Research 2000 has a shudder inducing poll on Republican attitudes and beliefs regarding Pres. Obama. Here are the highlights via Ben Smith (Politico)

Should Barack Obama be impeached, or not?
Yes 39
No 32
Not Sure 29

Do you think Barack Obama is a socialist?
Yes 63
No 21
Not Sure 16

Do you believe Barack Obama was born in the United States, or not?
Yes 42
No 36
Not Sure 22

Do you believe ACORN stole the 2008 election?
Yes 21
No 24
Not Sure 55

Should openly gay men and women be allowed to teach in public schools?
Yes 8
No 73
Not Sure 19

I’m not sure which one of these results is more startling. Let’s go with 63% of Republicans believing that Pres. Obama is a socialist. This suggests to me that level-headed, moderates have fled the party. I still content that this “lunatic fringe” is only a fraction of the U.S. electorate and the Republicans still have structural problems they need to work out. They are primed to get closer to control of both houses of congress, but to do that, they’ll have to win back moderates and become a “normal” party again with the same problems the Dems currently enjoy.

A few caveats are in order. Research 2000 was contracted by Daily Kos to do the poll, which doesn’t mean anything in particular, but it would be useful to look at the methodology more closely. Having said that, these results give us some good insight as to why the current president is having such trouble getting health care passed through Congress. If this poll is accurate, the Republican party is a right wing party. If you’re a Republican legislator, you run a serious risk of losing your seat to a “real republican” in upcoming primaries. This fear is allowing the Republicans to enjoy an amazing amount of party discipline. In our system, the minority always wants to be the “party of no” but is usually not able to because there are centrists who can be “peeled off” by the majority. Not so with this group of Republicans.

Update: Nate Silver looks at the crosstabs and finds marginal difference between demographic groups. Take the “socialist” question for instance:

Translation…the Republican tent is shrinking. Good for maintaining party discipline…let’s see about governing.

Matthew Yglesias thinks we should have fewer elections in the U.S.  To wit:

Consider, for example, America’s staggering quantity of elected officials. If you live in Toronto, you vote for a member of the Toronto City Council, you vote for a member of the Ontario Parliament, and you vote for a member of the Canadian Parliament.

Werd!  If civic republicanism is to have any chance in the United States where we actually expect citizens to be informed about politics, then we have to give them a fair shot.  California, by contrast, treats it’s citizens like the closet organizing guy from Saturday Night Live.  Instead of dirt, we have propositions and instead of water, we have elections for Insurance Commissioner!

Andrew Sullivan in his blog  penned a spirited defense for President Obama’s efforts to bring a civic republicanism view of American politics back to Washington.  It’s worth quoting from at length:

I’ve lived in Washington for twenty years. I saw in Obama the real hope that something constructive could emerge from the corruption and decline of the recent past. I saw last night the civil tone that marks a responsible politics, rather than the glib cynicism and mock heroism that has marked us in much of the new millennium.

I saw in the civic spirit – especially among the young – a means of renewal for the republic. And I remain convinced that those who want to “reset” Obama’s agenda to the old forms with which they are comfortable have waged a take-no-prisoners war on real change and real reform.

So this fever feels to me like either the kind that precedes the final death of this republic into a carnival of FNC-directed war and debt and drama led by charismatic media-emperors or empresses – or the fever that finally ends the sickness, and restores some sense of civic responsibility and republican virtue. Last night, I saw one of the few men left able to see the depth of the crisis and not lose faith in this country’s ability to overcome it. My faith in this country – so strong in the past – is not as strong as Obama’s now.

But I sure as hell believe in fighting for it, and for him, against the forces at home and abroad that would truly end this experiment in self-government while pretending, of course, that everything is exactly the same. I believe our crisis is deeper than many now believe – because it is not just a crisis of economics, of debt, of over-reach, of an empire now running on its own steam and unstoppable by any political force,  but because it is a crisis of civic virtue, a collapse of the good faith and serious, reasoned attention to problems that marks the distinction between a republic and a bread-and-circuses Ailes-Rove imperium.

