I am aware that not everyone is happy with Rasmussen polls, still I think this result is striking, especially the difference in perspectives:
63% of the Political Class think the government has the consent of the governed, but only six percent (6%) of those with Mainstream views agree.
Seventy-one percent (71%) of all voters now view the federal government as a special interest group, and 70% believe that the government and big business typically work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors.
The link is here, with further information, and I thank Roger Congleton for the pointer.
The federal government is a special interest group? I’m sorry, but what does that even mean. That only makes sense if you think there are people out there trying to grow the government for the sake of growing government. I don’t doubt people believe that, but 71% seems too high by a large margin.
The government is only a special interest group when the voters have abrogated their responsibility to look after it.
i agree with JG. what does that even mean? what part of the federal govt would be a special interest group? surely the military is a special interest group, and the NIH is a special interest group, and the DOT, and the DOE, and the SEC, and so on, but where do their interests align?
the statement about “consent of the governed” makes a lot more sense, and is interesting, and i will click on some links to get more color about what it might mean before complaining that it, too, is meaningless polling drivel.
The 6% number is incredibly scary, if that cohort of people is in any way large.
“– Some people believe that the federal government has become a special interest group that looks out primarily for its own interests. Has the federal government become a special interest group?”
Also describes how they calculate “political class”
For convenience, I think it’s worth listing this in the comments:
That seems like a relatively arbitrary way to define “political class.”
I’m surprised that anyone’s surprised. Any organisation eventually comes to exist primarily for the sake of existing – government, voluntary, business, educational – doesn’t matter. Maybe not universally true and perhaps more true now than it once was but at any rate it’s nice to see people realising it.
@Neal: really? We get a binary choice between “Evil” and “Lesser Evil, By A Tiny Fraction”, and that one choice every couple of years is supposed to rein in the self interest of governing bodies who don’t even read their bills, much less obey them?
The choice itself is ultimately up to the people. But you’re oversimplifying the choices available to the electorate — how many people make an interested, informed vote in local elections, which often have a much more diverse field of candidates?
The first question relies on the fact that it’s far easier to disagree with something that to propose a quality alternative. It’s not so different from the problem of polling about healthcare reform: Most people wanted reform, but few liked the reform that actually went through. People wanted reform for different reasons, so different in fact that finding a reform that pleased most people was never going to happen: There’s no consensus in figuring out who should be on the losing side of most changes.
If I polled Americans asking if they wanted to drive a better car, I would expect a majority to say yes, but I’d not expect to same result if I asked them if they were going to buy a new BMW tomorrow, and pay cash.
It’s not so much consent as submission. Anyway, I don’t see why anyone would be shocked that many believe bureaucracies expand to meet the need of expanding bureaucracies.
Not that I disagree with some of these results, but it always has been and still is all about the wording. These answers are practically coached. I mean who is going to answer “no” to this question:
“Do government and big business often work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors?”
You could probably also get 70% of people to answer yes to a question like “Do big corporations often put profits ahead of safety and consumer interests?” That doesn’t tell you anything about the political orientation of the populace at large, or their level of economic understanding.
It uses the question to define what is “the political class” and then says “The political class answers all the same way!”
Not to pile on, but I wish they’d just report the questions and the results without all the narrative.
Patently false. To the extent that is possible, the game is rigged. Anyone who has tried a third party run knows this well.
Because people are too damned lazy to get off their asses and work to make their favorite third party successful. You can call it a “rigged game,” but ultimately the two-party system in America is because people individually don’t value having a politically competitive system enough to make it happen*. Everybody knows you can’t gripe about the results of an election if you haven’t voted. The same logic applies to the two-party system: you can’t bitch about having only the “evil and lesser evil” as your ballot choices if you haven’t donated money or time or effort to your third party of choice.
* What? What? Failure of the commons?
Comments on this entry are closed.