Who Speaks for the Parties?
So Gallup asked this topical question about who speaks for the parties. The graphs above plot the responses of Democrats and Republicans. Obviously, the graphs show more uncertainty about who speaks for the GOP than who speaks for the Democrats. But my favorite finding is that partisans of both stripes, when asked about the opposite party, are more likely to name what we could call “bogeymen” (or women). Democrats are more likely than Republicans to name Cheney and Limbaugh as speaking for the GOP. Republicans are more likely than Democrats to name Pelosi as speaking for the Democratic Party.
Comments
had to follow the link to learn that it was an open-ended question and that our most recent former president ranked 5th with less than 0.5% of Republicans/Leaners naming him.
Posted by: kim | June 11, 2009 01:03 PM
obvious key diff between the bogeys: pelosi being both a currently sitting elected official and a leader. hard to blame repubs for naming her.
on the other side, it’s interesting that even repubs are not saying their currently elected leaders (incl. steele) speak for their party.
Posted by: Joel | June 11, 2009 03:14 PM