I don't know if I consider a few Republicans winning as a rebuke. From what I understand NY-23 was likely to go Republican (or at least Conservative) anyway. Deeds was not a strong candidate and Corzine was always in trouble. I don't know about elections elsewhere, but those three, should Republicans win all/some, are not a rebuke to Democrats.

It aint a rebuke, it is the result of an uninspired, slowly giving-up citizenry, realizing that once again -- just like the Big Dawg -- the hopey changey thingie is 99% shuck and jive.

i dont blame people for giving up with the mess of corrupt indecent spectacles pouring out of Washington and on their teevee screens.

"I've long worried that some (conservative, Blue Dog) "liberal bloggers like Carpetbagger" Democrats may want to see their party lose"

After all, you seem to want to have Bayh and others lose their seats because they are not "real" Democrats.

Of course, accroding to most of you, I ain't a real Democrat either.

However you look at it, people like Landrieux, Bayh, and Nelson are probably the best people we could hope for coming from those states. Throw in Democrats from North Dakota and Montana and you have a bunch of moderate Democrats.

Think about that, Nebraska and North Dakota have Democrats in the Senate. The reason that Maine has the most moderate Republicans is because those Republicans can win when Tom Delay would lose.

Come on, don't be stupid. Support Democrats who support your views 60% or 80% of the time. It beats the idea of a conservative Republican who supports your views 1% of the time.

It's a sign of how degraded our political thought and discourse have become that folks can describe those small state DINOS as "moderate" without the irony emoticon.

Another Blue Dog wants more Republicans in Congress because they provide him cover for his own legislative do-nothingness.

Without more Republicans the Blue Dogs are exposed as the mushy-brained middle.

Altmire probably has today's lesson backwards. Republicans will do well today because Democrats are staying home in droves.

Why would progressive Democrats want to vote anyway? The word that best describes the administration is timid. Barack Obama is way too deferential to Blue Dogs and Republicans. If anything today's loses reflect a Democratic base that is sick of giving the rich and powerful "conservatives" everything they ask without holding them accountable for anything.

mr. wilson,
i will continue to support the millions of children in poverty who need food, shelter, heath care, decent education.

i will not support any corn fed, corporate-bought arrogant asshole like Altmire, or the god damned corrupt clown senators you name and identify with, who seem to yawn at the thought that there might be an urgent crisis -- or three or four -- in this country currently.

I'll call a god damn pig a god damn pig. And I won't support a pig even if he calls himself a god damned democrat...

After all, you seem to want to have Bayh and others lose their seats because they are not "real" Democrats.

Oh, bullshit. We want them to lose their seats because they actively work to defeat the clearly stated priorities of the electorate by threatening (and too often, acting) to support the opposition's filibusters.

Until Blue Dogs learn that helping to get Democratic legislation to a vote is the minimum expectation for a member of the caucus -- regardless of what ass-covering move they choose in the final vote -- we will be on their cases. As should any "Democrat" whose goal isn't total obstruction.

there are 3 parties in america: there is the democratic party. there is the right wing party. and there is the moderate republican party that is hiding out in the democratic party because it is scared of the thugs in the right wing party.

If the Iraq war taught us anything, it should have revealed to us that really bad ideas can be very popular. What we need to do more than chastising individuals for being insufficiently loyal to the party that brung them, is educate Americans generally on the fact the Reaganism has failed miserably.
.
The mythology of small government and magic markets is alive and well. It needs to be buried next to creationism.

What Howard said.

And why is Altmire a democrat exactly, then? Can someone explain any further than Howard just did?

This is what Rahm gets for recruiting goopers to run as Democrats. Although I suppose that's exactly what Rahm wants.

More and more I feel like Obama ran a real bait-and-switch campaign. He should have run as the DLC quisling he is. At least we'd have known what we were getting.

Not that we didn't, mind you, but his book held out some little hope that he was more than Bill Clinton-lite. This all does make me wonder what a Hillary Clinton presidency might have been like, although, based on the disasterous way she ran her campaign, and the disasterous people she hired as staff, it doesn't seem like she would have been any better.

