Simple-minded politics:

Over at Kevin Drum's place, guest blogger Heather Digby Parton writes about the upcoming Wisconsin election: (emp add)

... in looking at the Marquette University poll just out yesterday, I couldn't help but be somewhat surprised by this:

Voters say they feel their current governor would be better at creating jobs than his recall challenger. Half say they think Walker would do a better job, while just 43 percent pick Barrett. And Walker holds a 51 percent favorable rating and 46 percent unfavorable, while his rival is at 41 percent favorable and 46 percent unfavorable.

It's almost unbelievable to me that voters would believe that when job creation has been the biggest issue of the campaign—and it hasn't been good for Walker ...

Even though Walker is being recalled mostly because of a fight with workers and the state is dead-last in job creation, 50% of the voters think he'll be better at job creation than the other guy? Nobody in the country has done worse!

This strikes me as yet another success of conservative talking points. I think many people have simply absorbed the oft-repeated notion that Republicans are the advocates for "job-creators" with their low taxes and deregulation and even in the face of clear evidence otherwise they can't really see how anything else would work.

Similarly, it appears that most people do not believe in Keynesian economics.

This is an era of simple-minded thinking. The overall economy is just like your household budget. Of all the components in the economy, only the much-heralded "job creators" matter. Regulations are bad. Facts and the historical record be damned.


posted by Quiddity at 5/31/2012 07:13:00 PM