A new CBS News poll finds Republicans have not made any headway in changing two important political numbers. Number one: the fact that 72 percent in a new CBS News poll are don’t like the shutdown. Number two: the fact that more voters blame Republicans than blame President Barack Obama — and not by a tiny margin:
On day three of the partial government shutdown, a new CBS News poll reveals that a large majority of Americans disapprove of the shutdown and more are blaming Republicans than President Obama and the Democrats for it.
Fully 72 percent of Americans disapprove of shutting down the federal government over differences on the Affordable Care Act; just 25 percent approve of this action. Republicans are divided: 48 percent approve, while 49 percent disapprove. Most tea party supporters approve of the government shutdown – 57 percent of them do. Disapproval of the shutdown is high among Democrats and independents. This CBS News poll was conducted after the partial government shutdown began on October 1.
Views of the Affordable Care Act are related to views of the shutdown. Those who like the health care law also overwhelmingly disapprove of shutting down the government. There is more support for the shutdown among Americans who don’t like the 2010 health care law. Thirty-eight percent of them approve of the shutdown but even more, 59 percent, disapprove.
Republicans in Congress receive more of the blame for the shutdown: 44 percent of Americans blame them, while 35 percent put more blame on President Obama and the Democrats in Congress. These views are virtually the same as they were last week before the shutdown, when Americans were asked who they would blame if a shutdown occurred.
Some GOPers are spinning this saying the poll shows Obama is being blamed, too. However, the bottom line is that more of the electorate is giving a thumbs down on the tactic pushed on the party by it’s now ascendant, dominant Tea Party and Talk Radio Show Culture wings.
And you can tell all is not well for House members on this strategy: Republican governors are keeping their distance:
Washington Republicans are getting little help from their friends in governor’s mansions across the country.
GOP governors aren’t urging John Boehner to stand strong: they’re calling for an end to the stalemate or ducking the shutdown issue entirely. That’s the same strategy that Republican presidential hopefuls and lawmakers in tough 2014 races are following.
As the shutdown goes on, the collateral damage will grow–along with voter anger at the GOP. Polls show that Americans blame the Republicans more than the Democrats or President Obama for causing the crisis.
Republican governors are dutifully taking shots at Obama and not explicitly blaming House Republicans, but they aren’t giving Boehner or GOP leaders what they really need: political cover.
Instead, they’re making sure to convey that–unlike DC’s dysfunction–they work across party lines to run their own states.
Case in point, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie: “While there’s blame to go around for the Republicans in the House for not coming to consensus even amongst themselves … and the Democrats in the Senate for not looking for ways to try to compromise with the Republicans in the House, there’s also blame that goes onto the president as well,” Christie said this week.
And it’s not just moderate Republicans. Even conservatives are pushing their party to get the government going.
Gov. Jan Brewer of Arizona, who has accepted the law’s controversial Medicaid expansion, urged Republicans to stop fighting over Obamacare and move on.
And there is more on this story — and many others. They underscore the fact that there is indeed a market for loyal, thoughtful, aggressive Republican opposition and alternative to the Democrats. But House Republicans are increasingly coming across as fanatics who don’t care about wrecking the country’s economy unless they can get Obama to surrender.
I suspect polls in coming days will show a further deterioration in the GOP’s position but perhaps not as much as some would think. The country is divided and the conservative entertainment media, Tea Partiers and online conservative websites will be framing the shutdown as something imposed by Obama and the Democrats. And it will some of the existing choir.
It just won’t recruit new choir members. And it could lose some as well.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.