by David Corn
Mother Jones
A new focus group study from the Democratic-friendly polling firm of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research shows that right-wing Republicans have jumped the political rails to inhabit a world of their own. The dominant “fact” for this band of conservatives is that President Barack Obama has a secret plan to impose socialism on the United States and repress the citizenry. Consequently, they believe that Obama’s success is tantamount to the destruction of the country.
From the study:
The self-identifying conservative Republicans who make up the base of the Republican Party stand a world apart from the rest of America, according to focus groups conducted by DemocracyCorps. These base Republican voters dislike Barack Obama to be sure – which is not very surprising as base Democrats had few positive things to say about George Bush – but these voters identify themselves as part of a ‘mocked’ minority with a set of shared beliefs and knowledge, and commitment to oppose Obama that sets them apart from the majority in the country. They believe Obama is ruthlessly advancing a ‘secret agenda’ to bankrupt the United States and dramatically expand government control to an extent nothing short of socialism. While these voters are disdainful of a Republican Party they view to have failed in its mission, they overwhelmingly view a successful Obama presidency as the destruction of this country’s founding principles and are committed to seeing the president fail.
