One of the more notable examples of the gulf in perceived reality between Left and Right these days is the very different perceptions of the power of Barack Obama. Most Democrats think the president has been hemmed in by the economic and fiscal conditions he inherited and by an opposition party with the will and the means to obstruct his every effort. Some Democrats also think he’s been hemmed in by his own timidity, and/or by the views and interests of his advisors, but nobody much thinks he’s kicking ass and taking names.
Meanwhile, on the Right, while the dominant attitude towards the president remains one of exultant mockery, in anticipation of a big 2010 Republican victory, it seems important to some pols and gabbers to maintain the impression that the president represents an ever-growing threat to American liberties.
This “Fear Factor” is especially present in the bizarre op-ed penned in the Washington Times by former congressman, and perhaps future candidate for Colorado governor, Tom Tancredo, calling for the president’s impeachment.
Now there’s nothing particularly newsworthy about Tancredo seizing the limelight with crazy talk, or even his contention that Obama’s violated his constitutional oath by refusing to immediately launch a nationwide manhunt to identify and deport illegal immigrants by the millions as the openly xenophobic Coloradan would do.
But it’s the paranoid fear of Obama’s totalitarian designs on the nation that stands out in the piece:

Barack Obama is one of the most powerful presidents this nation has seen in generations. He is powerful because he is supported by large majorities in Congress, but, more importantly, because he does not feel constrained by the rule of law….
Mr. Obama’s paramount goal, as he so memorably put it during his campaign in 2008, is to “fundamentally transform America.” He has not proposed improving America – he is intent on changing its most essential character. The words he has chosen to describe his goals are neither the words nor the motivation of just any liberal Democratic politician. This is the utopian, or rather dystopian, reverie of a dedicated Marxist – a dedicated Marxist who lives in the White House.

Aside from illustrating that Tom Tancredo knows absolutely nothing about Marxism, this passage makes you wonder why Tancredo thinks a future Republican Congress could get away with impeachment. Wouldn’t Obama simply suspend the Constitution, round up Republican Members, and then maybe ship them to one of those secret camps that FEMA–or is it AmeriCorps?–is supposedly building?
This is a perpetual problem for hard-core conservatives today, isn’t it? It’s hard to simultaneously maintain that Barack Obama is well on his way to becoming Benito Mussolini, and also that an aroused American people are on the brink of chasing him from office.
A similar contradiction seems to afflict the thinking of another conservative Republican who spoke out this week, Tennessee congressman and gubernatorial candidate Zach Wamp, as explained by Hotline‘s Dan Roem:

Rep. Zach Wamp (R-03) suggested TN and other states may have to consider seceding from the union if the federal government does not change its ways regarding mandates.
“I hope that the American people will go to the ballot box in 2010 and 2012 so that states are not forced to consider separation from this government,” said Wamp during an interview with Hotline OnCall.
He lauded Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX), who first floated the idea of secession in April ’09, for leading the push-back against health care reform, adding that he hopes the American people “will send people to Washington that will, in 2010 and 2012, strictly adhere” to the constitution’s defined role for the federal government.
“Patriots like Rick Perry have talked about these issues because the federal government is putting us in an untenable position at the state level,” said Wamp, who is competing with Knoxville Mayor Bill Haslam (R) and LG Ron Ramsey (R) for the GOP nod in the race to replace TN Gov. Phil Bredesen (D).

In his case, Wamp is floating an extra-constitutional remedy for what he claims to be an extra-constitutional action by the Congress and the Executive Branch. This did not work out too well when Tennessee and other states tried it in 1861, you may recall. But more immediately, what, specifically, is Obama doing that has led Wamp to propose so radical a step? Is he threatening to bombard military facilities in Chattanooga? Is an alleged “unfunded mandate” on the states really equivalent to Kristallnacht or the March on Rome?
Rhetorical excess is one thing; extreme partisanship is still another; but projecting totalitarian powers onto Barack Obama while one is in the very process of seeking to drive him and his party from office is, well, just delusional.

