the problem, never the solution.
Translation: There is only one solution for government programs that are bankrupting the country – raise taxes. Disagree and you are a demon.
In the same vein, here is what Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo adds to the discussion of the 13-story mosque planned for lower Manhattan, two blocks from the hole where the World Trade Center towers once stood :
The institutional Republican party has fully (though with some notable and honorable exceptions) hoisted its sail to xenophobia and religious hatred.
Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post takes a similar view.
WASHINGTON -- Lies, distortions, jingoism, xenophobia -- another day, another campaign issue that Republicans can use to bash President Obama and the Democrats.
I think you get the drift. Progressives believe the world is made up of two kinds of people. There are good people and then there are conservatives, and as is readily evident, progressives are not bashful about saying so. They have one teensy, weensy problem.
The US is a conservative country and moving in a more conservative direction. Conservatives rarely find progressive arguments persuasive, but this line of reasoning, all too common among progressives, has no chance of winning over conservative hearts and minds. Wouldn't you think they'd be bright enough to see that.
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