GOP continues to bleed support

[Joanne98]

GOP continues to bleed support
by kos
http://www.dailykos.com/
Mon Apr 02, 2007 at 09:54:10 AM PDT
Rasmussen:

March 2007

Republican 31.5
Democrat 38.1

March 2006

Republican 34.0
Democrat 36.7

March 2005

Republican 37.2
Democrat 38.7

These numbers are based on a massive sample size of 15,000 adults (not likely voters), with a margin of error of less than 1 percent.

Another significant note is that 31.3% of Americans now refuse to identify with either major party. That’s a seven percentage point increase since Election 2004 and the highest total of unaffiliateds ever measured. Most of the growth in unaffiliateds has come from the GOP. The number of Democrats in the adult population has remained more stable over the past 3 years.

These numbers confirm the recent Pew poll showing slipping identification with the Republican Party. The Pew poll, at 50-35, apparently pushed leaners harder. And given that the swelling ranks of the "independent" ranks in the Rasmussen poll comes almost exclusively from the GOP, it makes sense that once you ditch one party, you tend to favor the other.

What's stopping them from calling themselves "Democrats"? It took me a few years after ditching the Republicans to call myself a "Democrat". I was an "independent" who just happened to pull a straight ticket Democratic ballot. After spending years demonizing a party, it's hard to embrace it overnight. Democratic timidity on Iraq, whether real or perceived, perhaps plays a role. If you ditch the GOP because it becomes noxious to your values, you want the opposition to aggressively defend those values the GOP is attacking. Whether it's science (global warming, evolution), or Iraq, or civil liberties, or whatnot, they want to make sure Democrats are really better on those issues before fully embracing them.

Baby steps. First step -- destroy the Republican brand. And the GOP is happily doing this to itself. So remember, the problem isn't Bush -- it's Republicans and conservative ideology. Bush is the logical conclusion to an ideology that says government can't work. Don't let Republicans and their backers blame it all on Bush and argue for a do-over.
http://www.dailykos.com/

Kos makes a very good point. Destroy the RepubliCON brand name!

[MissWaverly]

1. agreed, the current Bush Republicans infuriate me

I was listening to a "loyal Bushie" explain who we didn't really need the EPA to regulate
"Greenhouse Gases." There are a "lot" of effective laws already on the books. Oh, really,
I guess that is why the State of Massachusetts and 11 other states and environmental groups took the argument all the way to the Supreme Court. They were so pleased by the EPA stand on carbon emissions. The EPA stand was a mandate for doing nothing, we don't really have the authority and even if we did, it's not really our job.

Here's a snip from the story from CBS, the Bush White House has not done anything to
regulate Green House Gases, nothing.

It (Supreme Court) ordered EPA to re-evaluate its contention it has the discretion not to regulate tailpipe emissions. The court said the agency has so far provided a "laundry list" of reasons that include foreign policy considerations.

"EPA has offered no reasoned explanation for its refusal to decide whether greenhouse gases cause or contribute to climate change," Stevens said. He was joined by his liberal colleagues, Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter, and the court's swing voter, Justice Anthony Kennedy.


http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/02/supremecourt/main2636888.shtml

[louis-t]

2. Ri-i-ight, and "big business will regulate itself" Think Enron, MCI, Adelphia

and "the private sector can do it better and cheaper than government" Think Halliburton, Blackwater, etc., etc., etc.....

[MissWaverly]

5. this would never have gone to the Supreme Court in the

first place if the EPA was doing its job, obviously it was not and voluntary regulation
does not work.

[calimary]

3. The same people who argue that "all we have to do is enforce all the laws

already on the books" ALWAYS conveniently fail to mention that the cost of actually enforcing said laws means you have to fund the bureaucracy fully, so you can HIRE, TRAIN, and DEPLOY enforcers, case workers, investigators, and other agents that will do all that wonderful enforcing they extoll so breathlessly. And, hey, kids, guess what? That takes TAX MONEY! These folks who speak so highly of enforcing laws already on the books are also the FIRST ones to call for cutting back government even more, dismantling or flouting the very laws they say should be enforced, or doing away with those laws altogether - to leave the private sector further unincumbered. A private sector left alone is a private sector that will prey on America for the sake of making a buck, and safeguards, decent pricing, decent hiring and treatment of workers, responsiveness to environmental and community concerns, and quality control be DAMNED.

[MissWaverly]

4. it was the same way with gun control

Bush was really sorry that the Brady bill expired, really sorry, the same way he was sorry
about Katrina, New Orleans is still in ruins, if they have not made any move to regulate,
then there needs to be laws that say carbon emissions must be regulated. We are not talking
about whether or not to have SMores or Coconut pies for the jamboree, we are talking about
the air we breathe.