Phooey.

This stuff is scary. We have crazy right, and center-right, and that's all we have. We can't let the crazies back into power, so we support the center-right with our noses-held and teeth-gritted.

Perhaps Altmire should be invited to become a Republican, if those examples of heavily watered-down bills (stimulus, climate changes, etc.) are things he considers too extreme.
At least, facing an aggressive progressive challenger in the primary might get his attention.

How many issues are there where Senator Lugar votes the way you want and Senator Bayh votes against the way you want?

I am fairly sure the answer is Zero.

How many issues are there where Senator Johanns votes the way you want and Senator Nelson votes the other way?

Again, I am fairly sure the answer is Zero.

Now, I realize that Nelson and Bayh often vote against the way you want. What is the chance of getting a senator from Nebraska that is to the left of Nelson? I think the answer is fairly close to zero. What is the answer of getting a senator from Indiana to the left of Bayh? I think the answer is fairly low, maybe 15% but that is just a wild guess.

Given the choice between the Republican and the conservative Democrat, I will take the conservative Democrat every time. Sure I would rather have a moderate to liberal Democrat and I am sure you all want a liberal Democrat. But that isn't realistic. I would love a Senate where 80 senators are more liberal than Nelson instead of about 58 or 59 like we have now.

But that ain't gonna happen.

Bayh and Nelson are better than the alternatives.

Live in the real world.

the real answer to the debate between Neil Wilson and Neill stems from Neil Wilson's last line: "live in the real world."

surely we have no choice but to do that (unless we become wingnuts, who have their own reality). the imperitive, then, is to change that world. the left has been notoriously outmaneuvered by the right for 30 years now, since the ascent of St. Raygun, in that regard. the public is uninformed, and is spoon-fed myths and lies that stick better than any messaging the left can manage. the majority of voters are "low information" voters. until we learn how to match the right in messaging and motivating low income voters, we will continually face the unpalatable choice presented by the Neill vs. Neil debate: tilting at windmills with progressive candidates, or holding our noses and backing DINOs for the sake of winning the vote to organize the chamber and run the committees.

Oh, piss off, Wilson, you reflexive contrarian. If you paid attention, you'd have noticed that I've made the argument 50 or 60 times that most of the senators you mention are the best we'll get from those backwards states. I have no problem with conservative Dems saving their sorry asses from being diselected by low-info voters by following their "consciences" in final votes.

My post today referred to procedural votes designed to prevent a bill from being voted on, and I notice you didn't address that. While primarying these fools isn't practical in most (not all) cases, neither is throwing up our hands and saying there's no pressure the leadership or the base can or should exert on them. If you think "60-80 percent" is an acceptable number for supporting an up-or-down vote , then we're operating from totally different premises -- and here's a hint: yours aren't on the Democratic side of the tracks.

Conservative Republicans have a world view that becomes their agenda, no matter how deluded their world view is.

Altmire, and Blue Dogs like him, also interpret whatever happens to fit their world view. But they overlook one point of view in that process: what do most voters think?

Sure, on any specific issue, there's multiple answers to that question. But where most agree is that they want their reps to figure out what's best for their constituents AND PUT THAT FIRST.

How many Dems get elected or whether Altmire gets re-elected is the stuff of tacticians. Most voters think the passage of beneficial legislation is first and foremost and if the outcome is nice, then election and re-election are the rewards. AFTERwards.

So if running deficits actually betters the lives of most of his constituents, they'll reward him.If he wishes to ignore economic history and simply be reactive to transient sentiments that aren't grounded in economic reality then he's only a panderer. Not a leader or a representative of anyone's best interests.

