Poll: GOP Opinion On Social Issues Wildly Out Of Step With Mainstream

[DonViejo]

Source: TPM

TOM KLUDT – SEPTEMBER 27, 2013, 9:43 AM EDT

Republicans are out of touch with much of the country on social issues such as gay marriage and abortion, according to new poll findings from Bloomberg released late Thursday.

While 55 percent of Americans — including 7 in 10 young people — support the right of gay and lesbian couples to get married, 52 percent of Republicans are opposed.

The poll also showed that 40 percent of Republicans want state legislatures to continue to push for laws that limit abortion, nearly double the 22 percent of Americans who feel that way.

A survey released in April showed that 66 percent of Republicans were opposed to marriage equality, while 53 percent of all Americans said they supported gay nuptials.

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Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/poll-gop-opinion-on-social-issues-wildly-out-of-step-with-mainstream

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The GOP is out of step with the rest of the country? Gee, what a surprise. NOT!

[WovenGems]

1. Old white people

That is what makes up the core of the republican base. And it keeps getting smaller despite advances in geriatrics. They need new blood but can't stomach any of the young folks because of how feel about social issues. Oh, what's an out of date political party to do?

[seabeckind]

2. Gerrymander n/t

[WCGreen]

19. Geriatric mandering

[Arkansas Granny]

3. Just to be clear, not all old, white people agree with the Republicans.

[LibDemAlways]

5. My now 90-year-old mother walked her precinct for

Adlai Stevenson back in 1952. She has never voted for a Republican and never would. She thinks elderly people who vote R are ignorant for voting against their own interests.

[Hayduke Bomgarte]

8. Sounds just like my Mother

Who is in her mid 70s.At least the part about people ignorantly,even stupidly,voting against their interests,regardless of age.

[MillennialDem]

6. Of course not. There are 18 year old frothy teabaggers and 95 year old flaming liberals - but when

you look at averages....

[LiberalLoner]

27. +1 that is why I have some hope for the future

[antiquie]

9. Do you think President Obama could have been elected without us?

When did Republicans lose their citizenship?
Were Republicans excluded from the poll of Americans?

Thank you.

[Shrike47]

21. I am an old white person; they never had me and never will.

[PDJane]

26. Old white men. Women tend to get more radical with age.

My mother is 87, and feels that abortion should be legal, and it's no one's business why a woman wants an abortion. She believes in a robust social services network, feels that feeding people is just what one should do, and was saddened at the appearance of the standard racial idiocies during the last American election. Her sad comment was that it was beginning to sound like the McCarthy era.

She was always a bit to the left of her peers, but she's gotten really progressive in her old age.

Most of her friends are like that, too, which I find interesting. She has a large number of friends among the younger group, too. It's interesting.

[llmart]

31. Thanks for posting what I was going to post......

that it's mainly old, white men who are out of touch with today's world - not the women. I'm not as old as your mother, but I am a senior citizen and I've always voted for Democrats. I have never cast a vote for a Republican in my life and I vote in all elections. My first vote was for McGovern and I'm still very proud that at 21 I had the brains and foresight to not follow the herd. I also never voted for Reagan though many Democrats I knew did.

There is a cultural/sociological/psychological explanation I've read about why old, white men are more likely to become more conservative as they age - something to do with the loss of power that they felt was their birthright in America in past generations because they didn't have to share any of the power that was just handed to them through virtue of being white and a man. Now that the times have changed and women and minorities have fought for and demanded equal rights, well, they don't like it.

[WovenGems]

32. Tangents

I knew my posting would get a few to say "But, but". A couple caught that the far right is made up of just that. Well, and a few youngsters who are angry the president is black.

[seabeckind]

4. This is so true

but they control the US HOR.

And a big chunk of the states, gov and state houses.

And a lot of the cities.

As long as their tactic is to isolate the opposition in the big urban areas, then restrict the representation from those areas, then suppress the vote outside those areas...

They win. It doesn't matter if Manhattan and San Francisco thinks a different way when they control everything in between.

[jwirr]

7. I have voted Democrat all my life but one very important thing about us old white people is that

we VOTE. Not just when someone we especially like is running but all the time in every election. It is why the rethug whites still remain a power of any kind. As soon as the various groups who elected President Obama learn that we Democrats will hold the land in our hands. Every election federal, state and local is important.

