Which polls?
Tea Party more popular than Dems, GOP
Posted: Wednesday, December 16, 2009 5:00 PM by Mark Murray
Filed Under: Democrats, Republicans, Polls
From NBC's Mark Murray and Domenico Montanaro
Just how angry is the public with the country's two leading political parties? Angry enough that the conservative, libertarian-leaning Tea Party movement is more popular than either the Democratic or the Republican parties, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.
The Republican Party maintains its net-negative favorable/unfavorable rating in the poll, with 28 percent viewing it positively and 43 percent seeing it in a negative light.
For the first time in more than two years, the Democratic Party also now holds a net-negative fav/unfav, at 35-45 percent.
By comparison, the NBC/WSJ poll shows the Tea Party movement with a net-positive 41-23 percent score.
firstread.msnbc.msn.com
Do Democrats realize what an opportunity they missed by dismissing and denigrating the Tea Party? The Winston Group poll says 40 percent of self-identified Tea Partiers are independents and Democrats. The Gallup poll says the Tea Party leans right -- no surprise there -- but is "generally representative of the public at large" in demographic terms. The December NBC / Journal poll said the Tea Party was more popular than both the Republicans and Democrats. A recent Rasmussen poll says the Tea Party is slightly more popular than the president.
These numbers suggest the Tea Party is a broad-based, diverse group of citizens who are deeply concerned about deficits, debt, taxes, and the growing size and scope of the federal government. Like any movement, the Tea Parties attract some crazies. But are those crazies any more representative of the Tea Parties than the ultra-far-left, anti-Americans were of public sentiment against the war? Indeed, one could argue that there are far more Castro-lovers from the ANSWER coalition at antiwar marches than there are nutballs at Tea Parties. But Democrats and liberals remain convinced that they are witnessing the ghost of George Wallace and the resurgence of racist politics. This fixation leads them to impugn the Tea Partiers as Klansmen and racists and nuts.
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