Sure, he's got a lot of company in Washington that acts that way, representing ignorance and continuing the mediocracy. But if he wants to do his job, he has to either stop deluding himself or stop deliberately lying - whichever is governing the view he expressed.

now hold on here: tilting at windmills with progressive candidates?

i'm too busy telling ron wyden he's a god damn schizoid on heath care reform...

i live in the real world where there is real live pain caused by real live thuggish thieves with crony congresscritters and a broken system of democracy.

i aint doggypaddling with mr. wilson in a tepid shit stream of ugly government, i'm for nailing the elected officials to the wall on the issues that make for a decent society.

(just cause i give the Dims a hard time doesnt mean i'm some damned clueless naderite...)

If the GOP does well in Virginia today, it will be because the top Democrat chose to run with mushy conservative positions that he thought would be popular downstate, and assumed that suburban Democrats would follow along because they have no place else to go. Unfortunately, they did have some place else to go -- home. Basically, he ran with a Blue Dog strategy, and anyone who takes the lesson from this that we should listen to the Blue Dogs should have their head examined. (Or, if they're an actual Blue Dog, is self-serving or self-deluded on a level with the "everything is good news for Republicans" crowd.)

Shortstop: You take yourself far too seriously.

Oh, piss off, Wilson, you reflexive contrarian. If you paid attention, you'd have noticed that I've made the argument 50 or 60 times that most of the senators you mention are the best we'll get from those backwards states.

I don't think I ever read one of your posts before and I sure didn't read them today before I started this post.

So, name a cloture vote where either Bayh and Nelson were the deciding votes.

Put up or shut up.

LOL -- you haven't caught on yet that Shortstop is the epitome of stooopid progressivism. She doesn't understand issues, and actively disrespects folks who understand politics, but oh, Lord, how she claims Authority.

My own hope is that the blue dogs who have tried to kill health insurance reform bite the big one in their next elections.

To inject some reality into this: there are 251 Democratic votes in the House. You need 218 to reliably get anything done.

There are 52 Blue Dogs. Can't anybody here do the math?

It's not simply a question of passing legislation -- it's also the not-entirely procedural votes on Rules, Discharge Petitions, Motions to Recommit, and appealing the rulings of the Chair.

The House majority can, to a degree, frame debates over Rules, e.g., we're going to have an up or down vote on issue X, so this isn't the place to debate issue Y, even if it is related to X.

But Discharge Petitions and Motions to Recommit are necessarily framed in terms of a specific issue. It's especially difficult when those who are out of step with the majority of their caucus sign onto legislation with which their caucus disagrees, which the minority party then uses to organize into Discharge Petitions (which takes a bill straight to the floor), or Motions to Recommit (which tells a Committee to deal with some issue that had been left out of a bill). That's because there is an automatic and visible contradiction between a Representative who will cosponsor a bill, but won't insist that it get a vote on the floor.

That means running the House requires understanding the political needs of each member of the majority.

So dissing Blue Dogs isn't the smartest way to run a majority party, particularly when they ARE the majority -- IIRC, 52 House Democrats were elected in districts that voted for McCain and Bush, and 48 of 'em replaced Republicans.

Lose them, and we lose the majority. Do the math.

Likewise, there are 58 Democrats and two Independents who caucus with the majority in the Senate. There are some levers on Leiberman, for example -- the Democratic caucus gives him a gavel and a budget, which they can take away.

But the fulcrum is awful close to the wrong end of the lever -- and in the House, it's mostly the leverage that the Blue Dogs have over the rest of the caucus, not the other way around.

Sometimes a Blue Dog is the best you can get for a given district, but Altmire's from Western PA. He'd better be careful about what he says, because he isn't exactly representing a bastion of Red State culture, and could easily get taken out in a primary by a credible opponent.

Did The Americanist just dis someone else for claiming authority? Was that a self deprecating joke?

Let's hope that Altmire gets his wish that Democrats lose seats in the next election and that we get our wish that those seats all be Blue Dog Democrats.

Go to Think Progress and look. It is a good bill. What is humorous about it is it includes the normal Dem things, but no one seems to have noticed that it also includes about 10 things the Repugs constantly say they want in a bill like: sell ins. across state lines, repeal antitrust ins. cos, tort reform, etc.

