Poll: Tea Partiers More Likely Than Other GOPers To View Snowden Positively

[DonViejo]

Source: TPM

TOM KLUDT – DECEMBER 3, 2013, 2:47 PM EST

For a guy who may forever have difficulty living in total security, Edward Snowden might find a tea party rally to be friendlier territory than most.

According to findings from Pew Research Center released on Tuesday, 55 percent said that Snowden's leak of classified information on government surveillance programs "harmed the public interest," while 34 percent said that it "served the public interest." But Republicans are divided along ideological lines in their views of Snowden.

From Pew:

Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who do not agree with the Tea Party are twice as likely to say the leak has harmed as to say it has served the public interest (61% vs. 30%). Among Republicans and GOP-leaners who agree with the Tea Party, about as many see the leak of classified documents as harmful (45%) as say they have served the public interest (43%).

Following his leak earlier this year, Snowden ultimately found asylum in Russia, where he's reportedly working a technical support job.

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Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/poll-tea-partiers-more-likely-than-other-gopers-to-view-snowden-positively

[Sand Wind]

1. The extreme come together at some point...nt

[leftynyc]

2. Now THIS cracks me up (n/t)

[Renew Deal]

3. Case closed

[Comrade Grumpy]

4. That makes sense. Tea Partiers are more skeptical of Washington than the GOP establishment.

Too bad their populism is of the curdled variety, blaming Jews and women and black people for their problems, instead of corporate capitalism.

All of us who aren't part of the Washington consensus have plenty to be worried about, Mike Rogers and Dianne Feinstein, not so much.

[Dopers_Greed]

5. A broken clock...

is right twice a day

[Maedhros]

6. George H. W. Bush's favorite book is "Catcher in the Rye"

J.S. Salinger must be an incredible asshole.

[question everything]

7. Does this mean that Tea baggers have things in common with DUers?

Surely you jest

[JoeyT]

8. That isn't much of a surprise.

It's largely the authoritarians that loathe him. Everyone else either supports him or doesn't care about him one way or the other. The people that DO hate him pretty much share the same tactics: Red baiting, sobbing about terrists under their beds, and screaming about how civil libertarians hate America.

[Nightjock]

9. and those numbers would be reversed if

a Republican was president.
Than the TP's would be against Snowden and calling him a traitor. It's all tribal to them.

[Hubert Flottz]

10. The Teabillies(Freeper Types)were all for the NSA spying on us...

When Bush and Cheney were doing the snooping.

[Douglas Carpenter]

11. if there was a Republican President in the White House the whole GOP would be hating him and the

pro-authoritarian Democrats who are now attacking him would be singing his praises.

[fujiyama]

12. And his attackers are in bed with Cheney and Feinstein on this...

Who gives a fuck what the tea-baggers have to say about anything? I don't take my cues from them and I'll venture a guess that aside from a few trolls, most DUers aren't either.

Politics makes for strange bedfellows. What else is new? This whole issue is about the authoritarian wings of both parties vs. the civil libertarian wings. And it's obvious that the military-intelligence industry has won control of both parties. We know the poll numbers were reversed when Bush was in office. Suddenly republicans are concerned about civil liberties and privacy. And so-called liberals that were screaming when Bush was in office about warrentless wiretaps are now attacking Snowden as a traitor.

Blind partisanship will leave you blind.