At The New Republic Andrew Levison explains why “Democrats Have a White Working Class Problem–and Not Just in the South.” Among Levison’s insights: “Every political campaign manager knows that in the practical world of political campaigns, white working class people in places like Wichita, Yuma, or Sioux City are not strikingly more “pro-Democratic” than white working class people in Baton Rouge, Augusta, or Memphis…If the notion that “the problem is just the South” fails to properly account for the real regional political divisions in America, however, it also fails to recognize the critical importance of another aspect of the political divisions within the white working class: the substantial difference between the more urban and less urban members of the group, regardless of the region of the country.”
The Guardian’s Dan Roberts reports that “Obama doubles down on threat to act against ‘tax inversions’ by US firms” — a good example of the kind of bold executive action that scares Republicans but enhances Democratic cred as the party of working people.
NYT columnist Charles M. Blow chronicles the GOP’s rancid history of race-baiting, of which Republican Rep. Mo Brook’s “war on whites” comment is merely the latest installment.
From Janet Hook’s “5 Takeaways from the August WSJ/NBC Poll“: “Republicans have a much bigger image problem than the president and his party, as the poll found that only 19% held positive views of congressional Republicans, while 54% held negative views. Frustration about the political system and ongoing economic problems is directed at both parties: Asked what message they wanted to send with their vote in November’s midterm elections a plurality of 33% said they wanted incumbents of both parties to lose.”
But new Associated Press-GfK poll gives GOP slight edge in ‘faith/trust,’ within MOE.
At Salon.com Jim Newell and Joan Walsh explain why Sen. Rand Paul is likely to tank in the glare of a presidential race.
Democratic political ad-makers have an angle to mine at At ThinkProgress.org, where Tara Culp-Pressler reveals that “The States With The Highest Uninsurance Rates Are All Led By Republicans.”
RMuse argues “The Truth Is That It’s Republicans Who Have Been Waging War On Poor Whites” at PolitcusUSA.
Chartheads may get a kick out of Phillip Bumps post, “Who wants to impeach President Obama? A visual scorecard” at The Fix, which provides a quick visual guide to the who’s who of GOP impeachment denialists, vacilators and advocates.

From John Harwood’s New York Times article, “Democrats Seize on Social Issues as Attitudes Shift“: “Now the values wedge cuts for Democrats….Democrats profit politically — among young voters, college graduates, single women, blacks and Latinos — from the sense that they welcome these cultural shifts while Republicans resist them…”That’s why people are voting for us these days — not for our economic prowess,” said Mark Mellman, a Democratic pollster. “They all reflect an underlying attitude. It’s openness, it’s tolerance, it’s respect for others and who they are.”
At The L.A. Times Michael A. Memoli and Lisa Ascara explain why “Obamacare loses some of its campaign punch for Republicans.”
CNN’s Dan Merica reports: “For the first time, a majority of Americans said they disapproved of their representative and thought they were part of the problem in Washington, according to a Washington Post-ABC poll out Tuesday. The poll found that 51% of Americans disapprove of the way their own member of Congress is handling his or her job, while 41% approve.” It’s a significant change, as Merica notes: “For decades, most Americans approved of the way their member of Congress was handling his or her job, but disapproved of the legislative body as a whole.”
For a map updating Crystal Ball’s assessment of the 2014 governorship races, click here. Accompanying article here.
At Gannett’s Baxter Bulletin Dick Polman reports “We’re on track for record-low midterm turnout this November, at least based on the voting evidence collected thus far. According to a new report by the non-partisan Center for the Study of the American Electorate, turnout in the first 25 statewide primaries was so anemic — down 18 percent from the early primaries in 2010 — that we’re “likely to witness the lowest midterm primary turnout in history…Bill Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a former Clinton White House adviser, tells NPR, “Gridlock is at an all-time high. The productivity in Congress is at an all-time low, and many Americans are asking themselves, ‘How much difference does it make who the people are, and what the party balance is, if nothing seems to change, election after election?'”
If Democrats needed another reason to get their midterm elections act together, Charlie Cook has it in his Government Executive post on “The Lessons of the 2010 Midterm Elections“: “While this year’s midterms won’t change the course set in 2010, what happens in the 2018 and 2020 gubernatorial and state legislative elections will be huge in establishing who controls redistricting in 2021, and which governors can veto or influence where the lines are drawn. For Democrats, those elections will determine whether they are going to be shut out of controlling the House for a second straight decade, or whether there will be a fairer fight for dominance of the lower chamber.”
Re Eric McWhinnie’s “10 States Most Dependent on the Federal Government” at the Wall St. Cheat Sheet, eight of the moochers delivered electoral votes for Romney and eight have government-bashing Republican governors.
Economist Jared Bernstein writes at The Upshot about findings from “the provocative new paper by the economists Alan Blinder and Mark Watson that rigorously examines how the economy has performed under presidents since the 1940s.”: “The American economy has grown faster — and scored higher on many other macroeconomic metrics — when the president of the United States is a Democrat rather than a Republican…The two looked at key macroeconomic variables averaged over 64 years (16 four-year terms), from Harry Truman to Barack Obama. Mr. Blinder and Mr. Watson focus mostly on the 1.8 percent annual difference in real G.D.P. growth. That is, over the full study, real G.D.P. growth averaged 3.33 percent per year. But under Democratic presidents the economy grew 4.35 percent and under Republicans 2.54 percent…Under Democratic presidents, the economy also spent fewer quarters in recession; added more jobs and more hours worked; and posted larger declines in unemployment and higher corporate profits than under their Republican counterparts. Stock market returns were a lot higher under Democrats as well, but because equity markets are so volatile, that difference is not statistically significant. (By the way, since March 2009, the S.&P. stock index is up 160 percent).”
Surely the good people of northern Alabama deserve better than this.

