Yesterday, Nielson Brothers Polling announced its finding that South Dakotans are pretty evenly split in blaming the Republicans and the Democrats for the partial federal government shutdown. Not so with a national sample:
The Republican Party has been badly damaged in the ongoing government shutdown and debt limit standoff, with a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finding that a majority of Americans blame the GOP for the shutdown, and with the party’s popularity declining to its lowest level.
By a 22-point margin (53 percent to 31 percent), the public blames the Republican Party more for the shutdown than President Barack Obama – a wider margin of blame for the GOP than the party received during the poll during the last shutdown in 1995-96 [Mark Murray, "NBC/WSJ Poll: Shutdown Debate Damages GOP," NBCNews.com, 2013.10.10].
Laying blame doesn't usually get us anywhere. But in this case, when Republicans are speaking so absurdly that I begin to doubt the possibility of rational negotiation and legislation, laying blame and tying votes to it may be the only way to force Republicans to put down the gun, release the hostages, and uphold the laws and Constitutional lawmaking processes they've sworn to uphold.
And one year until next fall’s midterm elections, American voters prefer a Democratic-controlled Congress to a Republican-controlled one by eight percentage points (47 percent to 39 percent), up from the Democrats’ three-point advantage last month (46 percent to 43 percent) [Murray, 2013.10.10].
If the the nation's full faith and credit weren't at stake, I'd say Republicans, keep driving yourselves right into electoral collapse.
PP has the War Toilet overflowing again.
Does that matter, Larry, when none of us can comment there? DWC symoblizes (and is paid to promote) the South Dakota GOP bunker mentality: shut out the opinions that threaten ours, cling to the past, and hope no one notices.
I don't know. I think 2014 is going to be a bad year for both parties. I think 2014 will be looked at as the year many incumbents fell from power in DC. DC Republicans are currently getting most of the heat for what is (or isn't) going on in DC, but so is Obama.
I do think the House will lose some R's, but still keep control. The Senate will likely lose some D's, but still barely be controlled by Reid. I think the bigger story will be an unprecedented amount of seats getting new faces. But then who knows, that is still a year away. Plenty of time for both sides to have multiple scandals and PR disasters.
I don't understand why Obama will give in on anything. Boehner and obstructors have behaved like little spoiled children. Rewarding them with even a face-saving gesture is encouraging more bad behavior. Let the retrograde obstructionists stew in their own juices. The insanity of their mythology might sink in to them.
Ken, it doesn't matter to say it will be a bad year for both parties unless a third party rises up to have a good year. We can define "good year" in this discussion very simply: In January 2015, do we control the House and Senate?
I don't know, we're at a historic time where more seats than ever are gerrymandered "safe" seats. The red districts aren't likely to suddenly go blue, or vice versa. The senate may be a different story. We'll see, but for Congress, the primaries are where the battles are.
My bet is the majority of those 53% who blame the GOP are already in blue districts, so I'm uncertain it'll mean major change in representation. I agree with Ken; we might see high turnover.
Santema and his white supremacist buddies are in denial, CAH: now they are looking for another North Dakota town in
witchwhich to hunt.http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/275462/
I reject the suggestion that Ken Santema or Stace Nelson are white supremacists.
Modis vivendi: i would add atavistic.
modus vivendi: i would also add orthographic taxidermists.
I don't know. A poll came out and said that 60% think everyone should get replaced in Congress. The only problem is that I think most will say throw the other bum out, but my party has it right.
I am open to that trade on every seat up for a vote in 2014. Of course, with Tim Johnson retiring, we still have an open choice as to whether to replace him with a Republican or a Democrat, right?
McCain made the "mistake" of saying the shutdown was caused by the Republicans so Gohmert described McCain as a supporter of Al Qadea.
From TPM: "I heard just before I came, some senator from Arizona, a guy that liked Gaddafi before he wanted to bomb him," Gohmert said. "A guy that's been to Syria and supported Al Qaeda and the rebels. But he was saying today the shutdown has been a fools' errand. And I agree with him, the president and Harry Reid should not have shut this government down."
Earlier in the day McCain, during an appearance on Fox News, stressed that the government shutdown was a result of a conservative effort to defund Obamacare.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/gohmert-describes-mccain-as-supporter-of-al-qaeda
To answer Cory's question, Republicans will control the House; Dems will hold the Senate.
The larger problem is the one that MJL alludes to. The folks who followed Ted Cruz to produce this folly are in such safe seats that they will be re-elected.
They, like the dog of Proverbs 26:11, will return to their vomit and we'll be back at this point again and again and again . . . no matter who controls Congress.
It seems to me that one of the highest priorities of the USA needs to be a constitutional amendment that clearly ends anything remotely similar to gerrymandering.
The next one is about stopping money control of politics.