Perhaps not surprisingly, Greenberg was dismissive of the Republican Party’s prospects, noting it had failed to pick up a significant number of voters despite a landslide 2010 victory in congressional races and a bleak economic picture. “The Republican Party is in trouble,” he said. “There are no more people calling themselves Republican through this whole process even though they had a landslide election in 2010…. It has become a cult. Independents are now equal to it,” in relative political strength.
Very interesting read from The Christian Science Monitor
This was from
Stanley Greenberg, Chairman of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research and a founder of Democracy Corps speaks at the the Monitor Breakfast at the Capital Hilton Hotel in Washington, DC, Friday
An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released earlier this week found that just 22 percent of the public thinks the nation is heading in the right direction. When Ross Perot ran as an independent presidential candidate in 1992, “those were happy times compared to now in terms of the mood of the country,” Greenberg said.
All those teabaggers have no love for rMoney. And since it looks increasingly rMoney's to lose, where are those folks going to put all that hatred and passion?
He noted that Bill McInturff, who runs the NPR poll with Greenberg, thinks the third-party vote could go as high as 20-25 percent.
There was a lot of confusion on my part reading this article. There was the claim that most of the undecideds were Democrats. But at the same time, the draw would be from the Rethuglican ticket, not Obama's run. So maybe these are the "Reagan democrats".
And the rethugs had a winner of a year in 2010, but their brand is in trouble. People are not calling themselves Republican. Indies are now a match for the GOP party.
Now where would this third party come from?
Americans Elect claims that it has had over 17 million match questions, which means, IMO that they are claiming 17 million visitors. They are also claiming that they have almost 2.5 million signature so that they can get on the ballot.
And that isn't counting the independent Libertarian Party run which has a few candidates and the Green Party and the Justice Party:
Wiki 3rd party runs for 2012
So if you take out 20% of the electorate, most of whom will bypass the GOP ticket entirely just on general principals, it sets up a scenario like Clinton had when Perot ran and scooped up a goodly number of right leaners.
But how is all of this going to affect congressional and senate races? How will the lower ballots fare in this anti incumbent mood. Will the voters take it out on their current reps? Will they discriminate against GOP if they hate the GOP top candidate?
And what will our reps need to do to protect themselves in this climate. What will WE need to do to protect our good candidates and push more good candidates into office?
And since these are the Indies that Obama has been chasing, maybe the base might be more valuable in this climate?