For those who are fed up with despairing about the Republicans’ obstructionist stranglehold on congress, I suggest reading Taylor Malmsheimer’s “The Future of Minimum Wage Will Be Decided in Cities” at The New Republic. It’s a little tonic for progressives who may be wallowing in mid-summer political doldrums. Have a swig:

In June, the City Council of Seattle made headlines when it voted unanimously to raise its minimum wage to $15 an hour, the highest in the country. While Seattle wasn’t the first city to take minimum wage legislation into it’s own hands, it seems to be at the forefront of a national trend toward significant minimum wage hikes at the local level. In just over a year, at least six other cities and counties have mandated minimum wages as high as $15, and several more have legislation in the works.
In 2003, Santa Fe and San Francisco became the first cities to institute their own minimum wages, distinct from their states–and it wasn’t without opposition. Each city faced significant resistance from the business community: In San Francisco, organizations like the Chamber of Commerce and the Association of Realtors campaigned against the ballot proposition, arguing that it would lead to worker layoffs. In Santa Fe, the local chamber of commerce joined with New Mexicans for Free Enterprise and four other plaintiffs to sue the city, arguing that the municipality did not have the power to enact a minimum wage higher than the state’s. Despite the opposition, the San Francisco raise passed with 60 percent of a ballot vote, and the New Mexico Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Santa Fe’s legislation. But over the next eight years, only three other localities raised their minimum wage above the state level.

Malmsheimer cites three reasons why the cities are driving the trend: It’s easier to pass legislation at the city level; Concerted targeting by advocacy groups, and; Cities have higher costs of living. It’s not a cakewalk, and big biz is fighting tenaciously against the trend. But Malmsheimer points out that there is “no evidence of appreciable job losses or job relocation from urban-focused minimum wages.”
Might this may be the dawn of a new era of cities filling the void left by Republican obstructionists in Washington? The minimum wage increases in cities are significant. But there may be a lot more to look forward to in other urban reforms that can’t get traction in congress, such as environmental regulations, housing and education, as well as needed economic incentives and disincentives.
Democrats need to keep up the good fight to win elections to secure needed national reforms. But let’s also keep an eye on the cities and get more involved in local reform movements. There is something to be said for keeping faith that workable reforms are contagious.

Julia Preston reports at the New York Times that a new poll by the Public Religion Research Institute found that 69 percent of respondents said that the 57,000 plus unaccompanied migrant children from Central America who have come to the U.S. should be permitted to stay “if authorities determine it is not safe for them to return to their home country.” Only 27 percent said they should be deported. However, notes Preston, “There is broad consistency for a policy offering support for the unaccompanied children and a determination process, not just an open door,” said Robert P. Jones, the chief executive of the research institute. “At the same time, there are concerns that policy may bring some negative consequences, and the situation has raised people’s concerns about immigrants over all.”