[redstatebluegirl]

10. We do vote!

I have also been a Democrat all of my life. My parents and grandparents reminded us often that voting was a right that not everyone is given and we should exercise that right every time we are given the opportunity. I vote in school board elections, bond issues all of them. When I go to vote for city council and school board elections I am usually the only one there to vote. No waiting. Same thing with state elections if they are on an "off year".

I don't believe there is an "off year" election, they are all important. Unfortunately a lot of people our age are tea party voters and republicans who show up every single time. That is how we get the school boards, state legislatures we have.

Young voters are so disillusioned with the system they are staying home in droves. They have not been convinced their voice matters. That is something our party needs to work on. Obama did a great job of getting them to the polls, but not as much the second time as the first. We need to employ the same things to get them out on state and local elections that they did on the 2008 election.

If you combine the above with the tons of money the opposition seem to have, even in local elections, it is going to be a while before we gain any ground in the local and state elections.

[jwirr]

12. Yes, many are starting to understand but at the moment we need all minorities to stand together

with the young and those of us who are elderly to be able to save this nation from the corporations and the rethugs. One of the things I cannot stand is hearing someone say they are not going to vote because they did not like the way some issue ended. IMO that is the way raygun and the bushies all got in. People who would have normally voted straight Democrat were angry about something and either stayed home or did not vote at all. After working ones tail off to get a win it is very hard to watch it all go down the drain.

What I am saying to every Democrat - vote and vote every chance you get. We can win if we do.

[jeff47]

14. You describe the end goal of the "both sides do it" camp.

Their goal is to disillusion the young, so they stop bothering with voting. Much to the GOP's benefit.

It's been running since the 80s, first to convince "Generation X" to not bother voting, and now it's trying to target Millennials.

Population size made it extremely effective against Gen-X - we really were ignored by the political process since WWII and Boomers massively outnumbered us. I'm hopeful it's much less effective against Millennials since those two groups are dwindling, and the Millennial generation is large.

[DonViejo]

13. Preach it, jwirr!....

[starroute]

11. These numbers suggest 1/3 to 1/2 of Republicans don't agree with the GOP

That's what I found surprising about the way the story is written up. Saying that 52% of Republicans are against gay marriage -- and that this has dropped from 66% just last spring -- says to me that six months from now the GOP will be out of touch even with most Republicans on this issue.

I think that's more significant than saying that Republicans skew slightly more conservative than most Americans on social issues.

[DissidentVoice]

15. So much for the GOP's vaunted "individual freedom" stance...

"Individual freedom"...as long as it conforms to THEIR ideas of what that "freedom" should be.

[Bluenorthwest]

18. Vaunted and touted are not really the same thing. They touted a posture and that's it.

nt

[yuiyoshida]

16. The Republican party and Fox News has suffieciently scared their base..

People who vote against their own best interests have been scared into doing so.. They also tell them that having an education is the height of snobbery. They are often told be proud of your ignorance and follow the herd like good little sheeple.

[Cryptoad]

17. GOP has always been,,,,

big on legislating morality!!!!!

[DonViejo]

20. Morality for others...

the old "do as we say, not as we do."

[Demeter]

22. No reason for Democratic complacency

our party isn't any better at reading the tea leaves...

[certainot]

23. this is not new and just knowing it won't effect elections because the left still ignore RW radio

that's the weapon the right uses to successfully project that its values are popular and common and acceptable - 1200 coordinated and unchallenged RW radio stations.

the left gives RW radio a free speech free ride.

these cons put think tank-fed carnival barkers on every corner and stump in the country to decide for the MSM what's acceptable and what's not and the left walks by with their ipods in theirears.

polls like this would have some value if they also asked how many of those sampled are among the 50 mil a week that those 1200 plus stations reach.

[judesedit]

24. Not to mention immigration

[libodem]

25. Go Figure

Their moral outrage is usually phoney and a cover for the latent tendencies they must be fiercely protecting.

Thinking of my guy Larry Craig, for one.

[Blue Owl]

28. The key word here is "wildly"

C'mon America, let's make sure this is manifest in the next election numbers...

[sakabatou]

29. You don't say!

[blkmusclmachine]

30. In other news, H2O is wet.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

33. As if we weren't aware of this already

Sadly the GOP is the ones who are not in the know.