10/18/2011


As the 2012 election draws closer, Democrats are getting less — not more — enthusiastic about the prospect of voting for president.


US President Barack Obama speaks at the Asheville Regional Airport in Fletcher, North Carolina, on October 17, 2011 during the first day of his three-day American Jobs Act bus tour to discuss jobs and the economy. (JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images)In a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll just more than four in 10 (42 percent) Democrats said they were either “extremely” or “very” enthusiastic about the 2012 vote.

Those numbers compare unfavorably to Democratic enthusiasm number in CNN surveys from the spring and summer, when 56 percent and 55 percent of Democrats, respectively, described themselves as either “extremely” or “very” enthusiastic about voting next year.

By contrast, the level of Republican enthusiasm has been high and steady for months. In a March CNN survey, 64 percent said they were “extremely” or “very” enthusiastic about voting in 2012; an equal 64 percent said the same in the October survey.

Here’s why the decline in Democratic excitement about 2012 matters. The enthusiasm gap in March was eight points in Republicans’ favor; now it’s 21 points in their favor.

Some of that gap is attributable to the fact that the party out of the White House is almost always more enthusiastic about retaking the office than the party that currently occupies it. (It’s like in sports; the defending champs tend not to be as hungry to win again as the teams they beat the year before.)

And, polling makes clear that much of the support the leading Republicans are winning is due in no small part to distaste with President Obama.

A recent Pew survey asked head-to-head matchups between Obama and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry and went the extra step of asking those supporting the Republican candidates whether their vote was for Romney/Perry or against Obama.

Of the 48 percent who said they back Romney in a head-to-head against Obama, 33 percent said it was a vote against the incumbent; of Perry’s 46 percent, 31 percent said it was a vote against Obama.

While the “party out of power” dynamic helps explain the enthusiasm gap, it doesn’t minimize the political problem facing Obama.

The simple fact in politics is that enthusiastic people vote. So, when there is a major gap between enthusiasm levels of the two parties’ bases, it’s a big deal.

The last two presidential elections bear that reality out. In the final CNN survey before the 2008 election, Democrats had a 19-point enthusiasm edge over Republicans. Four years earlier, Republicans had a 12-point enthusiasm lead.

Obama and his political team are clearly aware of the danger inherent in a less-than-enthusiastic Democratic base. In the last month he has pivoted hard to a sharper-edged (and more campaign-focused) message that focuses on his attempts to bring about change in Washington and Republican efforts to block progress.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/democrats-declining-enthusiasm/2011/10/17/gIQAUuKztL_blog.html?fb_ref=NetworkNews

There is also a big swing in Independents away from Obama.

It will be interesting to see if he jumps on the OWS bandwagon in hopes of some support from the very people who cast blame on his "Banker Cabinet Members".

Bush had the "warmongers and war machine (Haliburton)" behind him, Obama has Wall Street.... to not oppose OWS would be to cut his own throat. Opposition on OWS would turn more away from him....

Say goodbye to the one termer, and hopefully we have grown smart enough, or angry enough, to know that both sides and most candidates simply offer rhetoric and more of the same!

RON PAUL 2012!

interesting polls, google has pages of them,, with all types of implications,,,

the proof wont come until november 2012, what leads up to it is just lights and cameras...

well the poll results are for a somewhat liberal newspaper not Google.

I understand that and it still stands that there are all types of polls with all types of implications and the actual poll that counts will be the one in November 2012.

This poll happens to imply that we can tell something more than a year out by how 'enthusiastic' one party seems over another, which is a pretty broad assumption in my opinion.

Not only because it assumes people are going to vote strictly by political party, but because it kind of overlooks the reality that people will be voting for one of two candidates at the end of the day,, and the difference in support of those TWO candidates is much more substantial than the difference in political party enthusiasm.

not to mention how fickle the american public is,, we can even see changes from month to month in the gallup polls that reflect such constant change,,,in terms of who they support and in what numbers

I just have stopped putting alot of stake in polls that measure such things as 'enthusiasm' so far out. I will pay closer attention when a republican candidate is actually selected and there is indication of which CANDIDATE has the support(as opposed to which party).