It’s certainly old news that anti-government sentiments are on the rise these days, and that anti-government rhetoric is at the heart of the Republican Party’s hopes for regaining control of government in November and in 2012.
But as Ron Brownstein explains painstakingly in his latest column, it’s important to unravel these sentiments into their component parts. Trust in government has been fragile even if the best of recent times, and mistrust of government sometimes has to do with perceptions of incompetence, and sometimes with perceptions of its unworthy beneficiaries:

Polls suggest that an energized core of voters — possibly around 40 percent — has ideologically recoiled from Obama’s direction. That threatens Democrats, but their greater problem is that voters open to an activist government in principle are not convinced that it’s producing enough benefits in practice.
Partly, that verdict rests on concerns about effectiveness. Many economists may agree that Washington’s economic initiatives prevented a deeper downturn. But with the economy still sluggish, surveys show that most Americans believe that the medicine simply didn’t work well enough. That judgment compounds doubts about federal competence fed by failures stretching back from the Gulf oil spill to the New Orleans flood. One senior Democrat calls this the “echo of Katrina” problem.
The second worry revolves around government’s priorities. Most voters think that the principal beneficiaries of everything government has done to fix the economy since 2009 have been the same interests that broke it: big banks, Wall Street, the wealthy.

In other words, anti-government sentiments are an amalgam of feelings that can’t be simply attributed to a Tea Party-ish fear of government trampling liberties. More common is the feeling that “big government” might be acceptable if it did a good job, or if it worked on behalf of the interests of a majority of Americans.
The first problem shows that the 1990s-era progressive emphasis on “reinventing government” to focus on tangible results needs to be revived. And the second problem shows that Bill Clinton’s identification with “the forgotten middle class” is another golden oldie we should listen to again.

Here’s hoping the heirs of the late, great Link Wray will allow some YouTube mash-up wizard to use a little piece of Wray’s way-back hit instrumental “Run Chicken, Run” to accompany this video clip of Sharron Angle fleeing reporters:

As Andy Barr of Politico reported:

Sharron Angle walked out of an event to which her campaign invited reporters as soon as they were given the opportunity to ask questions of Nevada’s GOP nominee for Senate.
After giving a three-minute speech on Wednesday on her desire to repeal the estate tax, Angle was asked to make herself available to answer questions from the assembled reporters. Angle turned around without saying a word and left the event, as a video provided by the Nevada Democratic Party shows.

Barr was a little too kind in describing Angle’s exit: She didn’t just walk; Positioned for the quick getaway, she turned tail and hauled ass, as if she didn’t have even two minutes to answer questions. Barr puts Angle’s departure in context.

Angle was followed out of the event by several camera crews and reporters. Without speaking to the media, Angle got into a white Jeep Cherokee with a campaign aide and left the event.
According to the Las Vegas Sun, Wednesday’s event was the first to which the press had been invited since she won the June 9 Republican primary.

I particularly enjoyed the inadvertent high comedy of the smarmy m.c. of the press “conference” telling the media “I know Sharron’s got a very tight schedule. But Peter and I and (unintelligible) will make ourselves available for individual questions,” as the bewildered hard-hat guys watch Angle’s sprint, chased by reporters who weren’t into being spoon-fed b.s. by campaign aides. As a stagey political event gone wrong, it couldn’t have been scripted better by Robert Altman.
All of which may help explain why Angle is tanking in the polls. Kudos to NV Dems for capturing Angle in flight. May KY Dems, who also have a media-dodging wingnut to expose, follow suit. It’s not just Angle’s and Rand Paul’s indefensible policy positions; it’s also the fact that both of these candidates for the United States Senate are letting their handlers hide them from open scrutiny by the media. If they refuse to be videotaped answering questions like any candidate with a modicum of personal integrity, then let them be depicted as cowards in flight, which also makes for entertaining television.
Republicans, not just Paul and Angle, but also a slew of tea party House candidates with half-baked policies, have a lot to hide in this election. It will be a sadly-missed opportunity if Dems passively depend on the mainstream media to make them account for it.

