It was predictable.
Back in November of 2008, right after President Obama was elected, I pointed out that what people wanted from him and the Government was less taxes and less government intervention in their lives.
What the survey tells us is that people are not interested in using the tax code to redistribute wealth. Only 23% favored a redistributionist tax system while 73% did not favor such a tax system. 62% want the Bush Tax cuts extended while only 26% want them to expire. And 66% want the inheritance tax cut to be made permanent.
And most people (66%) want Congress to cut spending. And only 39% thought that Government isn't doing enough while most (54%) thought Government is doing too much.
Why anyone thought Obama and the Democrats would give them this is a mystery to me, but is was no mystery that people replaced Republicans because they felt they weren't delivering what they wanted.
Democrats should have noted this as well but instead they deluded themselves into thinking that they won on a mandate to increase spending and government intervention.
So it's not much of a surprise to find that the President and the Democratic-controlled Congress are losing favor with the most important segment of the population: Independents.
Fifty-three percent of independents questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Tuesday say they disapprove of how Obama's handling his duties in the White House, with 43 percent in approval. That result marks the first time in a CNN poll that a majority of independents give the president's performance a thumbs-down.
And worse, it's not just the President
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 43% would vote for their district’s Republican congressional candidate while 36% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent.
That represents the lowest level of support for Democrats in recent years, while Republicans have tied their highest level of support for the third straight week. The previous low for Democrats over the past year was 37%.
That's what happens when you misinterpret your mandate.
Truly, this does not necessarily mean that people thinks Republicans are doing such a great job, but it does likely mean that they think Democrats are doing a poor job in meeting their expectations. And the last time people felt that way the voted for the other guy even if the other guy was not perceived much better.
Now a lot of this could go away if the economy improves; people do tend to get grumpy when the economy sucks. But while the Democrats seem to be telling themselves that the "Tea Parties" and vocal dissidents to their proposed health-care legislation are the manufactured result of minority rabble-rousing, consider this:
Fifty-four percent (54%) of U.S. voters say tax cuts for the middle class are more important than new spending for health care reform, even as President Obama’s top economic advisers signal that tax hikes may be necessary.
Now the really bad thing about that, aside from the obvious, is that the President and the Democrats in Congress think they have already delivered a middle-class tax cut.
So I'm not convinced that Democrats have shed themselves of they type of self-delusion that led Republicans to their most recent Waterloo.
Of course, Republicans have stuff to worry about as well:
Seventy-four percent (74%) of Republican voters say their party’s representatives in Congress have lost touch with GOP voters nationwide over the past several years.
The current climate appears to me to be where the political classes of both stripes are in a race to the bottom. It just seems to me that the Democrats are more intent on winning it.
