Posted on 03/03/2011 11:54:02 AM PST by SeekAndFind
I promised you an update on this poll in the post about support for collective bargaining once the crosstabs were released. Here you go: The sample is 39D/34R/19I, including leaners, and 14 percent of respondents are union members. As Ed noted a few days ago, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says 11.9 percent of workers are unionized, so it’s a slight oversample but within the margin of error. On the other hand, Ed pointed out that public employees comprise 17 percent of the work force; in the Journal poll, 14 percent of respondents are public employees, i.e. a slight undersample. I don’t think the collective bargaining polling data is wildly skewed.
As for the rest of the poll, the Journal is touting the following as good news for Mitch Daniels. Proof at last that the public supports a “truce” on social issues?
Huckabee leads the field as the first choice of 25 percent of Republicans (Romney is second at 21, Gingrich third at 13, and Palin fourth at 12, although she finishes second as a second choice) so there’s still some support out there for an unapologetic social con, but yeah, priorities in this election lay elsewhere. Even so — is this poll really good news for Mitch Daniels, the guy who’s ready to fight the “red menace” of our federal debt?
Read it and weep, my friends:
Seventy-six percent say Medicare cuts are at least mostly unacceptable and 77 percent say the same of Social Security — including a clear majority who say it’s totally unacceptable. Here’s a related result, asking not whether cuts are acceptable but merely whether they’re necessary. Remember, entitlement spending is by far the biggest driver of America’s astronomical debt:
The silver lining is that majorities are willing to accept various tweaks to entitlements. Cuts are a no-go, but 62 percent say they’d find it at least mostly acceptable to reduce Medicare and Social Security benefits for wealthier retirees and 56 percent would find it mostly acceptable to gradually raise the retirement age for S.S. to 69 by the year 2075. In fact, 44 percent would even find a voucher system for Medicare “mostly acceptable,” an encouraging sign insofar as it gives the Ryans, Christies, and Danielses of the world a political foothold to push reforms aggressively. The immediate problem is that there’s even more support for tax hikes than there is for entitlement reform: 81 percent find a surtax on millionaires mostly acceptable and 68 percent say the same of phasing out the Bush tax cuts for “wealthy” families. One of the left’s big complaints about the Deficit Commission proposal is that it was heavy on cuts and light on tax hikes. This poll will encourage them to escalate that argument.
One last data point: A plurality of respondents say they’ll probably vote for Obama over a Republican challenger (45/40) and a majority say they support how he’s handling the Egyptian and broader Middle East uprisings (55/30). So long as he doesn’t do or say anything to further involve America in the region, he’s probably safe. Which means that no-fly zone is less likely than ever.
Too many people don’t want to give up their “goodies”. They want “goodies” (i.e. money earned by hard work) taken away from others so they can keep getting theirs because, by golly, they deserve it.
Either way the good times will definitely NOT be rolling much longer.
there are no entitlements. there ARE loans that allow them to happen, presently...and temporarily.
RIP USA.
No, Benjamin Frankin. Apparently we couldn’t keep it.
They should have a question that asks “Would you support cutting Medicare, SS and welfare benefits to illegal aliens and others who obtain them illegally?”
We need a law that mandates that EVERYONE in the U.S. will pay taxes. Get rid of that wacky EITC. It’s easy to sit around on your ass and demand more government freebies when you don’t have to pay taxes anyway. There is nothing in the U.S. Constitution that says we will have a BIG, nanny state government subsidized by “the rich and wealthy”. EVERYONE should pay their “fair share” if we are going to go for Socialism/Communism in this country.
"greatest generation" my ass.
Of course, we already had republics before the Constitution. What we have now learned is we can’t have a giant mega-republic. Small republics? Sure. I’d like to see us try that again.
If the conservative politicians stand down because of these numbers, our children will be looking back on this economy as days of plenty.
This just shows you that the GOP isn’t passionately voicing the threat of over regulation, over taxation, and big government.
We still have RINOs going on CNN, ABC, CBS, and MSNBC accepting liberal logic and talking points.
There's the silver lining.
A nation of thieves (leaches) willing to let the govt do their stealing.
All the American people need is an explanation on what needs to be changed in entitlement reforms and what does that entails——most don’t understand that if they are serious about our national deficits and debt being reduce that entitlements have to be reform because it takes a big chunk of the pie
Everything depends on the wording of the poll.
I can produce poll results on individual questions of 0 to 100 percent depending solely on wording.
Of course now that we're talking cuts its all about entitlements.
The democrats amd their media toads are running The Game on us again.
What could possibly go wrong when 51% of the country gets to vote on how much to take from the other 49% of the country?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.