The debate should be fun to watch if the Repugs have not taken time to read it. They will try to amend it and the Dems can say, "in here already."
Check mate.

LOL -- TK, you got a problem with ARITHMETIC, now?

Honest, this isn't complicated. You just have to pay attention -- seniority in the House depends on getting re-elected over and over. It doesn't matter whether you're talking Republicans or Democrats, the Representatives who get re-elected most often tend to be the ones from relatively safe districts. Sometimes, that rewards Representatives who are out of step with their Caucus as a whole (Jim Leach was a Republican example, but I can't think of many instances of House Democrats chairing Committees who are clearly more conservative than their caucus), but most of the time, it rewards solidly conservative Republicans (e.g., Thomas, Sensenbrenner) and reliably liberal Democrats (e.g., Rangell, Conyers).

But the way the Democrats GET to remain the House majority does not depend on districts like Rangel's in NYC or Conyers in Detroit.

It depends on those 52 Blue Dog districts. The majority cannot reliably pass legislation if it is written to make it easy for the safe seat Democrats to vote for it, but difficult or impossible for the narrow-margin Democrats. Do the math.

So our host managed to completely misunderstand Altmire's point, cuz, let's face it, basic political arithmetic isn't progressives' strong suit, viz, Jinchi's notion that it would somehow help progressives if there were more Republicans in the House.

LOL -- there ain't no appeal to authority in either of my posts here: just statin' facts.

If you wanna dispute any of the facts, take your pick: the Democrats don't have 251 votes in the House? 52 of 'em aren't Blue Dogs? It doesn't take 218 to get anything done? Rules, Discharge Petitions, Motions to Recommit, Appeals of the Rulings of the Chair -- you find these cannot be framed to catch a cosponsor in a contradiction, when he or she refuses to allow a vote on what they support?

DO tell.

Oh, I don't disagree with this assessment of yours, The Americanist. I just haven't noticed many others that you've gotten right. Your track record is exceedingly poor, in inverse proportion to the amount of childish chest thumping you engage in.

LOL -- clearly, you haven't been paying attention.

Look, this isn't about me. I trash knuckleheads here for practice, but my main point is generally that progressives shouldn't be so goddam quick to insult potential allies while making impossible demands, e.g., the idea that the swing votes in the Senate are from "backwards states", or that it would somehow be a good thing to have, say, 219 Democrats instead of 251 in the House.

But all you can think to say is about... me.

Kinda proves my point, doesn't it?

For all this talk about not supporting Blue Dog candidates.
And teaching them a lesson by putting up a strong Progressive challenger ...

Been done. Been there. We saw the results.

In 1976 the Liberals of the day ( Todays Progressives ) saw a filibuster proof majority and control of Washington as an obvious MANDATE to finish what Johnson started.

The moderates of the day ( Southern Democrats and Neocons ... yep NeoCon always was and has been a DEMOCRAT, not a Republican ) said "Wait, hold it. All the people said was Nixon was a crook and Ford pardoned him! There is no mandate!"

The L-Word ( Yep, another misconception. The L-Word was designated by MODERATE Democrats not Republicans ) became an insult to describe the members of the party who wanted to drive out the "sell-out pretend Democrats."

They figured with such expansive majorities they could lose a few seats to "put those people" in their place.

Lo and behold 1980 comes along. And what was amazing isn't that a washed up hack cowboy actor became President.
What is amazing is the Republicans won TWELVE of 17 seats. TWELVE.

How could that happen?

Well you see the problem is ... you challenge Bayh, you get the message sent out that you have to be a TRUE yadda yadda.

People who agree with the likes of Altmire won't vote for YOUR candidate.
Californians that agree with Altmire will say F**K that B***H Boxer.
And they will vote for Fiorna and send YOU a message by seeing Boxer gets fired.

They will elect someone like Palin to punish the Progressive.

And THAT is where the Liberals of 1980 and Progressives of today make a mistake.

The moderate Democrats represent a group of voters. Just like Progressives those voters are concentrated in certain areas, but are also spread out through the country.

