As I also asked HERE in reference to a Bloomberg poll that showed that most Americans are against a government shutdown, you have to now wonder whether the Republican party is in danger of doing to its political prospects what Charlie Sheen is doing to his career. Look at this Bloomberg poll on what most Americans think of the GOP’s attack on unions:
Americans reject Republican efforts to curb bargaining rights of unions whose power they say is dwarfed by corporations, a Bloomberg National Poll finds.
The news story has the most relevant finding further down:
Sixty-four percent of respondents, including a plurality of Republicans, say public employees should have the right to bargain collectively for their wages. Sixty-three percent, including 55 percent of Republicans, say states without enough money to pay for all the pension benefits they have promised to current retirees shouldn’t be able to break those obligations.
Add Scott Walker…this poll..movements to undermine collective bargaining in other states..opposition to a government shut down…and the conclusion has to be that the GOP is satisifying Rush and Sean and Tea Party members but is showing signs of helping the Democrats piece together a new coalition of Democrats, independents, and former Reagan Democrats who are not unsympathetic to unions. It’s less of a case of the Democrats being brilliant than the Republicans being not exactly “stuck on stupid” but seemingly stuck on the talk radio political culture and ideology as a means and end to itself.
More from the poll:
As battles rage between state workers and Republican governors in Wisconsin and Ohio, 63 percent don’t think states should be able to break their promises to retirees, and respondents split over whether governors aim to balance their budgets or weaken unions that back Democratic foes, according to the poll conducted March 4-7.
The poll shows that political challenges to government workers are failing to draw broad support from a public more concerned about unemployment than government deficits. Respondents are divided over whether public employees should sacrifice to help states ease their fiscal crises: About half say governors are unfairly targeting unions and 46 percent say public employees should be willing to accept benefit cuts. The fracture largely reflects party lines.
“The Republican Party sees an opportunity to attack and possibly destroy the base of their opponents’ political power,” says poll respondent Dale Palmer, 59, a Democrat and retired teacher from Zephyrhills, Florida.
Palmer says budget deficits are a result of the economy and years of tax cuts, not the actions of public employees. “They’re putting it now on the backs of their enemies even when these particular unions are willing to bargain,” he says.
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.