This variant of poll question is completely meaningless. They really don't track with opinion change on policy issues, which is what matters. In fact, responses are highly correlated with pre-existing opinions.

If history is any guide, the general public will lap up the demagoguery right up until the point that it turns really sour for them. Far right rhetoric has always appealed to the disaffected middle class, even though the long-term effect of right wing policies has always led to economic stagnation at best and complete societal destruction at worst.

Until it turns sour , or the governors wife gets arrested

I live in a purple part of Gerry Connolly's district (Prince William County, Virginia - 51st CD). I visited his local office yesterday to give my support to health care reform. His aide told me that originally, the phone calls had been overwhelmingly against reform, but that now, they are mostly phone calls in support. Furthermore, he estimated that overall support here has been about 50-50. That sounds about right.

I think there is something else at play here. This is an election year for every congressman in the House. Many Republicans knew their jobs were on the line if they did not fire up their base. Getting the loonies to focus on death panels, etc. gets them out to vote.

This is kind of like the resolution against illegal immigration sponsored by the Republican chair of the board of supervisors of Prince William County, VA a couple of years back. It got everyone focused on illegal immigration and not so much on the more important issues at hand. The resolution passed, and the Republican got re-elected. This affected the state senate race in our district, as well.

I know that much of the opposition is astroturf in origin but I suspect the right has done it's homework. It knows that there is a large group of very fearful older white middle class people out there who are scared their long secure privileged position on the top of the American heap is over. Many of them, especially the people on social security, don't know how to act. They like things just the way they are. Until know they could regard the 47 million (who they think of as mostly black and brow) without insurance in the same way they regard Aids victims in Africa. They don't want anybody messing with their existence. They are too old to get jobs. They don't have any special skills anyway. They are scared of change. Many are prepared to lash out. This could get ugly.

I think I am going to stop watching MSNBC for many of the same reasons I stopped watching Fox and the Beck era CNN. We need a lot less heat and a lot more light. The cable networks all seem to be churning conventional right and left "wisdom." They have all descended into tribalism.

"until now" and "brown." Preview is my friend. This is going to be a difficult day.

This is an election year for every congressman in the House.

News to me.

This an election year for every congressman in the House.

Arrgh. You are so right. Is my face red. No coffee this morning...

We have state elections in Prince William County this year.

Arrrgh. We have state elections in VIRGINIA this year.

"there's plenty of screaming left to do" . . . and none of it will be from supporters of health care reform.

Let's face it: the left is apathetic. It took almost eight years and a bright new candidate like Obama to get enough people off their couches. Two wars, a massive redistribution of the country's wealth, and the systematic destruction of civil liberties only drew a yawn from the left.

Does America want health care reform? Yes. Will it fight for it? No.

So what will happen in the end? Well, the Democrats are too far along to stop completely, so the only alternative will be to pass a watered down bill that eats into a woman's right to choose, guarantees more Big Pharma profits, and closes the door forever on a single-payer system. In exchange, the Democrats will have something they can wave over their heads proclaiming victory. No Republicans will vote for it, and disengaged independents will migrate back to the Republicans in time for the 2010 elections.

As a result, the Democrat will have reinforced the notion that they can not maintain their caucus, are at the mercy of special interest money, and can not be trusted to govern.

Of course, eight years later the Republican, having stolen more money from the middle class, and having committed more crimes against humanity, will lose control to the Democrats and we can start all over again.

So tell me: why does anyone vote for these turkeys?

I knew it. I'm surrounded by Assholes. -Dark Helmet

(sigh) Repeat after me: "Reform is about cutting the cost of INSURANCE, not cutting care. Medicare should not be able to refuse to pay for end of life counseling. When everybody is covered, care will cost less. Why? Because reform is about cutting the cost of insurance, not care..."

Proof that the pro healthcare reform people need to work even harder to get the truth out there and stand up to the wingnuts.

I saw an ad last night while watching the Hallmark Channel (during a MASH rerun) that was aimed at seniors, telling them that Congress was going to slash funding for Medicare to pay for health care reform, and take away their right to pick their own doctor.

It was pretty effective, and I can imagine many seniors viewing that and immediately rushing off to a town-hall meeting to scream at somebody.

