Interesting survey

[catsittingstill]

Democracy corps recently posted an analysis of the differences between far-right conservatives (20% of the electorate) and regular conservatives.  Fascinating stuff.

The good news from the survey of the focus groups, such as it is, is that the majority of the far-right conservatives do not seem to be motivated by racism.  The bad news is that they share a common belief that Obama is head or puppet of a conspiracy to deliberately destroy the country.  They believe they have special knowledge of his shady past and ill intentions that the rest of us are too lazy or misguided to seek out for ourselves.

And they are 20% of the electorate which makes them, what, 40-50 % of the Republican Party?  This worries me.   I sure hope the survey is wrong.

Comments

[admnaismith.livejournal.com]

The right reaction is to leave, and to form a majority with the other 80+ percent of your country's population.

And also, if considering voting for ANY Republican, be mindful of these statistics. That Republican, if elected, WILL govern so as not to offend the Palinists.

[judifilksign.livejournal.com]

Or, will reach out to the middle and end the divisions between parties, and really, really make the far right feel like the persecuted minority.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I agree that this is a possibility--but to reach out to the middle such a politician would have to offend 20% of the electorate, or more than half of the votes zie already has. Standing up for reality at the cost of alienating more than half of the people who would otherwise vote for zir would require extraordinary courage--courage which I certainly hope would be recognized and rewarded by the rest of the electorate, but courage which I suspect is rare.