Left turn?

Gallup has been asking people where they stand on the left-right spectrum and found some interesting results:

PRINCETON, NJ -- Thus far in 2009, 40% of Americans interviewed in national Gallup Poll surveys describe their political views as conservative, 35% as moderate, and 21% as liberal. This represents a slight increase for conservatism in the U.S. since 2008, returning it to a level last seen in 2004. The 21% calling themselves liberal is in line with findings throughout this decade, but is up from the 1990s.

[. . .]

There is an important distinction in the respective ideological compositions of the Republican and Democratic Parties. While a solid majority of Republicans are on the same page -- 73% call themselves conservative -- Democrats are more of a mixture. The major division among Democrats is between self-defined moderates (40%) and liberals (38%). However, an additional 22% of Democrats consider themselves conservative, much higher than the 3% of Republicans identifying as liberal.

True to their nonpartisan tendencies, close to half of political independents -- 45% -- describe their political views as "moderate." Among the rest, the balance of views is tilted more heavily to the right than to the left: 34% are conservative, while 20% are liberal.

There are several interesting things here. One is that the "conventional wisdom" that the nation has moved to the left is pure bull crap. If you will think back to the last presidential campaign you will recall that Obama was running on a platform of fiscal responsibility and promising the vast majority of Americans a tax cut.

That's right. On those all important "kitchen table" issues he managed to get to the right of his hapless boob of a Republican opponent. This was made possible not only by John McCain's incompetence but by a mainstream media which abandoned bias for outright advocacy.

Yet with the worst Republican candidate in the history of Republican candidates and a news media which had transformed itself into an arm of the Obama campaign the Republican still only lost by a few percentage points.

Next please note that those Republicans identifying themselves as "liberal" only make up 3% of the GOP. This should make us wonder how liberal Republicans like Colin Powell have become contenders for the position of "face of the GOP". Since Powell represents only the most minuscule fraction of the Republican rank and file it would seem that only the support of the mainstream media (you know the folks who regard Barack Obama as less a president than as a God-King) keeps Powell from being perceived as what he is - a left-wing operative who is only pretending to be a Republican for the purpose of doing as much damage to the GOP as possible.

Finally note the fact that while only 3% of the GOP identify themselves as liberal fully 22% of Democrats consider themselves to be conservative. In other words there is as much potential for a genuinely conservative Republican candidate to gain the votes of conservative Democrats today as there was back when Ronald Reagan was running for president.

So much for the "Reagan is dead" meme.

The lessons seem very clear. One, the inside-the-beltway "Republicans" care far more about being invited to the right cocktail parties and being asked to appear on the Sunday shows than they ever will about little things like winning elections and fixing the titanic mess that Obama is making of our economy and our international standing.

Two, the way for the GOP to regain control of the legislature in 2010 and the White House in 2012 is to ignore the poisonous advice of the mainstream media and their pet liberal Republicans and follow the lead of men like Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh. If we run conservative candidates with good communication skills who are unashamed of their conservatism, who are willing to take the fight to the reigning liberal establishment and who are unafraid to criticize Barack Obama by name WE WILL WIN.