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Crazy Pills

Nov 1, 2008 at 6:29 PM

Alfred Holzheu in General craziness

‘I Felt Like I Was Taking Crazy Pills’

Politico’s Ben Smith reprints a disconcerting email he received from an unnamed Republican consultant, describing a focus group in "an upper-Midwestern state" that had just been shown an ad that was "no-holds-barred attack" on Barack Obama, "cut for an independent group, which hasn’t aired." Quoting verbatim from the email:

The two most unreal moments of my professional life of watching focus groups:

54 year-old white male, voted Kerry ’04, Bush ’00, Dole ’96, hunter, NASCAR fan…hard for Obama said: "I’m gonna hate him the minute I vote for him. He’s gonna be a bad president. But I won’t ever vote for another god-damn Republican. I want the government to take over all of Wall Street and bankers and the car companies and Wal-Mart run this county like we used to when Reagan was President."

The next was a woman, late 50s, Democrat but strongly pro-life. Loved B. and H. Clinton, loved Bush in 2000. "Well, I don’t know much about this terrorist group Barack used to be in with that Weather guy but I’m sick of paying for health insurance at work and that’s why I’m supporting Barack."

I felt like I was taking crazy pills. I sat on the other side of the glass and realized…this really is the Apocalypse. The Seventh Seal is broken and its time for eight years of pure, delicious crazy….

Maybe this guy just happened upon a couple of especially odd voters, but let’s speculate as to what it means if this pair represents a significant voting bloc. If a lot of people like this are out there, the result may be an unexpectedly large Obama victory, perhaps combined with big congressional gains for Democrats.

In that event, the Democrats would see themselves as having a mandate and would have both the ability and the motivation to push major legislative initiatives. But if their "mandate" is the product of the sort of emotional anti-Republican backlash Smith’s correspondent describes, it may prove illusory–and an anti-Democratic backlash could develop, perhaps as early as 2010. Something like this happened in 1992 and 1994.

Things could of course go in a completely different direction, but it does appear as though Obama is benefiting in the short run from what can be termed a political bubble. Members of both parties, like investors in the market, would be well advised not to get too caught up in the emotions of the moment.

How can we expect to get good representative government if the even the "intelligent" people are so challenged, not too speak of the other 50% (just a percentage I pulled out of the air)

Article originally appeared on Alfred Holzheu – online and verbose (http://www.holzheu.com/).

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