I couldn’t agree more with Sullivan….I’m constantly struck by the absurdity of a strict pluralist view of politics. A “this is the way it is, and has always been” view of politics that sanctions acting in one’s self interest at the expense of the common interest. This is a form of nihlism that we don’t see as desirable in individuals. We tell our children to “work out your problems,” not “get that ice cream and be sure not to share it with anyone.” We don’t act in our workplaces as if it’s acceptable to “get mine” and “screw everyone else.” But we’ve decided that this behavior is acceptable in the political realm. I blame Machiavelli for this, but that’s another story 🙂 James Madison was right that government is necessary because “men are not angles” but Madison didn’t discount the citizen’s ability to be civic minded. In fact it was central to the maintenance of a strong republic.

Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wretched situation. No theoretical checks—no form of government can render us secure. To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea. (Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention 1788)

Selleck Waterfall Sandwich

I mean honestly, was this stuff just randomly generated? How about — Robert Urich, cactus, donuts.

Jurgen Habermas has a Twitter feed.  But he’s not following anyone.  What kind of communicative action is that!

Update: OK, it’s a hoax. Not Habermas.

Via org.theory.

With due deference to Ice-Cube (minus da Lench Mob), the President’s  tete-a-tete with Congressional Republicans at their legislative retreat was a welcome change from the  scripted speeches that characterize Washington D.C.  I can’t remember the last time I saw an American president field question from the opposing party.  It was the most interesting hour of political television I’ve seen in a long time.  Sadly, it shouldn’t be as rare as it is.  Here’s the Q&A in it’s entirety.

So says a poll by PublicPolicy Polling (PPC)

Our newest survey looking at perceptions of ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Fox News, and NBC News finds Fox as the only one that more people say they trust than distrust. 49% say they trust it to 37% who do not.

What are we to make of this?  It suggests that trafficking in polarization is good for business.  Logically if you can fill a consumer niche like Fox does, you’re going to make money and develop a brand loyalty.  It reminds me of the interesting work that Jonathan Haidt is doing on conservative and liberal morality. He suggests that conservatives view loyalty as part of their morality system while liberals disregard loyalty as important to their moral order.   So MSNBC’s attempt to be a “liberal FOX” is going to be of limited success.  You never hear a conservative say “if Obama wins, I’m moving to Canada”!

via Andrew Sullivan

Notes from North of 49ºN

The above video from YouTube does a decent job of explaining what the big issue in Canada is at the moment, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s proroguing of Parliament. Proroguing? It may seem like a Sarah Palinism, as in “pro-rogue”, but it’s a suspension of Parliament without dissolving it. Harper, a Conservative, prorogued Parliament last year when the other parties were threatening to form a coalition of New Democrats, Liberals, and the Bloc Québécois. This time around, Harper was being asked tough questions by Parliamentary committees about what his government knew about the torture of Afghan detainees after they were turned over to Canadian Forces. On 30 December, the Governor General, upon Harper’s request, prorogued Parliament until 3 March 2010, killing all bills and suspending all committees. The official reason given was the economy, but nobody bought it.

There were two major results::

1. A grassroots effort using social media mobilized sizeable protests across Canada
2. The Conservatives have lost ground in the public opinion polls and are in a statistical dead heat with the Liberals

On Facebook, a group for Canadians Against Proroguing Parliament has amassed 219,600 members {28 January} and last Saturday nationwide protests were organized. Here in Toronto, a sizeable crowd assembled downtown::

The prorogation of Parliament is viewed by many as anti-democratic {See Rick Mercer’s opinion piece in the Globe & Mail}, although Harper has supporters of his decision. For the time being, anti-Conservative momentum has picked up the pace and support for the Liberals has increased—at the expense of the NDP, Greens, and Bloc.

It’s over a month until Parliament reconvenes. It will be interesting to see if the anti-Conservative sentiments will weather the Winter Olympics in Vancouver and any possible coherent response by Harper. Upon Parliament reconvening, I’m not sure if an election will be triggered. A weakened Harper that’s ready to deal may do more long-term damage to the Conservatives. I’ll be blogging on Rhizomicon within a few days on my detailed analysis of the EKOS poll data, which should make the Liberals a bit cautious about another {expensive} election in the near future.

Twitterversion:: Harper’s proroguing triggered Facebook mobilized protests.EKOS poll:: Grits surging @ expense of Tories,Greens,NDP,& Bloc. @Prof_K

You know you’re a political science geek when you DVR the State of the Union speech…and then you’re pissed off because the recording cut off the Republican rebuttal!

