The Bush Hangover: Large Majority Holds Bush, GOP Responsible For Crisis
One pet theory of this blog is that the financial crisis has had the effect of keeping George W. Bush firmly affixed as an albatross around the GOP’s neck. Call it the Bush hangover.
It didn’t have to be this way. John McCain campaigned against Bush’s record, and GOP leaders had hoped to recast the party in the post-Bush era and to erase the taint of Bush’s historic unpopularity. But the crisis, by sparking a debate over who caused the mess, has ensured that Bush continues to define the GOP in the public mind.
New polling from Democracy Corps seems to bear this out. It finds that 57% of likely voters agree with this statement:
Former President Bush and the Republicans in Congress are the most responsible for the current state of the economy.
Only one in four, or 26%, blame Obama and Dems.
A large majority is willing to accept the view that Bush and current GOP are joined in responsibility for the crisis.
Meanwhile, this same poll finds that large majorities support an ambitious regulatory and activist role for the Federal government, while minorities oppose more regulation and think the government should scale back its ambitions. The Bush hangover has left voters very irritable and predisposed to take a dark view of the current GOP and its approach to governing.
Some recent thoughts along these lines from Andrew Sullivan.
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Maybe its not a hangover. Maybe its just a sober recognition of the facts.
Greg: How long do you think the hangover will last? When do you think folks will wake up and realize that the stimulus that was supposed to have already created jobs hasn’t worked as promised? Why do you think the public does not hold the Dems at least partially responsible considering that they held majorities in congress since 2006?
Nothing on the entertaining Rove-Biden slapdown?
Who can these 26% BE? They can’t truly blame Obama and dems can they? They must WANT to blame them. Or they are idiots.
“Large Majority Holds Bush, GOP Responsible for Crisis.” This confirms what I’ve suspected: a large majority of the country is sane.
Hi Greg et al~
Busy for me today, so I am catching up on some postings. Look, the majority of Americans make the connection between all of this even though there is a serious effort among GOP’ers to try and deflect their responsibility. Nobody thinks that Dems are blameless either, but the GOP’s constant arrogance and lack of humility prevents them from being able to even acknowledge their role in any of this. Every single time it seems to come up, they start metaphorically foaming at the mouth and say that it is all the Dems fault. Even Barney Frank (who is guilty of his own metaphorical mouth foaming) has at least admitted that he has made mistakes, as well as others, but not the GOP, no way, they are not going to admit one single thing. They will hang Fannie/Freddie around the Dems neck every single time, but they don’t even acknowledge the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and the Future Commodities Modernization Act – both written and strongly advocated by none other than former Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX). These are the very two pieces of legislation that made it possible to deregulate the bank so much that they were able to jump into credit default swaps and leverage 30 to 1. Look, we have always had poor people with credit challenges that wanted to be homeowners, but it was never profitable for the banks to lend to them, until these pieces of legislation. So the GOP can sound-off all it wants about how it is everyone else’s fault, but the majority of the public just does not believe them. Also, as an interesting note, the coverage of Rove/Cheney/Rove/Cheney – the Republicans are just loving those two being out there. I say bring it! Keep on going – Rove doing interviews, Rove editorializing, Cheney doing interviews, Rove smacking Biden, heck let’s throw in a little Limbaugh/Coulter for good form. Because I can promise you one thing, it may make the Republicans feel good about themselves, but nothing reminds moderate Americans (much less Dems) how much they dislike Bush and Republicans then to see Rove/Cheney hitting the airwaves and trying to convince everyone how “right” they are about everything. Until they get some new faces and a new message (tax cuts don’t solve everything, especially when you are fighting two wars), they are going to be suffering from a “Bush Hangover” for a VERY long time. Happy Easter All!
Happy Easter JennD
George W. Bush
I honestly think that George W. Bush is one of the 5 to 10% of politicians that are not corrupt. Barack is from Chicago, by choice, so are most of his cabinet, and staff, Rahm Emanual is just like Blago.
I wish I could have voted for Bush Cheney a third term than the innocents now in office. I’m still waiting for something from Obama on the pirates, just a statement that we wil not stand for it. We are the United States Of America, the strongest country in the world.
Barack bowing to the king of Saudi Arabia, saying we are not a Christian country, apologizing for our arrogance is a huge mistake on Obama’s part. He is arrogant, his ego is too big, he belongs teaching a class, not the leader of the free world.
Let’s be frank, Barney Frank is to blame for a lot of it, he can’t admit it or take it from a student. Frank has the D behind his name, if it was the R he’d be in jail. Affairs with officers of bank he was supposed to be overseeing? Is that not corrrupt? It is. Most politicians are.
I think Dodd, Frank & Waters have a lot mud on their hands. You may be able to blog by whatever the polls say – as you’re in this to make money off of your ad-clicks, but you can’t govern by poll numbers… thats what congress does – and look where we are.