Evans Liberal Politics
October 6, 2010
Obama and Dems Struggle to Reclaim
Liberals’ Enthusiasm Ahead of Elections
Obama Strains to Get Liberals Back Into Fold Ahead of Vote, © The New York Times, October 5, 2010, by Peter Baker, excerpt quoted verbatim:
WASHINGTON — With four weeks until Congressional elections that will shape the remainder of his term, President Obama is increasingly focused on generating enthusiasm within the base that helped put him in the White House two years ago, from college students to African-Americans.
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But Mr. Obama has aimed much of his prodding — and not a small amount of personal pique — at the liberals most deflated by the first two years of his presidency. Assuming that many independents are out of reach, White House strategists are counting on Mr. Obama to energize, cajole, wheedle and even shame the left into matching the Tea Party momentum that has propelled Republicans this year.
As he holds rallies aimed at college students and minority groups, sends e-mail to his old list of campaign supporters and prepares to host a town hall-style meeting on MTV, the president essentially is appealing to his liberal base to put aside its disappointment in him. Without offering regrets for policy choices that have angered liberals, Mr. Obama argues that the Republican alternative is far worse.
“You can’t sit it out,” he told a conference call of college student journalists last week. “You can’t suddenly just check in once every 10 years or so, on an exciting presidential election, and then not pay attention during big midterm elections where we’ve got a real big choice between Democrats and Republicans.” He added that “the energy that you were able to bring to our politics in 2008, that’s needed not less now, it’s needed more now.”
At times, though, the message has come across as scolding and testy, in the view of some Democrats. Mr. Obama told Rolling Stone magazine that Democrats “need to buck up” because it would be “inexcusable” for them to stay home. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. told a fund-raiser recently that the base should “stop whining and get out there and look at the alternatives.”
The White House may be making progress closing the so-called enthusiasm gap with Republicans, according to Democratic strategists who point to improving poll numbers and fund-raising. But the fact that Mr. Obama needs to make such a concerted effort highlights the depth of disaffection among liberals over what they see as his failure to aggressively push for the change he promised.
“It’s great that President Obama is showing a fighting spirit in the weeks before an election, but what his former voters need to see is that same fighting spirit when he’s governing,” said Adam Green, a co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, a group started last year to advocate for liberal goals and candidates.
David Axelrod, the president’s senior adviser, said the appeal to the base stemmed entirely from political reality. “It’s not frustration at all,” he said. “It’s fundamental. Almost the entire Republican margin is based on the enthusiasm gap, and if Democrats come out in the same turnout as Republicans, it’s going to be a much different election.” ….
Read the full article, here.
"The Republican Wave Has Crested;"
Democrats Gaining in Polls
“The Republican Wave Has Crested”; 2 New Polls Show Significant 7 Point Gains for the Democrats, Daily Kos, October 6, 2010, by TomP, excerpt quoted verbatim:
We have seen it recently in California where Brown and Boxer are opening up signifcant leads, in Washington and in Connecticut. Yes, the economy is making it a tough year, but new polling shows the Democrats coming back. The tradmed, however, is so invested in their wished-for Republican wave, that the news is not getting out. WE need to spread the word:
Submitted by Simon Rosenberg on 10/5/10
More evidence this morning confirming the argument we’ve been making for the past few weeks – the Republican wave has crested, and a new dynamic in election 2010 has taken hold.
New Rasmussen and Washington Post polls each show a 7 point swing towards the Democrats in the national Congressional Generic in the past few weeks. As we wrote yesterday this movement tracks similar movement seen in other polls released over the past few days, indicating that the Democrats have made substantial improvement in their position over the past month.
2 New Polls Show Significant 7 Point Gains for the Democrats
Simon Rosenberg is President and Founder of NDN and a veteran of the 1992 Clinton War Room. More from him:
In the lead Washington Post story on their new poll, the 7 point Democratic gain was “modest,” and the 6 point Republican lead “significant.” Not sure how that got by their editor this morning but shows how fundamentally invested much of DC’s political class is in the September version of this story which had Democrats losing the House, a wave election and big Republican gains were already “baked in the cake.”
2 New Polls Show Significant 7 Point Gains for the Democrats
Even with 9.5 % unemployment, the Republicans are having trouble winning both chambers of Congress. 9.5% unemployment. Yes, it was Bush’s fault, but people often just blame whoever is in office. 100s of millions of dollars spent by Big Business and the Billionaires, and yet the Republicans still have not put it away. This was their chance and they have not and will not succeed.
It’s despair that leads people to give up. We need to be agents of hope, showing that Dems can win. Simon Rosenberg sees Dem fortunes improving through October and into the election:
Given current trends it is reasonable to conclude that the Democrats could pick up another 3-6 points in the national polls before election day, which would have a significant impact of course on the many close races across the country.
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