This item by TDS Co-Editor William Galston is cross-posted from The New Republic.
A recent Politico poll has opened up “D.C. elites” to yet another round of criticism. They’re so unlike normal Americans, you see. Forty-nine percent of them think the country is heading in the right direction (versus 27 percent of the general population), and 44 percent think the economy is heading in the right direction (versus 24 percent of the overall public). Only 6 percent of the elites think the downturn has affected them more than most Americans–unsurprisingly, considering that 45 percent of them enjoy household incomes of $150,000 or more (versus 3 percent of the public). Nor is it surprising that 68 percent of elites think the Tea Party is an evanescent fad (versus 26 percent of the general population) or that only 23 percent think that “family values” are a very important issue (versus 62 percent), or that elites say they care less about immigration, taxes, Social Security, and ethics in government than does the public.
But the survey doesn’t tell such a simple story–its more surprising findings have attracted less attention, probably because they don’t fit into the conventional narrative of-out-of-touch, inside-the-Beltway elites whose views are wholly out of sync with those of “real Americans.” But consider the following:
· 52 percent of elites think the economy/jobs is the most important issue facing the country (general public–48 percent)
· 49 percent think the war in Afghanistan will not succeed (general public–48 percent)
· 64 percent think the political system in Washington is broken (general public–72 percent)
· 51 percent are “somewhat” or “very” dissatisfied with President Obama’s response to the oil spill (general public–61 percent)
Or take an issue–who will end up footing the bill for cleaning up the oil spill?–where one would expect a big split between hot populist suspicions and cool elite assessments. 69 percent of the public thinks that the taxpayers will get stuck holding the bag. But so do 59 percent of D.C. elites, despite repeated assurances from the president on down that BP is fully responsible! Similarly, 52 percent of the American people believe that despite the recent catastrophe, offshore drilling should continue. But so do 49 percent of D.C. elites. Or what about climate change, often regarded as a distinctively upscale concern? Only 31 percent of the people think that climate change is a very important issue. The corresponding figure for D.C. elites is … 33 percent.
George Bernard Shaw once said, “Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.” Based on the evidence in the Politico survey, he was on to something. If the American people throw stones at their government, most of the projectiles will hit a mirror.

In terms of historical trends, there is not much of an upside for Dems, who currently control 27 state legislatures, compared to the GOP’s control of 14 (8 split), in Tim Storey’s “Legislature Lowdown” at Larry J. Sabato’s Crystal Ball:

…Since 1900, there have been 27 elections held in the presidential mid-term year. In all but two of those mid-term elections, the party in the White House lost seats in state legislatures. The only exceptions were in 1934 and 2002. In 1934 during one of the lowest points of the great depression, Democrats campaigned on Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and gained over 1100 legislative seats nationwide in FDR’s first mid-term election. In 2002, Republicans rode a groundswell of support for President George W. Bush in the wake of the September 11th attacks to pick up 177 seats. However, in the other 25 mid-term elections, the party of the president lost an average 495 legislative seats. Mid-term losses have been mitigated in recent decades since modern redistricting took hold, but the trend is still very consistent. This trend is not good news for Democratic legislative candidates running for the first time since 2000 with a Democrat in the White House.

Storey identifies 27 “battleground” legislative chambers, where a pick-up of just 3 seats would lead to a switch of party in the majority. Dems have 14 to defend, compared to 11 for the GOP, with AK Senate and MT House tied. The big prizes, in terms of the more populous states, are the NY Senate (32 D – 29 R – 1 vacant), the OH House (53 D – 46 R), and the PA House (104 D – 98 R – 1 vacant). Close behind would be the TX House (73D – 77 R),
As Storey points out, in 44 states redistricting by state legislatures is a critical issue of concern with respect to national politics (6 states that have special commission-like structures for that purpose). Further,

The 2011 redistricting could be the first time since the era of modern redistricting began in the 1980s, following the 1960s landmark Supreme Court decisions on redistricting and the evolution of the process in the 1970s, that Republicans have the redistricting edge in the states, and it could be substantial. If November 2nd is a big Republican wave election, it could give the GOP sole redistricting authority in the drawing of more than 160 U.S. House districts–nearly six times more than their Democratic counterparts. Under this scenario, the bulk of the seats redrawn in the 2011 redistricting, about 200, will be in states with divided partisan control. The stakes for this November’s legislative elections could not be higher. It’s shaping up to be a year of historic volatility in state legislative elections.

