What Americans really think of government

[red states rule]

You know it is going to be a bad election for Dems when the Washington Post runs a story like this




The Role of Government Survey
What do Americans really expect from Washington? Has public opinion about of the role of government changed dramatically in this new age of government here, there and everywhere? Is the Obama administration badly out of sync with voters when it comes to robust federal action?

The results from a new, large-scale Washington Post-Kaiser-Harvard poll on the role of government help answer these ripe questions, and show how lumping people into big vs. small government types distracts from the more complicated, interesting reality.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/WebReportcard.gif

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/fedrole2.html

[Dante]

You know it is going to be a bad election for Dems when the Washington Post runs a story like thisTo: red states rule :fart:

Funny. The WAPO has always ran stories that made Democrats look bad if it were considered newsworthy or would sell papers. :fart:

[SassyLady]

Looks like to me the Repubs are at the bottom Dante.

[Kathianne]

The NYT has this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/weekinreview/10sokolove.html


October 9, 2010
Door-to-Door in Levittown
By MICHAEL SOKOLOVE

LEVITTOWN, Pa.

PATRICK MURPHY, a Democrat who represents Pennsylvania’s Eighth Congressional District, stood at a podium last week in the parking lot of a small business with the muscular name of Iron Horse Excavating. His campaign had made sure to put him right in front of a massive piece of earth-moving equipment, the sort of thing that suggests action and progress. The co-owner of Iron Horse, Troy Brennan, a barrel-chested man and former mixed martial arts fighter, was one of five local businessmen who stood with Mr. Murphy. The two-term congressman introduced them as “the people who are leading us out of the biggest recession since the Great Depression.”

The campaign event took place on the outskirts of Levittown and about a mile from the old Fairless Works plant of United States Steel. Levittown has a defined past. It is where workingmen and women — many of them migrants from Philadelphia’s teeming neighborhoods or the coal-mining towns of northeastern Pennsylvania — found an affordable home and a place in America’s middle class. When political candidates come around now, the town’s residents listen for some tangible hope of a future.

Mr. Murphy, a former Army captain with the 82nd Airborne Division, was the first Iraq veteran elected to Congress — and one of the first elected officials in Pennsylvania to throw his support to Barack Obama. He endorsed him in August 2007, “when it looked like he had no chance,” as Mr. Murphy put it. After Mr. Obama prevailed in November 2008, the congressman’s close association with the new president seemed like a kind of political bragging point. But not now. One independent poll has Mr. Murphy trailing his Republican opponent, Mike Fitzpatrick, by a substantial margin in a district that has long swung between Democrats and Republicans. (Mr. Fitzpatrick represented the district for one term before Mr. Murphy unseated him in 2006.)

I grew up in Levittown, and twice during the presidential campaign of 2008 traveled back to report from there. It is a place that can seem like a relic: older, whiter and less educated than much of the rest of America. Its voters overwhelmingly preferred Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary, but that November they voted in big numbers for Mr. Obama, which was notable, in part, because Levittown was founded in the mid-1950s as a whites-only town.

I went back again last week to see how Levittown was faring and how Mr. Murphy was selling the Democratic economic program, and himself, in a community battered by the recession. Tens of millions of dollars in stimulus funds have gone into the Levittown area — to the three school districts that serve it, to infrastructure projects and to local businesses. If the money has made a political difference, it is not yet apparent.

...

I walked with Mr. Murphy one evening for nearly three hours as he campaigned door to door in in largely Democratic, vote-rich Levittown. A boyish-looking 36, Mr. Murphy displayed the enthusiasm and earnestness of an Eagle Scout. “I’m Patrick Murphy, the local congressman,” he said to whoever answered the door. He talked about the 3,000 jobs he had saved in the district, including many “green” and high-tech jobs of the future.

The reception he got was eye-opening. The people Mr. Murphy encountered were angry, and none of them, as far as I could tell, were associated with the Tea Party movement. The very first voter he talked to that evening was a man in his mid-70s who said he had paid more than he expected for a recent hospital stay because of the health insurance reforms passed by Congress. Mr. Murphy told him he did not think that could possibly be the case and urged him to visit his district office so his staff could review the medical bills.

“Sir, I’m doing my best. I really want to help you,” he said. It got him nowhere. “I think you’re all a bunch of sewer rats in Washington,” the man told him.

...

Very few people seemed to want to actually listen to him. They jumped in with long lists of grievances: taxes, job losses, immigration, crooked local officials, junked cars in neighbors’ yards.

Marge Reed, 75, opened her screen door and before he could complete a sentence said, “You know what, Mr. Murphy, I don’t believe anything anybody tells me anymore.” She apologized for her frankness but said it was to be expected because of her Irish heritage. “I’m Irish, too,” Mr. Murphy said, as if she might not know that. “So is your opponent,” she said, and they both laughed. She told Mr. Murphy that she planned to vote for him, then continued giving him a piece of her mind.

Little of the anger Mr. Murphy encountered was aimed directly at him or even at President Obama. Mr. Murphy never once mentioned the president’s name, and, oddly, over the course of three hours, neither did any of the Levittown residents. People just did not like their situation or the general drift of the country, and seemed to hold everyone in a position of power — locally and in Washington — responsible...

[red states rule]

To: red states rule :fart:

Funny. The WAPO has always ran stories that made Democrats look bad if it were considered newsworthy or would sell papers. :fart:

Using your "theory" the headline on November 3 would be something like this:

"Democrats sweep 3 House elections. Monor setbacks in 71 other districts"