This ought to raise some serious concerns about the public perception of Democrats in Congress:
A new Quinnipiac University poll measuring the "temperature" of registered voters' feelings toward various political figures put Palin third to last, followed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Pelosi.
Pelosi scored the "coolest" temperature of 32.9 degrees, while Reid was at 34.8 degrees and Palin checked in at 38.2.
Politics is still a popularity contest, and Reid and Pelosi are at extremely low levels of popularity.
There's a bit of conventional wisdom made popular by Jim Collins in his book, Good to Great, that says that you need to confront the brutal facts in your organization, but still maintain an unwavering faith about your collective ability to overcome these challenges. This isn't merely "positive thinking" - it's a rigorous commitment to reality that allows you to get rid of what isn't working and find better solutions.
Leaders Pelosi and Reid are extremely unpopular among Republican voters. Reid remains relatively unknown (37% say they don't know enough about him to form an opinion), but Pelosi is highly disliked and only 15% of those polled said they don't know enough about her to form an opinion.
So, that's the reality.
What must we do to overcome this challenge to Democratic Congressional leadership?
First, we need to do a better job of telling the story. Conservatives and independent voters are dominating the discussion and framing Pelosi as a "San Francisco liberal" who is out of touch with what's going on in the lives of regular Americans. The 2010 strategy from the RNC was to run on a "Fire Pelosi" agenda and paint Pelosi as a controlling, narrow-minded, country club liberal who didn't allow consensus-building or dialogue and debate.
Second, we need to rehabilitate the Democratic brand and fight back against the notion that Democratic policies are bankrupting the country. We need to tout the success of the new health reform law, student loan reform, and the Recovery Act, even as we support continuing reform efforts and push for protections on Social Security and Medicare. We need to fight the Republican spending cuts on valuable programs that stimulate the economy and save lives and jobs. And we need to remind American taxpayers of the out-of-control military spending in our country that is a much-bigger part of the problem than the discretionary domestic spending targeted by the US Chamber and Republicans.
Finally, we need to point out that for all their talk about "job-killing" legislation, the Democratic leadership has done much more than the Republicans to create jobs, end wasteful spending, and compromise with the other side of the aisle. Republicans have received a free pass for proposing legislation that would kill 770,000 jobs and for wasteful tax cuts for millionaires that fail to stimulate the economy or create jobs.
The DNC made a strategic decision in 2009 to focus on supporting the President's agenda. That decision is laudable, but has created a rift within the Democratic Party and has failed to support other Democratic elected officials who should be endorsed and celebrated by the DNC. Democrats need to do a better job of celebrating one another, and do more to support the leaders who are under constant fire from the right-wing corporate-owned media and the plutocrats who support corporate welfare and destruction of the social contract. Local organizers with Organizing for America need to do more to support positive relationships between members of Congress and President Obama, and to help neighborhood teams to build stronger relationships with Congressional staffers.
Approval ratings aren't a reflection of job performance, and sometimes those approval ratings drop when tough decisions are made. But we should take the message to heart that Americans are blaming Pelosi and Reid for much of what's wrong in Congress, and do more to support their leadership and fight back against the relentless attacks by corporations, lobbyists, and plutocrats.