New Poll Shows Democratic Incumbents in Big Trouble

[Exapno_Mapcase]

If anyone on the left thought that Republicans would do something other than utterly cave and sell their firstborns to avoid another shutdown, then they deserve to be ridiculed. It’s as bad as, I don’t know, arguing that Romney would win in 2012. Both had 0% chance of happening.

[adaher]

They hardly caved. The Republicans got a little bit more than the sequester in terms of spending cuts and no tax hikes. It’s not as much as they would have liked to get, but it’s certainly not caving.

But hey, even if it’s caving, it’s still learning, and it keeps the focus on what Democrats are doing to the voters. The Republicans have been unhelpfully distracting the public from what Democrats have been doing for some time now.

[Trinopus]

@adaher

In regards to Democrats being in trouble, has anyone noticed that the Republicans seem to be learning from their mistakes? Two year budget deal passed the House overwhelmingly.

See, I’m occasionally right.

Yep. Nice to see the Congress actually doing its job. Very nice to hear Boehner chewing out the ultra-conservatives for their folly. Ironic, but nice. Maybe this will be the big sea-change where the Republican Party reforms itself and makes a big, healthy swing back toward the political center.

(We can dream, can’t we?)

[adaher]

Closer to the center than they’ve been, but they should still be a conservative party given that 40% of Americans identify themselves as conservatives. The Democrats need the center more than the Republicans do, since there aren’t many liberals in the country.

[42fish]

@Exapno_Mapcase

If anyone on the left thought that Republicans would do something other than utterly cave and sell their firstborns to avoid another shutdown, then they deserve to be ridiculed. It’s as bad as, I don’t know, arguing that Romney would win in 2012. Both had 0% chance of happening.

I don’t know that I’d say that a second shutdown had 0% chance of happening. Sure, it would be politically harmful and have no upside, but that was true of October’s shutdown, too, and the Republicans went ahead with that one.

[adaher]

Yeah, but knowing the Tea Party mind like I do, being one of them and all, I figured they’d do it anyway, just because the Cruz types see “fighting” as all important, and compromise as a great sin.

And of course when it failed miserably, the hardcore would be marginalized.

[Gyrate]

There’s an interesting article in the Economist this month about how unmarried women tend to vote Democratic regardless of age or race, and some speculation why that it.

Knowing The Economist that link may not work for many of you, here’s a key point:

For an explanation, consider a third big development: the Republicans’ embrace of policies and slogans that might have been laboratory-crafted to upset and unite different types of unmarried women. A case in point is Mr Cuccinelli, whose candidacy dismayed establishment Republicans as much as it excited conservative activists. He is a shrink-the-government zealot: targets for his ire extend to municipal swimming pools (for crowding out the private sector). He is also a social conservative who opposes abortion, gay rights and no-fault divorce (as a state legislator, he proposed a bill to make divorce harder if one party disagreed). Poll-testing of different attacking strategies found single women outraged by Mr Cuccinelli’s social crusades. “Divorce was a big one,” Mr Halle fondly recalls.

Also worth noting:

unmarried women are one of America’s fastest-growing groups, leaping from 45m in 2000 to around 53m today—making them, in theory, a larger block of eligible voters than blacks and Hispanics put together (though in reality the groups overlap).

Fortunately for the GOP they carry the married-woman vote so clearly their best option is to start marrying off the womenfolk as fast as possible.

[adaher]

So messing up marriage with Great Society programs was a Democratic plot!

[Gyrate]

Yours is a fascinating mind.

[Exapno_Mapcase]

@42fish

I don’t know that I’d say that a second shutdown had 0% chance of happening. Sure, it would be politically harmful and have no upside, but that was true of October’s shutdown, too, and the Republicans went ahead with that one.

Despite some public protestations, the Republican leadership knew they got creamed. They failed completely and publicly. They were rescued by the failure of the Obamacase rollout but that was a temporary respite. It was going to get fixed. The looming budget crises - they ain’t over yet - were being closely watched by every political reporter in Washington, just waiting to pounce as the slightest sign that another battle that could be given 24/7 coverage was beginning. Another Republican failure to cripple the country would have been played on the news as a second Civil War, with the South losing again.

The budget deal that was struck is instructive. The Republicans got nothing but the status quo. That’s why the extreme conservative think tanks and pundits are in white rage. But status quo is a huge victory compared to what the Democrats could have fought for. That’s how bad a shape the Republicans were in. The Democrats have begun to grow the shadow of a notochord but they don’t have spines yet.

I suppose the total lack of Democratic spinage might have inflated the odds, but the reality was that Republicans literally could not wreck their image again with the general public. They’re in bad enough shape now that enrollments in Obamacare are soaring, so it’s harder to use that as an issue. (That won’t stop them, but fewer every day will believe them.) If they made their intransigence the all-day headline again, they were doomed. So 0% chance. Politics as it really is, not as wish fulfullment fantasy.

[BrainGlutton]

@adaher

In regards to Democrats being in trouble, has anyone noticed that the Republicans seem to be learning from their mistakes? Two year budget deal passed the House overwhelmingly.

See, I’m occasionally right.

But now Senate Republicans are planning to filibuster it.

[BrainGlutton]

This goes directly to the OP.

The final Democracy Corps battleground survey of 2013 belies the conventional wisdom that Republicans have enjoyed a major rebound over the last few months. On the contrary, our survey of the 50 most competitive Republican House seats and the 30 most competitive Democratic seats shows that there has been no movement. Furthermore, the second tier of less vulnerable Republican target districts has actually destabilized — meaning that there may be more Republican seats up for grabs than many believe right now.

While the disastrous ACA website rollout has taken a toll on the president’s approval rating and image, we do not find that voters are willing to punish Democrats — or, more importantly, reward Republican incumbents — for these failures. Instead, this poll finds that Republican members are damaged by their total focus on Obamacare. Voters increasingly believe that these vulnerable Republican incumbents are part of the gridlock in Washington, are too focused on battles with Obama, and are too aligned with Speaker Boehner, whose plans have not helped the economy or the jobs situation. We tested a series of messages and attacks (both for and against Republican incumbents), and found that battling on Obamacare is their weakest case for re-election. In fact, it undermines it.

This survey also confirms what we have been tracking all year: Seniors are moving more solidly into the blue column. In this survey, Democratic challengers have a 4-point advantage on the named ballot against Republican incumbents. As a reminder, Democrats lost seniors nationally by a 21-point margin in 2010.

[Buck_Godot]

@BrainGlutton

But now Senate Republicans are planning to filibuster it.

Even if they succeed, as long as Reid doesn’t cave, (and I don’t see why he would) the Filibuster will break in a matter of days. The only thing worse for Republicans than preventing a deal on the budget would be preventing a deal on the budget using an anti-democratic technique that nobody really likes.

[adaher]

A Republican filibuster can only succeed if the Warren faction in the Senate helps them out. In the House, the ratios of Republicans opposed to Democrats opposed weren’t THAT far apart. If we assume similar ratios in the Senate, this thing passes with 75 votes, with about 17 Republicans opposed and 8 Democrats.