Guardian UK: How being 'the party of no' is working for the GOP

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How being 'the party of no' is working for the GOP
Intransigent, extremist, uncompromising … the Republican party should be a basket case. Instead, it has a winning strategy

Gary Younge
guardian.co.uk, Monday 14 May 2012


In exit polls during the Republican primaries, voters were given four choices about what they believed to be the most important quality in a candidate: "can defeat Obama", "true conservative", "strong moral character" and "right experience".

While all might be considered important, given that the purpose of primaries is to choose a contender to fight in the general election, one would have imagined the first would have won hands down. Not so.

While defeating Obama was always the most popular quality, it rarely exceeded 50%. Indeed, in Ohio, Florida, New Hampshire and Iowa – four swing states of the kind the Republicans must win if they hope to take the White House – defeating Obama never got more than 45% (Florida), and went as low as 31% (Iowa).

But winning has long ceased to be the primary aim of a significant portion of the Republican base. If it had been, they might have been running the Senate by now. In 2010, they selected two ultra-conservatives, Christine O'Donnell in Delaware and Sharron Angle in Nevada, in winnable contests where more moderate candidates were available. They lost them both. .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/may/14/how-being-party-of-no-working-for-gop

[Populist_Prole]

1. Is it really though?

K & R'd though. Good reading.

I think the only way it "worked" for them is that it satisfied their desire to go deep and narrow. They are circling their wagons around the nutjob base, but they won't be enough to win a national election.