Oddly, I Find This Comforting

Gallup has concluded that more people identify as conservatives than moderates or liberals. To quote the article, "Forty percent of Americans describe their political views as conservative, 36% as moderate, and 20% as liberal. This marks a shift from 2005 through 2008, when moderates were tied with conservatives as the most prevalent group."


My sparring partner WAMK is thrilled with this, and published some of the charts to bolster his belief, I think, that 2010 will sweep all the Democrats out of office. However, if you look at these charts, which examine the spread by party identification... well, it's complicated but consider this. The number of people who self-identify as Republicans nowadays is pretty small. It's like 25% or something. So that big bar of Republicans who call themselves conservatives doesn't matter so much. Plus you'll note that 1% more of Republicans call themselves liberals this year.

The Independents who consider themselves conservative is on the rise, at the expense of Moderate and Liberal. But will they vote Republican? The Republican brand right now is anything but conservative. The Republican brand is Glenn Beck, a foaming-at-the-mouth crazy; it's Sarah Palin, a flakey rogue. Most states have Conservadems who will be acceptable alternatives to them wild-eyed Hitler-accusin' gun-totin' refusenik Republicans.

And the current movement in the Republican party is to kick out the moderates ("melt Olympia Snowe! haha) so if you are looking for conservatism, you're just going to find Cheney-style neocon radicalism instead. If the country does move back to the right, I'm not so upset. Maybe we're a conservative country, but we're not nuts.