At The Upshot Derek Willis reports on Kansas Democrats’ promising new emphasis on demographic modeling and micro targeting persuadable/mobilizable voters.
In her Washington Post column, “Building a progressive alternative to ALEC,” The Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuval observes, “Recently, the American Legislative and Issue Campaign Exchange and the Progressive States Network announced a merger to build an organization that will be focused on moving a progressive policy agenda in the states. While the goals of the new undertaking may resemble those of ALEC, their methods are vastly different. They will operate transparently, use no lobbyists, and make their model legislation and resources available to everyone; their database already showcases 1,800 examples of progressive legislation. And they will engage with people, not corporations…As [executive directory Nick] Rathod underscores, “For nearly a generation, conservatives have outpaced us at the business of movement-building in states. They have focused hard on it, poured resources into it and have been ruthlessly efficient at it. Starting now, we will do the same.”

Oppo alert: Time magazine’s Jay Newton-Small reveals how House Republicans are planning to get a larger share of women voters.

The National Journal’s Lucia Graves and Stephanie Stamm crunch the data, explain “What Keeps Women from the Polls?” and find that the voter turnout of women, and African American women in particular, is adversely impacted by disproportionate caretaking responsibilities.

From the Christian Science Monitor: Jared Gilmour’s “Why Democrats are campaigning on your student loan debt: Student loan debt is a big issue, and Democrats are increasingly talking about it in an effort to get voters to the polls in key states this November” notes that “Student loan debt is a big issue with big reach. In fact, 37 million Americans currently face a record $1.2 trillion student debt load. And nearly 7 million borrowers are in default on $100 billion in loans, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.” Gilmour quotes DCCC Chair Rep. Steve Israel: “Show me a suburban district, and I’ll show you a district where that’s going to be a motivating issue” and notes that Democratic candidatures are advocating reforms in major Senate races.

At Brookings Elaine C. Kamarck discusses reforms for “Increasing Turnout in Congressional Primaries”

Take a gander at this nifty political demographic map of North Carolina at the American Communities Project web page. You hover over the color-coded regions and it tells you which demographic group (i.e. “working-class country,” “college towns,” “military posts” “evangelical hubs,” “African American south,” “graying America” etc.) dominates the population. The analysis accompanying the map bodes well for Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan.

The headline of Steve Benen’s Maddowblog post “The GOP loses control of its Frankenstein monster” sums up the impeachment follies nicely. Benen observes, “Republican leaders created a monster, doing nothing to tamp down the right’s crusade to tear down the Obama presidency, and they suddenly find themselves scrambling now that the monster is running lose. As Arit John put it, Republicans have “lost control of the impeachment plot they hatched.”

Dan Balz’s “If voter turnout is key, why is it so low?” rounds up the reasons and possible cures for low voter participation in mid term elections.

Brendan Nyhan has a good post at The Upshot on the folly of the ‘Green Lantern Theory of the Presidency.”

Long-term unemployment is plummeting.

The GOP appears ready to squander many millions of taxpayer dollars on a doomed impeachment effort —even though 65 percent of voters think it is a bad idea, according to a CNN/ORC International poll released Friday.

How many millions would the Republicans spend? One clue is that they spent more than $40 million taxpayer dollars on Ken Starr’s impeachment ploy, and Republican leaders are even less anchored to prudent management of taxpayer dollars today.

From The Hill, Mike Lillis quotes DCCC chair Steve Israel on Democratic strategy to use the House’s August break to underscore who is really responsible for “the do-nothing congress”: “August will be about our action versus their inaction,” Israel said…”We’ll be talking about how they have stalled on everything, and we have a specific series of initiatives to jumpstart the middle class. That is going to be August.”

Tim Devaney writes, also at The Hill, that “Business groups alarmed by rise of ‘micro-unions’ in workplace.”