Progressives piss off those voters, they not only lose the locations they are concentrated in but ALL those voters AROUND the country.

And NO ... Boxer can NOT win in California without the moderate or Blue Dog voters. If she could Prop 8 would not have passed, last year or in 2000 under the DOM.
And YES ... the moderate Democrat voter WIL punish each and every one of YOUR progressive representatives by either staying home or actively voting against them.
Even if it were to mean replacing a Boxer with a Palin.

In 1980, The progressives of that day decided to send a "message".
The message they received back from the moderate Democrats was "You want intra-party war? We will show you war."
The progressives of the day said "not war!"
But the moderates said "WE consider it war ... it IS war! Let's burn this party DOWN!"

"The stimulus bill was made smaller as part of a compromise. The scaled-back health care bill is the result of a series of compromises. The climate bill has been subjected to a variety of compromises. Just about everything Democratic policymakers have done this year has been restrained."

Are you kidding me? Compromise? With whom?

The only "compromise" that was made in these bills was between socialists and "progressives" with nary a real American in sight.

"Progressives" and socialists consider it "compromise" when YOU abandon your values and agree with THEM! If you don't, you're a racist, woman-hating, homophobic red neck desperately clinging to your religon and guns.

It's a bit unfair to his legacy, but the simpler way to illuminate Chromehawk's point is to recall that Ted Kennedy challenged Jimmy Carter for the Democratic nomination in 1980, largely over health care.

Another illustration -- this is the kind of political insight you guys exemplify, yet don't understand -- of the truism that when conservatives get mad, they vote to throw somebody out: when progressives get mad, they stay home, cuz, after all, they're too smart for an electorate that, as Shortstop puts it, is full of "backwards states" and "low-info voters".

Shortstop attacked Wilson. He responded with a simple challenge -- name some cloture votes where Nelson or Bayh were decisive.

She hasn't replied. When a thread like this uses FACTS, she vanishes.

Likewise, I noted the simple arithmetic in the House -- 251 Democratic votes, 218 to get anything done, and 52 Blue Dogs.

There IS some leverage on Lieberman in the Senate, cuz he has a gavel (and a budget) from the Democratic caucus.

But if you actually know something about how the House works -- with the prospect of votes on Rules for legislation, discharge petitions, motions to recommit, and even rulings of the chair -- you'll understand my point that it's the Blue Dogs who have leverage, over the majority of the Democratic caucus, than that majority has over the Blue Dogs.

How come you guys have so much trouble with civics 101?

Any Blue Dog that doesn't view themselves as squarely in the conservatives (of whatever party) bull's eye for their next election have surely been sipping right wing nut koolaid.

If health care reform is minimal, or economic stimulus doesn't create jobs, or the country perceives Obama and the Democrats as failing to fix the country's problems, then it will be the marginal blue districts which are most likely to flip red. So if they want to muck up the Democratic party agenda by being against legislation that even the majority of their own districts want, they're just painting a big target on their own backs.

Or Ben Franklin said:

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.

"even the majority of their own districts want..."

This is the crux, in fact. Who says their districts want it?

A very serious (and almost unremarked) problem progressives have, is that the polls we like tend to be national and sorta squishy, while the ones that count tend to be local and harsh.

That is, we keep hearing about how some large majority of the public favors a "public option", and so on, derived from national polling samples of 1,500 or so. People even break 'em down, with X% of "self-described conservatives" favoring some progressive project or other.

Polls like that have limited utility, because they cover way too broad an electorate (the frigging NATION?) to have any on the ground value, plus they aren't set up to test counterpunches.

It would count more to have polling from WITHIN key states (Nebraska?) and even Congressional districts (several of the Blue Dogs) that didn't just test positives like "health insurance reform would be good", but also how well "public option" stands up to "death panels".

A whole lot of Democrats hear voters telling them "I voted for you cuz Bush wrecked the economy and was screwing up two wars, but I didn't elect you to ..."

