A poll commissioned by the Club for Growth in 12 swing congressional districts over the past weekend shows that the voters who made the difference in this election still prefer less government — lower taxes, less spending and less regulation — to Sen. Obama’s economic liberalism. Turns out, Americans didn’t vote for Mr. Obama and Democratic congressional candidates because they support their redistributionist agenda, but because they are fed up with the Republican politicians in office….
Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco district will always support universal health care, and Jeff Flake’s Arizona district will always support less government. But the 12 districts we surveyed represent the political middle of the country, and in this cycle their partisan allegiances changed. The question is, have their opinions on the issues changed as well? The answer is emphatically no.
Consider the most salient aspects of Mr. Obama’s economic agenda: the redistribution of wealth through higher taxes on America’s top earners; the revival of the death tax; raising the tax on capital gains and dividend income; increased government spending; increased government involvement in the housing crisis; a restriction on offshore drilling and oil exploration in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR); and “card check” legislation stripping workers of their right to a secret ballot in union elections.
On each of these issues, swing voters stand starkly against Mr. Obama. According to the Club’s poll, 73% of voters prefer the federal government to focus on “creating economic conditions that give all people opportunities to create wealth through their own efforts” over “spreading wealth from higher income people to middle and lower income people.” Two-thirds of respondents prefer to see the permanent elimination of the death tax, and 65% prefer to keep capital gains and dividend tax rates at their current lows.
Read it all and take the time to look at the overall poll results also
I hate to admit it, but maybe the libertarians are right. I think as the US becomes more and more diverse, we need to ease up on a lot of laws, regulations and restrictions. And that also means cutting back a lot of gov’t programs, spending, and taxes.
Anyway, too much to outline here in a simple comment and I’m still pondering this…
Then they deserve the consequences. Maranatha.
William Sulik, I want to commend you on your intellectual honesty; for thinking things through to their logical consequences, regardless of partisan allegiances. As you look at the political sphere through the lens of liberty, you’ll see that issues clarify and make resounding sense. Labels and epithets such as left, right, moderate, progressive turn out to be meaningless and inconsistent. Structures such as church, family, and charities turn out to hold significance and hope for the future while new government programs and taxpayer-funded morality announcements pale in significance. Christ and Christ alone becomes the stumbling block you present to your unsaved acquanintances, rather than the latest political platform of the Christian Right or Left. God speed on your journey of investigation!
Thank you, #1, I reached that conclusion about 16 years ago.
[blockquote]On each of these issues, swing voters stand starkly against Mr. Obama.[/blockquote]
Well, swing voters, you better get used to getting your views run over by the Democrats in the House, the Democrats in the Senate, and now the the Democrat President, Barak Hussein Obama. It now does not matter what you think, want, or desire…you have given the power for at least the next two years to the most liberal coalition in our history. There are no checks or balances right now. Somehow, the 9% approval rating for the Democrats that have had the majority in the House and the Senate for the last two years has not crossed the cognitive threshold of the majority of voters. They have voted to extend the legislative agenda for a group that they only give a 9% approval rating to. The disconnect is amazing. I hope they enjoy the victory. I hope they enjoy the hard left turn our nation is about to take, despite what they want. They voted for this, and now they are going to really get it.
A political cartoon in our paper captured the real truth of the election: “Bush Defeats McCain”.
I was at a meeting at a presentation at a church seminary tonight, with a dinner ahead of time. At our table I heard the expression from two guys “The nightmare is over”. I wanted to ask them what was so bad about their lives the last eight years, but I held my tongue. Now I wish I hadn’t. The presentation on the subject of liturgical change after the dinner was, however, very good.
Thank you for posting this, Kendall. This election seems to have been an emotional reaction to the perceptions about the last administration. As details emerge about Democratic proposals one by one we shall see if they draw support consistent with the election results. My own theory is that many of the more radical ideas will draw strenuous opposition as the details emerge. Time will tell.
As the central US state begins to decline through fiscal overreach and corruption, the pre-state institutions of Tribe and Creed will have to strengthen if we are to preserve the social order. The modern US has been an experiment in people of hugely divergent worldviews and geographies trying to govern each other–a sort of domestic empire, actually. The end of all empires is the breakup into constituent nations. For the Left, this means no more social engineering and redistributive justice. For the Right, this means no more nanny state and overseas military deployments.
The people got what they wanted. It remains to be seen how long they are going to want what they got. I hope Obama doesn’t think he has any kind of “mandate”. He ran as the Anti-Bush and that is what got him elected.
the snarksterâ„¢
People voted for change – which of course can be either good or bad. Because Americans (at least historically) do not like losing wars, do not like socialism, do not like goverment making their decisions many people may not like the change we are likely to see.
I think many Americans will have what I call a Colonel Nicholson (Alec Guiness – Bridge on the River Kwai) moment of realization.
until and unless the Republican party’s face is best represented by Sen. Tom Coburn and Rep. Jeff Flake, they will and should remain the minority party. Right now, it is sadly better represented by porkers like Sen. Ted Stevens (thankfully on his way to the slammer), Rep. Don Young., Sen. Thad Cochran etc. The old guard, whose motto might as well be “cut taxes and increase spending,” needs to go….
Chris, what a great post! You nailed it exactly;the GOP kool-aid of ‘no new taxes’ simply won’t meet the needs of TODAY (especially not the diplomatic and financial MESS this neocon GOP Administration has led us into, especially in Iraq!)
As Mr. Toomey’s writing, well, it’s a give-away when one uses phrases such as ‘death tax’ and ‘redistribute the wealth’. 20 years of ‘trickle-down’ economics has resulted in a yawning ‘wealth’ gap; the working people’s wages have actually declined, and the Cheney/Bush tax cuts shoveled even MORE $$$ to the top 5%. At last, the American people show signs of awaking! We need reform NOW and sadly the GOP has demonstrated again and again that it is out of ideas. It was a sad sight to see McCain cave in to his far-right base — but it also showed the electorate exactly whom rules the GOP. At this moment, the electorate simply does not trust the GOP (especially the neocon wing) because they’re the ones who led us off a cliff into the current near-catastrophe on so many fronts!