Some disturbing stats from Robert Reich’s “The rise of the non-working rich” at The Baltimore Sun: “In 1979, the richest 1 percent of households accounted for 17 percent of business income. By 2007, they were getting 43 percent. They were also taking in 75 percent of capital gains. Today, with the stock market significantly higher than where it was before the crash, the top is raking even more from their investments…The six Walmart heirs have more wealth than the bottom 42 percent of Americans combined (up from 30 percent in 2007).”

So why aren’t voters more ticked off about inequality? Eduardo Porter mulls over some possible answers at The Upshot. “Researchers at the University of Hannover in Germany propose a simpler reason: Voters don’t demand more redistribution because they don’t grasp how deep inequality is…Evidently, nobody has a clue: In every one of the 26 nations, most of them in the developed world, for which they collected data, people believe that the income gap is smaller than it really is. And using perceived rather than actual inequality, the median voter theory works much better: Where people believe inequality is worse, governments tend to redistribute more…Unsurprisingly, Americans suffer from a pretty big perception gap. They think an American in the middle of the income distribution makes only 4 percent less than the national average, according to Ms. Engelhardt and Mr. Wagener’s research. In truth, the American in the middle makes 16 percent less.”

From David Lauter’s L.A. Times post, “Democratic strategists prescribe populism to cure party ills“: “Stanley Greenberg, who has advocated populist economic arguments since before his stint as Bill Clinton’s White House polling chief, made a similar argument this week in releasing a new survey of voters in 12 Senate battleground states. The poll showed that some voter groups that are key to Democratic chances are significantly “underperforming” relative to 2012, Greenberg said. That’s bad news for Democrats. But the survey, which tested the impact of different political arguments on voter intentions, indicated that a “populist economic narrative” could motivate those voters, even in states that traditionally lean Republican. The subjects Greenberg tested included raising the minimum wage, stronger laws to guarantee equal pay for women, closing corporate tax loopholes and raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans.”

Democrat Paul Davis leads by 8 points in KSN News poll in bid to take KS governorship away from Republican Sam Brownback.

At latinpost.com Nicole Rojas reports that “Latino Voter Turnout Likely Down in 2014, but Immigration Reform Will Still Affect Results.” Rojas quotes Patrick Oakford of the Center for American Progress: “Colorado has one of the fastest growing Latino electorates in the United States, and a lot of the races right now in Colorado are really close. So the Latino vote will matter,” Oakford said…Latinos will particularly be influential in Colorado 6th District, where incumbent Republican Congressman Mike Coffman will face off against Democrat Andrew Romanoff. “It’s a really close election. Mike Coffman narrowly won his previous election, and Latinos are going to be crucial to that,” Oakford said.”

NYT’s Jeremy W. Peters reports that anti-choicers are polishing their message with a new spin that sounds like it’s from Frank Luntz’s playbook.

At Pew Research Center Drew DeSilver addresses one of the most consequential of questions of electoral politics in the U.S., “Voter turnout always drops off for midterm elections, but why?” Lots of good numbers and analysis here, but could it be as simple as the reality that low-information voters are more likely to cast a ballot in presidential elections?

After reading Aaron Blake’s “Americans hate Congress. They will totally teach it a lesson by not voting,” noting that turnout was twice as high in percentage terms 50 years ago, I wondered if maybe many Americans are too time-challenged/exhausted to get informed about local elections.

At The National Journal Norm Ornstein posts on “The Existential Battle for the Soul of the GOP: What happens when extremism becomes mainstream?,” and observes “The most interesting, and important, dynamic in American politics today is the existential struggle going on in the Republican Party between the establishment and the insurgents–or to be more accurate, between the hard-line bedrock conservatives (there are only trace elements of the old-line center-right bloc, much less moderates) and the radicals.” Ornstein then presents a remarkable catalogue of radical right-wing crazy talk. This one should be a keeper/sharer. Ornstein concludes, “when one looks at the state of Republican public opinion (especially among the likely caucus and primary voters), at the consistent and persistent messages coming from the information sources they follow, and at the supine nature of congressional leaders and business leaders in countering extremism, it is not at all likely that what passes for mainstream, problem-solving conservatism will dominate the Republican Party anytime soon.”
NAACP set to make voter suppression the central focus of its annual convention, which begins Saturday.

At Bloomberg News Mike Dorning explains why “Obamacare Fight Carries Risks for Republicans in 2016 Swing States.”