That's why I keep pointing to Rule of 4 polling and empirical testing for what moves votes 'round here. It seems a lot more helpful than deriding "backwards states" and "low info voters".

Hey, the country is center-RIGHT! The people are pissed off. They don't WANT the progressive agenda!

A very serious (and almost unremarked) problem progressives have, is that the polls we like tend to be national and sorta squishy, while the ones that count tend to be local and harsh.

Yes, national polls have health care reform at 60% to 70% but locals polls may differ.

Please show us some polls.

"Just about everything Democratic policymakers have done this year has been restrained."

Only a liberal could view wasting $787 billion we don't have and trying to institute socialized medicine as restrained.

Um, Glen: did you read my post?

Um, Glen: did you read my post?

Yes, you keep referring to really incise local polls.

Love to see them. Please show us some.

Literacy is not your strong suit, I take it.

"It would count more to have polling from WITHIN key states (Nebraska?) and even Congressional districts (several of the Blue Dogs) that didn't just test positives like "health insurance reform would be good", but also how well "public option" stands up to "death panels"..." doesn't say that I have those polls.

It says they'd be useful.

Since you agreed that "local polls" wouldn't necessarily reflect the national polling, it's sorta hard to see why you're asking me FOR the polls that we both agree would be useful to have, which I didn't say I had.

In point of fact, there ARE surely such polls, done by pretty much every candidate for Congress, including the incumbents, in all the states and districts I mentioned.

And guess what? The results are available... to exactly the folks whose positioning on these issues yer bitchin' about, as if you, with only these less than helpful national results, know better'n they do.

For example, there was a poll released -- today, I think -- IN Nebraska, which claimed that Senator Nelson was about to really, deeply piss off his employers with his stand against the public option: done by Research 2000, it found that 46% of Democrats would be inclined to vote against Nelson in a primary cuz he's against the public option.

I'm sure he's deeply alarmed.

Cuz I find myself thinking that just maybe Nelson has some polling, too -- NOT done by his political opponents and advocates for positions he's against: what do YOU think?

Literacy is not your strong suit, I take it.

Apparently not, but we all have ready access to polls which indicate strong state and national preference for not only health care reform, but specific aspects of health care reform. One assumes you have access to poll data which strongly indicates that Blue Dog votes are representing their districts.

Here are the complete results for the Nelson poll which you reference:

http://boldprogressives.org/nelsonpoll

It would appear that other people have reached conclusions quite different from yours regarding the results of the poll, specifically with the results shown here:

ASKED TO DEMOCRATS ONLY:

QUESTION: If Ben Nelson joined Republican senators in filibustering and killing a health care bill because it had a public option, would that make you more likely or less likely to vote for him in the 2012 Democratic primary election or would it have no real affect on your vote?

------ MORE/LESS/NO EFFECT
ALL ---- 7 / 46 / 47
MEN ---- 7 / 44 / 49
WOMEN -- 7 / 48 / 45
18-29 -- 6 / 49 / 45
30-44 -- 6 / 47 / 47
45-59 -- 8 / 46 / 46
60+ ---- 8 / 44 / 48

It certainly looks as if he's be losing half of his Democratic support if he joined a filibuster, but you have access to the data so you can draw your own conclusions. Sorry about the formatting, html table formating didn't seen to work.

Here's another one for Senator Blanche Lincoln:

http://boldprogressives.org/lincolnpoll

As you can clearly see from this poll, the Senator's stand on health care reform is not in line with her constituents with 56% supporting a public option and 37% opposed. (But other pundits have suggested her views exactly coincide with her major financial backers.) And here, once again, you have access to the data and can draw your own conclusions.

Yes, we are all aware polls are biased.

Yes, we are all aware politicians conduct polls.

But we cannot determine why a Blue Dog's voting against national polls, or apparently, their own state polls, until we see the data. We'd love to see it. Please show us some more.

LOL -- "One assumes you have access to poll data which strongly indicates that Blue Dog votes are representing their districts..."