I just hope the turning point doesn't come when Obama is assaulted and has to be rescued by the SS at one of these Town Halls or one of these gun nuts gets serious.

Given that every gun-owning fruitcake sees from Portsmouth that he can get a Chris Matthews interview, I'm getting a "Don't Go To Dallas, Mr. President" vibe about Obama's visits to these Western Town Halls.

Modern day Independents are conservatives too embarrassed to be associated with the idiots running the republican party.

There might be a couple of truly independent people, but for the most part Independents have conservative ideologies.

Ever notice how the media has been going out of it's way to interview self proclaimed Independents, yet when they open their pie holes all that comes out is republican talking points ? It's a shell game they are playing, just like the polls, they ask 'Independents' a certain set of questions knowing the likely results, the results they wanted to begin with.

The Dems have two choices: pass reform, or don't pass reform. If they don't pass reform, they cede momentum to the other side, and they're going to take losses in 2010. The losses will hit the conservadems most heavily even if they vote with the R's.

Or they can pass real reform, that demonstrably makes things better, and reap the rewards for generations.

In a survey of 1,000 adults taken Tuesday, 34% say demonstrations at the hometown sessions have made them more sympathetic to the protesters' views; 21% say they are less sympathetic.

Independents by 2-to-1, 35%-16%, say they are more sympathetic to the protesters now.

Most of the "independents" I know are people too stupid and uninformed to have an informed opinion on anything, and who revel in their ignorance as being "the American way." When you consider the public "education" most of them had, such an illiterate approach to understanding the operations of the constitutional republic they are supposedly citizens (a term that used to mean "informed, engaged, electorate") of, it's not really suprising.

And, even more sadly, the few "independents" I know who I have had a conversation with about health care are about as informed as the people in this poll. The only place they're even less informed is the subject of climate change.

Sadly, Mencken got it right way back in 1924: "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public."

I feel more sympathy for people who are genuinely afraid that the gov't is going to kill them or an elderly or disabled relative. If I believed this I would be scared and frustrated too. That being said, I still don't think they are right. I still want reform.

I feel sympathy for schizophrenic people on the subway shouting about an alien take-over of the planet, but I don't look to them for advice on policy.

Prudence, I'm so glad you said that, because it echoes what I've been thinking. I have this problem a lot with polls, and especially with their interpretation. It leaves no room for nuance, nor for the different ways a person may interpret the meaning of a question.

I took a bit of abuse on one site not long before the election, because I admitted that I'd answered the question "Is there any chance you'd change your mind about your vote?" in the affirmative--their idea being that anyone at that point who wasn't 100% certain must be pathological in some way. I found that a bit offensive. My vote was about a 99% probability for Obama, but was there a _chance_ I'd change my mind? Yes. A small chance, but you never know what the future may bring.

Now you have something like this. If asked this question, I might very well find myself answering that I was "more sympathetic" toward their views. Because I do have a lot more sympathy towards their obviously sincere fear.

That does not mean I think their fears are justified. I've looked into the origins of their claims and I'm convinced their fears are chimeras. But I am sympathetic. How I answered this question would have depended on if I was interpreting "sympathetic towards their views" as meaning more "feeling for them" or more "agreeing with them."

"Any chance the right's thuggish extremism might spark a public backlash?"

Unless the msm tell the public that the protests are lies and bullshit, the protesters will be viewed as having some validity. It's not complicated and the media knows it.

And as you said elsewhere, "it pays to lie, blatantly and repeatedly, when launching a campaign against a policy initiative. If proponents ignore your bogus claims, they go uncontested, making it easier to persuade uninformed voters. If proponents challenge your bogus claims, the media will say they've "lost control of the message."

It always comes back to the media. Right now the big media guys are doing what they love the most--tearing down a Democratic President. And most Americans get their political information from the tube, not the net.

It really is necessary for the left side of the blogosphere to keep the pressure on the media and the politicians. You're the last bastion of truth. I love y'all, but that's sad.

the problem with the label "independents" is that there is no "national" meaning to it...in the last election, red state independents voted mccain, blue state independents voted obama [with a few exceptions; va, for example]...as in all national numbers, it could very well be that the massive size of obama disapproval among whites in the south is messing with these poll results