Georgia Republicans have nominated David Perdue to hold Saxby Chambliss’s senate seat for the GOP, and all indications are that it will be a close race against Democratic nominee Michelle Nunn. Some regard Perdue’s win as an upset. The AJC’s ‘Political Insider’ Jim Galloway has posted “5 reasons David Perdue shocked Georgia’s political world to win GOP Senate nod,” noting his money advantage, a possible anti-incumbency trend, his ground game edge and other factors. TDS managing editor Ed Kilgore explains at Talking Points Memo:”

In the end, with turnout barely reaching double-digits, down about 20 percent from the primary, geography appeared to have decided the contest. Perdue augmented his primary advantage in metro Atlanta and middle Georgia just enough to exceed Kingston’s base in his coastal congressional district, with Kingston’s Atlanta endorsers Handel and Gingrey not delivering enough votes to make up the difference.

With benefit of hindsight, Perdue is much in the genteel conservative mold of Isakson and Chambliss, with the polished, upper-class persona which state Republicans like to have in the U. S. Senate. Unlike Chambliss and Isakson, however, Perdue’s sometimes graceless comments and dubious work history present problems, which Nunn’s campaign will surely amplify. In their Atlanta Constitution report on Perdue’s victory over Rep. Jack Kingston, Greg Bluestein and Daniel Malloy observe:

Perdue now faces Nunn, who has amassed a considerable bankroll and is leading in some early polls. The strength and crossover appeal of the CEO of nonprofit Points of Light — not to mention the scars of a bloody, nine-week GOP runoff — have Democrats convinced they could break Republicans’ hold on the state.
“There is a clear contrast in this race between Michelle Nunn, a leader who has spent the last 25 years leading volunteer organizations and lifting communities up, and David Perdue, someone who has spent his career enriching himself while oftentimes tearing companies and communities apart,” Georgia Democratic Party Chairman DuBose Porter said in a statement. “Georgians want leaders who will fix the mess in Washington, not someone who puts personal profit ahead of regular people.”

At the Washington Monthly, Kilgore describes Perdue’s vulnerabilities:

…Against Perdue, every weapon used against Mitt Romney would be available, but with Nunn comparing her nonprofit experience with the Republican’s money-grubbing and worker-screwing….Perdue’s shown a tendency to commit gaffes. He gave a huge opening to Karen Handel in the primary by mocking her lack of higher education in casual remarks that were taped and later released. And in a newspaper interview later on, he mentioned “revenues” as part of the federal budget picture without ritualistically swearing he’s die before ever accepting a tax increase, which was turned by his opponents into a dishonest but effective assertion that he’d called for a tax increase. Maybe the GOP would surround Perdue with gaffe-proofers if he won tonight, or insist he limit his entire campaign to the kind of soft-focus saturation ads that made him a contender to begin with.

As Kilgore notes of Perdue in the TPM post cited earlier, “In many respects, he’s a deep-fried Mitt Romney with shallower pockets.”
If Georgia’s swing voters want real change, it’s hard to see how they could favor a business-as-usual Republican over Nunn, who has a significant track record doing real humanitarian work. She is also well-regarded by Atlanta’s African American community, and if Georgia’s Black leaders campaign for her in the state’s five largest cities (Atlanta, Columbus, Augusta, Macon and Savannah), she just might pull it off.

Hats off for the top ‘regular guy’ actor James Garner — also a lifelong Democrat who supported the campaigns of “Dennis Kucinich (Congress in 2002), Richard Gephardt, John Kerry, Barbara Boxer, and various Democratic committees and groups,” according to wikipedia. He was one of a handful of leading actors who supported MLK and sat in the third row during King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. Below is a clip of Garner in one of his best performances as a reluctant warrior (he had two purple hearts in real life) in “The Americanization of Emily.” But don’t miss his hilarious portrayal of RJR Nabisco CEO Ross Johnson in “Barbarians at the Gates,” either.

