Tea Party Hits Record Level Of Unpopularity In Public Opinion Poll
The Tea Party is more unpopular than ever before, according to a Rasmussen poll
released Monday, with just three in 10 voters holding favorable views of the movement. Half of respondents said they view the party unfavorably.
Those numbers represent a considerable dive in support since the Tea Party's heyday in 2009, when a majority of voters rated it favorably.
Many of the Senate challengers with Tea Party backing
were defeated in 2012
, and the movement suffered another PR blow after a
falling out
among the leadership of the Tea Party group FreedomWorks.
Although most members of the House's Tea Party Caucus were reelected in November, the group had some high-profile losses, including the defeats of former Reps. Joe Walsh and Allen West. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), the chairwoman of the House Tea Party Caucus, barely retained her seat.
The movement is now widely seen by the public as declining, according to the Rasmussen poll -- 56 percent of voters said the Tea Party became less influential over the past year, and just 8 percent said they identified as part of the Tea Party movement.
The teabaggers continue their long slide into irrelevance... Oh, it's just another biased lefty poll...Oh...Wait... It's RASMUSSEN... (Well, we know how accurate they were in last presidential race... Maybe it's a fluke...)
People are finally waking up and seeing the Teabaggers for the whackos that they are. We always laugh at the Teabagger house just outside of Jefferson. The one with the rickety old fort type fence. The one with the dont tread on me flag flyng high. I have been out to diner before and herd tourists laughing about it as well. I always picture whoever lives there outside burying and unbarying his guns.
There is consensus across the ideological spectrum that Obama came out on top, with a majority of Democrats and independents and nearly three quarters of Republicans saying the president got more of what he wanted from the tax legislation.
"Barack Obama is viewed as the clear political winner in the fiscal cliff negotiations, but the legislation itself gets only a lukewarm reception from the public," the Pew report said. "As many disapprove as approve of the new tax legislation, and more say it will have a negative than positive impact on the federal budget deficit, the national economy and people like themselves."
Most Democrats approved of the legislation, and the vast majority of the party -- 81 percent -- supported Obama's performance in the negotiations. Republicans' discontent with their party leadership, in contrast, was profound. Only 40 percent of Republicans approved of the GOP's handling of negotiations on the fiscal cliff, fewer than the 45 percent who disapproved.
:thumbsup:
