Ok, great, so why are they allowed to dominate the national discussion?

And another thing. There's a question you've asked yourself, Steve: Why does anyone, ANYONE, care what Newt Gingrich thinks about anything?

Thank god for FOX News. If not for their fair and balanced coverage, ridiculously liberal outlets like the WaPo would be running roughshod over the most important political party in real America.

Here's the appropriate slogan: "Republicans: We Deceive, You Believe."

It would also be a mistake to believe that this poll suggests more people are switching to the Dem side. A lot of the independents are just Paulsian teabaggers.

>"Ok, great, so why are they allowed to dominate the national discussion?"

The top 1% control more wealth than the bottom 95%. Follow the money.

What the newt is saying is that the number would be much higher if they only polled real Americans. His private research indicates that the true number is close to 100%.

Okay, Newt, show us the (recent) results that are fundamentally different from this poll.

And that number also puts the other lunatic fringe polls in perspective, like 50 % of Republicans doubt that Obama is a Citizen. That gives us a 10% of the population in reality that have had their minds warped by Beck et al or are just too stupid to even find the door when they leave the hose

Why do you think we call them repugnacans!

Not that the demoncrats are much better.

The 20% sure are LOUD and seem to like BULLYING as a way of governing, if you can call it that.

Sore losers. Spoiled brats. Bully-pulpiteers. Voices shouting in the wilderness. Federal government bashers. Closet Confederates. All these terms are what more Americans are beginning to realize the repugnacans really stand for, have to offer, and how they behave.

and thanks to Newt's typical right wing insistence that up is down and day is night, that 20% isn't going to get any bigger for a while. A big part of the republican problem is their denial of reality. Most people simply don't want to invest in a public policy that shuns truth and instead caters to a handful of people whose motives are muddied up with b.s.

I remember watching a Fox round table segment a year after Sept. 11 as we approached the 2002 midterms where Barnes and Hume talked with glee about the republican identification advantage. A poll showed that republicans outnumbered dems for the first time in decades and they celebrated the fact, it seemed they were celebrating how 9/11 had made everything right in their world.

They pretty much declared the dems to be dead and Rove's permanent majority a reality (they predicted republican control of the house for at least the next 20 years based on that one poll). I want a better class of dem in congress to be sure, but man, how far we have come from those dark days.

According to the DAY Poll, taken among ten randomly selected family members, (and all hoping to mentioned in 'THE WILL'), 90% feel that Newt is a jerk.

As to the other ten percent: every family has a black sheep. . .

Just because more than 20% of the people Gingrich knows and runs across are Republican doesn't mean that number isn't accurate. Gingrich's world is self-selective.

And of course he won't admit to the number being that low. He is partly responsible for the current incarnation of the Republican party. He entered the house in 1989 and left in 1995 which is when the current flavor and tone of the Republican party was set in stone. What you see today is a direct reflection of him and later his inheritor Delay. His ego would never admit to his part of the downfall, only the resurgence.

Why then, if polling data is to be believed, are their candidates poised to win so many upcoming elections?

Doubtful@10:06

I've been wondering the same thing. If these polls are correct,Corzine should be running away from Christie and Reid in Nevada shouldn't have any serious Republican challenger.

Why then, if polling data is to be believed, are their candidates poised to win so many upcoming elections?

Except for Virginia, they aren't. Unless you're talking about useless predictions regarding 2010, where the only ones pumping a GOP "comeback" are the GOP and MSM.

doubtful and winkandanod,

I think a big portion of the independents are disaffected Republicans. No doubt they are still conservative and will vote for conservative candidates. It's the Republican brand that has taken a hit.

A lot of the independents are just Paulsian teabaggers.

Well, yes, they keep telling us that, but how many is "a lot"? Some hard numbers on this would be useful, and I don't think we have any yet, do we?

The Republican party seems to have reached tiny mass criticality, a state wherein, instead of gaining mass by attracting new matter by virtue of their awesome gravity, they're losing it to larger forces. The Democrats will pick up some of this loose matter (more Blue Dogs), the "independents" will pick up some, and the Ron Paul/Ross Perot "birther" wing will haul in a big chunk or two. The end result will be a hemmoriod-sized Republican party that should go away on its own, so long as we don't scratch it.

doubtful and Winkandanod -
When you consider that the 20% are concentrated into districts where the majority are Republicans (think Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Texas), it's really not impossible to reconcile. The Republicans at this point are a rump party that only really represent the old Confederacy and they continue to cater to the ignorant rubes there who constitute their base - which is exactly why they're coming in at only 20% or so nationally. Having 70% of support in a handful of states doesn't offset having only 10% of support everywhere else - but that handful of states can be expected to reliably continue to support them and return their Republican representatives and senators to office.

If these polls are correct,Corzine should be running away from Christie and Reid in Nevada shouldn't have any serious Republican challenger.

I'm not sure that these are the best examples. Corzine's got a year's subscription worth of issues, and Nevada's a red state. Everyone wants to take out a majority leader, particularly when he's in the opposite party of most of his constituents. Reid just happens to be making it incredibly easy for them to do so.

A better example might be Connecticut, which is about to dump Dodd for a Republican. The Countrywide mortgage was nasty stuff, but after the Bush trainwreck and Lieberman's perfidy, I find it amazing that an ostensibly blue state is still so constantly fickle in its voting love. I am beginning to think that CT has the nation's highest percentage of super-low-information "independents."

Those poll results could be even worse then Newtie thinks. I'm a life-long Republican that readily concedes my affiliation. While I wasn't one of those polled and have no illusions I am anything but an absurdity, I would sooner have a root canal than vote GOP as long as my party pursues its current lunacy.

I don't think the issue is whether or not people are "switching" from Repuglican to Democrat...rather that, one wants to hope, that more and more are becoming beyond embarrassed to be identified with REPUGS!!! Here is where the FOUNDING FATHERS screwed it up...it's not about FREE SPEECH...it's about TRUE SPEECH...something we have lost nearly entirely...and the best of the best at just making crap up and getting the MSM to repeat and repeat is are the RETHUGLICANS...

No one dislikes Republicans more than I or is happier to watch their numbers dwindle, but I have done several national likely voter polls this year, including one last month, and in none of them did Republicans come in under 30% unweighted. There is certainly a marked downward trend, and we see that in a lot of statewide polls as well, but 20% nationally seems low to me.

Don't forget: the November 2008 exit polls had Republicans at 32%. While it would be wonderful if the Republicans had lost a full third of their identifiers in less than a year, that would be an absolutely extraordinary rate of decline.

Democratic Poll Guy: No one dislikes Republicans more than I or is happier to watch their numbers dwindle, but I have done several national likely voter polls this year, including one last month, and in none of them did Republicans come in under 30% unweighted.

To what do you attribute all these results?

The latest CBS News poll found 22% identify themselves as Republicans. The latest AP poll found 21%. Ipsos/McClatchy put the number at 19%. Gallup had the highest total for the GOP, at 27%, but the Pew Forum study had it at 23%, while NBC/WSJ found 18%.

Actually, I just looked at the Post's polling numbers and that 20% number is among all adults. Among likely voters -- which is what counts in elections -- the Post still has Republicans at 34%.

Ok, great, so why are they allowed to dominate the national discussion?

That's easy -- that darn liberal media! Oh, wait...

according to pollster.com....

all voters: dem 33.4, gop 21.4, independent 39.5

go to likely voters and the numbers change

dem 40.0, gop 34.2, indi 23.8

so newt's response was to quote Mao again?

gop = punchline generator

Newt Gingrich, disgraced former Speaker of the House...
Need one say more?