Good SOTU as far as these things go.  The pins are set up for a president to knock them down.  As I was watching, I kept coming back to a Gallup poll one of my students sent me that showed Obama had the largest gap in public support between the parties.  While 88% of Democrats support him, only 23% of Republicans do the same.

Can any appeal to compromise, however eloquent and soaring, overcome such a polarized political climate? This video of the D.C. tea party protests over the summer reminds me of how daunting Obama’s task remains.

The president is appealing to a “fair-minded” middle that complains they are fed up with politics. I wonder how much of this is genuine frustration and how much of this is a convenient trope for not getting involved in politics. It’s an easy conversations starter to refer to Washington as a “a den of thieves” or “a bunch of crooks.” At the end of the day, I wonder how much appeals to political temperance is going to benefit him.

Tonight is Barack Obama’s State of the Union address. Let’s hope it’s more exciting than Steve Job’s iPad announcement and I’m sure many Dems. hope it elicits less ridicule.

The WSJ has an even article on Rahm Emanuel, the White House Chief of Staff, about how he’s taking heat from the left.

“The friction was laid bare in August when Mr. Emanuel showed up at a weekly strategy session featuring liberal groups and White House aides. Some attendees said they were planning to air ads attacking conservative Democrats who were balking at Mr. Obama’s health-care overhaul.

‘F—ing retarded,’ Mr. Emanuel scolded the group, according to several participants. He warned them not to alienate lawmakers whose votes would be needed on health care and other top legislative items.”

From a strategic perspective, I feel both the Republicans and Democrats are rudderless. The Republicans have taken potshots at Obama and the Democrats, but don’t have a unifying vision. The Democrats led by Obama are taking heat for not addressing the problems-at-hand head-on and the left wing of the party feels the administration is compromising ideology.

A year ago, Obama was ushered in on a mandate of change. Emanuel is a Clintonian centrist and deals in a raw pragmatism in the service of getting things done. So, while many in the Democratic party in wake of the loss of Ted Kennedy’s old Senate seat in Massachusetts {hey, I spelled it right, unlike Coakley} think the party should go more centrist. Strategically, the Obama administration needs to address the concerns of the people in effective ways. While Emanuel’s centrist pragmatism may seem like a reasonable way to push policies through, it’s passive. Love him or hate him, George W. Bush was good at changing the game with the help of Karl Rove. Jon Stewart for weeks has lambasted the Dems. for focusing so much on retaining a filibuster-proof Senate majority, something W never had. While it could be argued that this is because of many centrist constituencies that Senators are beholden to, I see a dearth of effective communication and policies that people can get behind.

The lack of support on health care reform is a perfect storm. The right has framed it as a government interventionist boondoggle and the left have failed to communicate what they perceive the stakes to be. I see “centrist pragmatism” as resulting in the proposed healthcare legislation, which is overly complex, hard to understand, and reeks of compromise.  As we’ll see below, healthcare is now the “wrong” issue, no matter how hard politicians try to spin it as being tied to the economy.

Rahm’s centrism is wrongheaded, but blindly following a hard left agenda would also be a mistake. I think the Obama administration needs to look at the priorities of the people and the challenge will be to craft policy addressing these and communicating how the policy will effect change.

What are the public’s priorities?  According to a Pew Research study conducted earlier in the month, overall, the economy is looming large as a concern::

Terrorism is third, with the Christmas airline bombing attempt fresh in people’s minds. The next three are interesting with possible drivers:: social security {decimated retirement plans and obliterated pensions}, education {rising costs}, and Medicare {rising pharmaceutical costs}. Breaking things down by ideological lines, the following pattern emerges::

Interestingly, what matters to all groups is pretty similar. Healthcare is only in the top 5 for Democrats, painting the issue as partisan, given its divisiveness.

What to do? All roads lead to the economy and while the deficit is a concern, strategically, I see populist Keynesian measures that put people to work as a way to win over independents, appeal to the Democratic base, and would be hard for Republicans to fight.

Twitterversion:: Centrist pragmatist R. Emanuel under fire from left-Democrats, but what about people’s priorities? Insights fr. Pew data. http://url.ie/4sen  @Prof_K