FiveThirtyEight’s Harry Enten probes the data to determine whether or not “Voters Are Rational in Midterm Elections.”
Shout out to the San Diego and Imperial Counties Labor Council, along with supporting pollster and message-developer Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, for providing the leadership needed to make San Diego the largest American city to enact a minimum wage hike. Naturally, the fat cats are already scheming to undermine the victory.
David Montgomery has an interesting report at the Sioux Falls Argus Leader on the troubles of the South Dakota Democratic party, and what various players say is needed to repair the damage left by the upcoming retirement of Sen. Tim Johnson.
WaPo’s Philip Rucker and Robert Costa have an informative round-up of the array of Democrats making moves to get into position for a 2016 run, including Amy Klobuchar, Martin O’Malley, Kristen Gillbrand, Andrew Cuomo and others.
But some, if not most of them, may really be running for Hillary Clinton’s veep, suggests Chris Cillizza at The Fix.
National Journal’s Emma Roller rolls out “Elizabeth Warren’s 11 Commandments of Progressivism.”
Re Wendy Davis’s run for Texas Governor, Dan Balz reports, “Jeremy Bird, who set up Battleground Texas, said there is a path to victory for Davis: turning out registered minority voters who often stay home; registering unregistered minority voters; and attracting the support of suburban white women. She will do better among African Americans and Hispanics than the polls now show, he said.”
Macer Hall of the Daily Express reports that British Labour party Leader Ed Milliband, who is being advised by David Axelrod and Stan Greenberg, is due in the U.S. this week, no doubt looking for guidance and support in his quest to restore a Labour majority. Apparently, the UK’s electorate is as polarized as our own.

Heather Digby Parton’s Salon post, “GOP’s sales-pitch swindle: Why Dems need to push Obamacare harder: When Republicans do something, they sell it big time. With the left tentative on the ACA, here’s what’s at stake” addresses a chronic Democratic failure. Parton explains “Once again the Democrats, afraid of being associated with something unpopular, distanced themselves from their own accomplishments rather than seeing the long-term advantage in being the party that brought people “freedom plus groceries.” In this case that would be the liberty afforded to every individual when they are able to move to change jobs, start a business or otherwise operate as free individuals without fear of losing their health insurance — and “groceries” meaning a government that delivers a bit of financial security in an increasingly unstable economic environment.”
In his New York Times letter from Washington,” Albert R. Hunt explains why “Some business interests and entrenched congressional politicians argue the party’s right wing is in retreat. Not so.” Says Hunt, “Many of the more establishment Republicans who prevailed in primaries had moved decidedly to the right. The Republican agenda on Capitol Hill largely is framed by the most conservative of the conservatives.”
In his Washington Monthly post, ““Temporary” Insanity from the Hard Right?,”TDS Managing Editor Ed Kilgore puts it this way: “it’s important to remember that on the really big issues, movement conservatives are pushing against an open door; the GOP has already conceded much of what they’re being told to do, particularly on matters of core ideology rather than tactics.”
Re Thomas B. Edsall’s NYT Opinion piece, “The Coming Democratic Schism,” when has there not been profound differences about priorities, often generational? The Democratic Party could also evolve toward greater unity of its diverse constituencies, with better rank and file education. Young and old share a common interest in secure retirement for all citizens, so aging people don’t have to work and take entry-level jobs away from younger workers.
Kilgore writes of Edsall’s reliance on Pew Research categories: “…Some of the questions (some from the Pew “typology” report in June, some from a study commissioned by the libertarians at Reason, some from a couple of academic papers) about the economy and the role of government have the familiar problem of offering false choices between private sector and government “solutions” to economic and social challenges, as though one excludes the other…I would warn that his adoption of the Pew typology categories of “Solid Liberals” and “Next Generation Left” as the two pro-Democratic groups most at odds with each other gives the dubious impression one is passing from the scene while the other represents the future of liberal politics…Truth is Pew constructed these typological groups based on ideological and voting-behavior coherence and then slapped on the labels. Perhaps there’s a true trend line here, but the impression a lot of people may get that “Next Generation Left” means millennials is entirely unfounded. It’s really not that simple.”
Put Harold Meyerson’s American Prospect post “Why the Democrats Need to Take Sides” on your ‘read and distribute’ list. A teaser: “Bettering the economic lot of their constituents–particularly since those constituents are represented disproportionately among those Americans who now call themselves lower-class–will require the Democrats to do something they haven’t really contemplated, and have consistently avoided, since the 1930s: taking a side, with all that entails, in a class war.”
Class war, or at least conflict, may be unavoidable in these times of growing economic inequality. But E. J. Dionne, Jr. discusses prospects for Democrats nurturing a “pro-business populism.” It’s possible that enhanced class solidarity can make room for a thriving entrepreneurial culture that supports business innovation and creativity — perhaps a bridge between the traditional progressive Democratic values and young voters’ aspirations to succeed, referenced by Edsall’s argument noted above.
Here’s an interesting stat, from Kyle Kondik’s Crystal Ball post “The Hidden Barrier to a Republican Senate Majority: The GOP has had little recent success defeating Democratic incumbents“: “Incredibly, in the 16 Senate elections since then [1980], the Republicans have flipped only 12 Democratic Senate seats where the incumbent was running again.”
Another indication that Sen. Elizabeth Warren has the Dems’ best quiver full of zingers, from her remarks at a Buckner, KY town hall: “Mitch McConnell believes that when it comes to a choice between protecting tax loopholes for billionaires or reducing student loan interest rates, he will work to protect every last dollar of every last tax loophole,” said Warren. “And then he tells students to dream a little smaller, to do with less and give up a little sooner.”