Writing 101: Never say "One assumes", when what you meant to say is "I assume..." It is dishonest. You're using the passive voice to pretend that your own mistaken assumption is more generally true. It's a subtle thing, and typical of self-delusion -- if you'd honestly said "I assume...", you might have realized that you were wrong.

These threads 101: I get knuckleheads around here like TK all the time bitching that I seem to know what I'm talking about, viz., "The Americanist just dis someone else for claiming authority? Was that a self deprecating joke?" And now you're assuming.... that I know what I'm talking about.

Take the hint, willya?

These threads 201: What I actually do in these threads, is REASON, from facts. For some reason, this annoys people, e.g., the aforementioned TK, who said of me: "I just haven't noticed many others that you've gotten right. Your track record is exceedingly poor..."

Oh, I dunno about that. I pointed out that NY23 was a turnout election, when all the rest of you guys were arguing about ideology: “her endorsement swings the race to Owens, it'd be just about perfect: Hoffman's guys will be convinced that they were stabbed in the back... Note how she plays the local issue of Fort Drum, and her relationship with McHugh: it's a turnout election, and I can't see how her endorsement of Owens is going to help Hoffman's ground game -- that's not something Dick Armey or Sarah Palin can help you build: THEY'RE not going to be picking up elderly voters at senior citizen homes and driving 'em to the polls.”

Finally, your own point: you're still deluding yourself. "we cannot determine why a Blue Dog's voting against national polls, or apparently, their own state polls..."

And just who did this poll that you find so persuasive, while Nelson evidently doesn't find it persuasive at all? A group that wants to threaten Nelson with a primary.

Psst... if they COULD threaten him with a primary, they'd have, you know, a candidate? Maybe they will, but start there: the reason this poll is deeply suspect is because it is MOTIVATED (and structured, and worded, and quite probably sampled) to produce the result they want.

Beware. That was my point, after all (the one you've missed three times), that progressives are waaaay too easily persuaded that there is overwhelming evidence in support of what we wanted to believe in the first place.

Again, consider how this poll does NOT use the Rule of 4: it asks a loaded question, and offers THREE answers -- more, less, and no effect. That does not allow for the clean Rule of 4 division into For/Against (that is, it offers a middle ground), and it does not measure intensity.

So it can't be used to measure what moves votes, which is ultimately the most important vector.

As a illustration, consider how a series of similar questions might be structured:

1) How much do you know about Nelson's role in the health care debate? A whole lot, a little, not much, nothing?

2) From what you've heard, would you be more likely to vote for him? [ in a primary (for Democrats)] Sure, maybe yes, maybe no, no way in hell?

3) Nelson is leading the fight AGAINST a public option: will that make you more or less likely to vote for him? Strongly for, sort of for, sort of against, strongly against.

See, that's how REAL polling is done -- and those are generally confidential, by contract, because they contain REAL information. Polls like that not only cleanly measure for/against (cuz there's no middle ground), they also measure intensity and even (sometimes) knowledge. What's more, they measure what moves votes. F'r instance, suppose the first question crosstabs that likely independent voters are 40-60 ignorant of Nelson's role in health care reform, while Democrats are the opposite, while self-described progressive Democrats make up ALL of the (let's say) 20% who are know-it alls -- but the second question shows that while those progressives would strongly oppose Nelson in a primary, the other 40% of Democrats would strongly support him? And of independents, who make up the majority of the 'dunno' crowd, let's say 80% are inclined (but not passionate) about voting for Nelson cuz of "what they've heard" on health care. Through two questions, he's got a majority on his side, however weakly, and a vocal minority that he can ignore -- hell, that he can use to his advantage, cuz it demonstrates independence.

Complete the loop: supposing the third question shows that hardly any of the Democrats who haven't been following it closely are moved to oppose Nelson cuz he's against the public option, while virtually all the independents move from "sorta" for him to "strongly" for him when the public option is named.

Cuz that's what real polls measure: what moves votes.

Now -- are you doubting they exist? Are you saying that guys like Nelson are flying blind?

I doubt it.