REPUBLICANS TOO EXTREME? REALLY?

Well my fellow Republicans, this may come as a bit of a shock to you all but apparently we are now considered as being a bit too extreme by those who make up a majority of our fellow Americans. And strangely enough, it would seem that while many Tea Party activists have become increasingly disillusioned with Republicans for, you know, being a little too willing to sell out their principles, stranger still is the fact that a majority of Americans as a whole, don’t appear to agree on the need for a harder line from Republicans. In fact, if a new poll from CNN is anywhere near being accurate, the country may want Republicans to simply back down even more. The poll, taken between December 16 and 18, shows some alarming statistics for Republicans, especially those concerned about negotiations over the fiscal cliff.

From CNN’s writeup: "According to the survey, 53% say the GOP should compromise more, with 41% saying the Democratic Party should give up more of the proposals it supports to develop bipartisan solutions.[...] Fifty-three percent of those surveyed say they view the policies of the GOP as too extreme, up 17 points from two years ago. Only 37% say they view the polices of the Democratic Party as too extreme. It probably doesn’t help that House Speaker John Boehner, who’s leading GOP fiscal cliff negotiations with the president, is held in fairly low regard, particularly in comparison to Obama. According to the poll, 34% of the public approves of how the top Republican in the House handling his job. By contrast, the president’s approval rating stands at 52%."

These numbers may strike some people as alarming, and I guess with some justification. However, when Glenn Beck’s website, TheBlaze, took its own look at the poll numbers, there were what some considered as being bright spots and unexplained issues with the numbers, which should come as no surprise, since such is usually the case whenever we’re dealing with CNN. For instance, a majority of Americans are glad Republicans control the House of Representatives, in spite of and apparently at the same time, thinking their policy choices may be too extreme. Moreover, while Republicans have been in much better positions in terms of public perception of their policies in the past, Democrats have consistently bested them in ‘appearing’ more mainstream to the public, even at the height of the 2010 Tea Party wave.

Nevertheless, at the height of that wave, only 36 percent of the country viewed the GOP as too extreme, with 58 percent thinking their views were generally mainstream. That number has almost completely reversed, with 53 percent viewing the GOP as too extreme now, and 43 percent viewing them as generally mainstream. Yet for strategists who may want to correct this problem, the poll offers little guidance. CNN’s poll director observed that the numbers reflect a damaged GOP brand, but the poll does not test particular Republican policies for a perception of extremism. Rather, it simply lumps all those policies together under the Republican umbrella. As such, Republicans would come away from the poll knowing that their brand is damaged and that Americans view them as too extreme, but with no idea why.

So the question is, do the majority of Americans actually want nothing more than for us to kick the fiscal can further down the road instead of at least attempting to take the necessary actions now to correct things. Do they prefer that we, at this point, simply leave things as they are for our kids to figure out later and to then try to fix? I mean exactly is it that this poll is even telling us? Is it that a majority of Americans feel that there is no real urgency in dealing with our current financial mess? Is the fact that we have already had our credit rating lowered once, and may be on the verge of yet another reduction just not something they’re all that worried about? And I guess it’s ok with a majority of Americans that we just keep on printing money like there’s no tomorrow? But there is a tomorrow, and it’s insane to think we can keep on going like this.

Lastly, I find it as being somewhat shocking, even disgusting, that 52 percent of the American people can actually bring themselves to approve of the way that a man, who has no problem with using the death of 20 children to further his own political agenda, is doing his job. He has done so in trying to both bring about tougher gun laws and in trying to convince Republicans to cave on taxes in regards to the ‘fiscal cliff.’ That’s, my friends is the definition of someone who is extreme. And what does having such an opinion say about our society? As Americans, what are our priorities these days? Our country is going down the tubes, and it is not the fault of ‘extreme’ Republicans. And the fact that a majority of Americans insist on walking around with blinders on should not deter the rest of us from doing what we know is right!