Less than half of Americans approve of the job the U.S. Supreme Court is doing, according to a new Gallup poll conducted July 7-10, reports Rebeca Rifkin of Gallup Politics:

Americans remain divided in their assessments of the U.S. Supreme Court, with 47% approving of the job it is doing, and 46% disapproving. These ratings are consistent with approval last September, when 46% approved and 45% disapproved, and rank among the lowest approval ratings for the court in Gallup’s 14-year trend.
Since Gallup began asking the question in 2000, Americans have typically been more likely to approve than to disapprove of the job the Supreme Court is doing. However, the margin between the two has been narrowing since its recent high point in 2009, and Americans were divided over the court in 2012 and again in 2013. Separate polling found that confidence in the Supreme Court also fell to record lows this year, as Americans’ confidence in all three branches of government is down.

It’s a partisan thing, as Rifkin notes. Numbers rise and fall in response to recent decisions, with Republican approval of the court spiking up in response to the Bush v. Gore, Hobby Lobby and abortion/contraception clinics buffer zone decisions, and Democratic approval tanking. The Democratic respondents high (68 percent) was reached after the decision upholding Obamacare. Rifkin did not note the numbers after the Citizens United decision.
While nearly 2/3 of the Supreme Court’s decisions this term have been unanimous, the high profile cases like Hobby Lobby tend to polarize public opinion. Regardless of how the public feels about the court, however, it’s not likely to become a pivotal issue for voters in the foreseeable future.
It would be interesting for Gallup or other pollsters to ask respondents how they feel about increasing the size of the court to 11, in order to make room for genuinely moderate justices.
It doesn’t require a constitutional amendment to increase the size of the Supreme Court. Article III authorizes the Congress to determine the number of justices. The U.S. started out with six justices, as a result of the Judiciary Act of 1789, grew to 7 in 1807, then 9 in 1837 and 10 in 1863. In 1866, however, the Judicial Circuits Act of 1866 provided that the next three justices to retire would not be replaced, reducing the size of the Court to 7 by attrition. The Court shrank by two seats until the Judiciary Act of 1869 set the number of justices again at nine, where it has remained unchanged.
FDR got into big trouble trying to “pack” the Supreme court, proposing to appoint a new justice for each incumbent Supreme Court justice who reached the age of 70 years 6 months and refused to retire — appointments which would continue until the court reached 15 justices. The political fallout was disastrous for Roosevelt.
The public may, indeed be somewhat wary about increasing the size of the court, which the Republicans would likely flog as “big government” liberalism. But FDR’s mistake may have been overreach — the maximum size of 15 he requested. A 2012 CBS/New York Times poll indicated that 60 percent of the public thought lifetime appointments for the Supreme Court justices is a “bad thing.,” with just 33 percent saying it was a good thing. Another indication that the public favors some reform of the high court is reflected in polls showing strong support for televising the proceedings.
Adding two justices might be more acceptable to the public, despite the certainty of an all-out GOP propaganda campaign against it. Nonetheless, it’s a needed discussion which might resonate in the current political climate — and one which Democrats should certainly lead the next time we get a landslide.