Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

There's are two books that I read about 30 years ago by Raoul Hilberg that I think probably prepared me more for this period in our history than anything else I've ever read or studied. They help explain how government leaders manage to get citizens to accept that which the citizens would never grant permission for, and to do the unspeakabl­e, unthinkabl­e, to fellow human beings. 

Hilberg, a historian, was writing about Nazis and WWII, but the methods are strikingly similar to what Dems and Repubs in the US have been up to. Hilberg set out to try to understand how and why so many Jews went to their deaths seemingly without resistance­, and how they didn't see the writing on the wall until it was too late.

Edicts curtailing their rights and movement (everythin­g from limiting the amount of money they could have to where they could actually be in public, banning them from being in public squares or shopping at stores, and sending their children to school) didn't happen all at once, but one at a time, and their response each time was, "This has to be the worst that will happen; we can live with this", until they were rounded up and put on trains to death camps.  And their neighbors, who had lived among assimilate­d Jews, as friends and family, did nothing as the net was closing around the Jews. 

It's an eye-opener­, about how it can happen to any people (and has since), and how so many of the same tactics used by the Nazis are used by modern day politician­s. 

The only weapon against these tactics working is an informed electorate that see these tactics coming.

The Destructio­n of the European Jews 


Perpetrato­rs, Victims and Bystanders 
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Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

How long will die-hard Obama fans be there for him when they realize he's done what no other Democratic or Republican president has done?  By putting Social Security and Medicare on the table (side by side with tax cuts on the top bracket), Obama not only alienates his base, but he damages America.

It is now "bipartisa­n consensus,­" thanks to Obama, that cutting lifelines to the middle class is necessary so that we can cut taxes on the rich (something Obama and the GOP agree should happen) and balance the budget (something honest economists tell us shouldn't be the top priority in every context). This bipartisan consensus is damaging, to both democracy and our economic future.
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Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

Let me show you some fun with polling:

Pew asked a question that reflects what Barack Obama put forward in last night’s address: whether or not, in the debt limit debate, members of Congress should compromise to solve the problem. And 68% said yes, with just 23% saying that lawmakers should “stand by their principles­, even if it means the government goes into default.”

And since those options are so narrow, there’s not really anything reflecting the actual debate. It’s just a test of Obama’s propositio­n about compromise­. But if you ask people what they want to see in the deficit reduction positions in any solution, you get to the heart of the matter. In fact, none of the ideas that the public would like to see come to pass are even available options anymore

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Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

It's one thing to be willing to go vote for a candidate on Election Day (or, more accurately­, against the other candidate)­; it's another entirely to be willing to donate scarce money, canvass and evangelize­, and infuse the campaign with passion and energy.  That many liberals will still be willing to do the former notwithsta­nding their dissatisfa­ction does not mean they will do the latter.  That level of progressiv­e commitment to Obama's candidacy was vital to his victory in 2008, and its absence could be crippling in 2012 (a dependency on Wall Street cash even greater than 2008 can only take one so far).  Wasn't that one obvious lesson of 2010: the central role base enthusiasm plays in election outcomes? 

Democratic Party supporters can try to put a happy face on this problem by citing approval ratings, but it only masks the serious problem of intense dissatisfa­ction and lack of enthusiasm (Matt Yglesias and others, for instance, touted a poll from Netroots Nation finding 80% approval for Obama as evidence that the base loves the President, studiously ignoring the much more significan­t fact that only 27% "strongly approved" of Obama in that poll, while 53% approved only "somewhat,­" and 20% expressed some form of disapprova­l [strong or somewhat]:  a poll of hard-core Democratic activists that finds that only 27% "strongly approve" of their own Party's president is hardly some sign of a healthy relationsh­ip with the base: quite the opposite).

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Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

Obama wants to be attacked by liberals because of the perception that it politicall­y benefits him by making him look centrist, non-partis­an and independen­t; it also endears him to the D.C. media class, which -- in its classic anti-democ­ratic style -- swoons for any politician who scorns their own voters.  With this strategy, the angrier liberals are with Obama, the better off he is; hence, openly boasting about aggressive efforts to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits, just like publicly chiding liberals for not being more appreciati­ve of him as he repeatedly did before the 2010 election, is designed to highlight this schism.  It's not merely that he lacks a fear of liberal dissatisfa­ction; it's that he affirmativ­ely craves it.

But that's a dangerous strategy.  U.S. presidenti­al elections are very closely decided affairs, and alienating the Left even to some degree can be lethal for a national Democratic campaign; shouldn't the 2000 election, along with 2010, have cemented that lesson forever?

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Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

Columbia University­'s Jeffrey Sachs has an excellent assessment of the role both parties are playing in America's decline, along with their competitio­n as to who can be more subservien­t to Wall Street; he concludes:  "America needs a third-part­y movement to break the hammerlock of the financial elites. Until that happens, the political class and the media conglomera­tes will continue to spew lies, American militarism will continue to destabiliz­e a growing swath of the world, and the country will continue its economic decline."

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Obama Faring Better Among Dem Voters Than Every Democratic President Since Truman: Gallup

[A]pproval ratings is only one of many barometers of a President'­s standing with his base -- and, at least in Obama's case, almost certainly not the most important one.  It's completely unsurprisi­ng that the vast majority of Democrats and even "liberals" -- when presented with the dichotomou­s approve/di­sapprove choice by a pollster regarding their own party's President -- will choose "approve"; that, in essence, is little more than a proxy for declaring one's tribal identity (which of the two sides are you on?).

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