In addition to redistricting concerns, adds Storey, “Legislatures enact over 20,000 new laws every year” and spend “about $1.5 trillion” in taxpayer money annually.”
Looking at the big picture, it’s possible Dems could lose some state legislatures, but still have control in a plurality of states. What may be more important in terms of congressional seats and the electoral college is what happens in the aforementioned larger states, especially TX, which is expected to gain as many as 3 or 4 U.S. House of Reps. seats. Perhaps Democratic contributors would do well to send a little love to the state Democratic Party organizations in NY, PA, OH and TX.

As you may have noticed, the latest right-wing “scandal” (at least for those who are not mesmerized by the “exposure” of liberal opinion in the leaked archives of the JournoList) is the planned construction of a mosque and Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero in New York. This is essentially a local land use issue of the sort that New York authorities deal with every day, but the “threat” of this mosque has already become a cause celebre around the country, particularly with the Tea Party folk.
But the most radical reaction so far has been not from any Tea Party spokesman or talk radio jock, but from the former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and a putative presidential candidate in 2012, Newt Gingrich. Check this statement out:

There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia. The time for double standards that allow Islamists to behave aggressively toward us while they demand our weakness and submission is over.

Yes, Gingrich is arguing that religious liberty for Muslims in the United States should be made contingent on religious liberty for non-Muslims in Saudi Arabia. Anything less is a “double standard.”
I suppose this sounds reasonable to people who think all or most Muslims are “Islamists,” or buy Newt’s dubious assertion that the name of the proposed facility, Cordoba House, is a deliberate Islamist provocation aimed at heralding some future armed conquest of the United States. But put aside the particulars here and think about the idea that a unilateral commitment to religious liberty by the United States represents a “double standard” inviting our destruction.
This isn’t a particularly new idea. For a very long time some American Protestants resisted full civil rights for Catholics on grounds that Catholic countries did not extend similar rights to Protestants. You’d think Newt Gingrich, as a very avid recent convert to Catholicism, would be aware of that history and its relevance to his “double standard” argument.
Newt’s line, of course, is an analog to the argument beloved of some conservatives that in the civilizational struggle with Islamism, American principles of decency–say, a reluctance to torture prisoners–are just signs of contemptible weakness that make our enemies laugh at us. It’s richly ironic that the kind of people who deeply believe in “American exceptionalism”–the notion that much of what is good on this planet would disappear if America began to resemble countries like Canada or England or France–are sometimes among the first to argue that America should abandon its distinctive beliefs whenever it is convenient. But Gingrich carries the freedom-is-weakness argument to a brand new extreme. Wonder how his fans would react if he suggested that the right to bear arms should be suspended for the duration of the War On Terror to keep guns out of the hands of Islamists? The mind reels.

One of the most common political journalism narratives of recent weeks has been that Republicans are about to pull off a truly historic sweep of governor’s races, setting up an absolute domination of redistricting and replenishing the GOP’s presidential bench.
Maybe so, but there are some interesting counter-indications as well, and in states that could have a big impact on redistricting.
As noted here often, Democrat Roy Barnes is by all accounts competitive against any Republican in Georgia, a state where Republicans control the state legislature and where the additional of a congressional seat will create a major redistricting fight.
Another big redistricting cockpit is Texas, and there Democrat Bill White is certainly competitive against Rick Perry.
And now comes a new surprise: a PPP poll showing Democrat Alex Sink with a sizable lead in the governor’s race in Florida.
It appears that the nasty Republican primary battle between Attorney General Bill McCollum and moneybags Rick Scott is hurting both candidates. And the independent candidacy by Lawton Chiles, Jr., assumed in the beginning to be a real problem for Democrats, may actually be helping Sink. At the moment, she leads Scott 36-30, with Chiles taking 13%, and she leads McCollum 36-23, with Chiles at 14%.
With the incumbent Governor, Charlie Crist, having left the GOP to run for the Senate as an independent, GOP prospects in Florida suddenly don’t look that sunny. And that could matter nationally, since Florida is a state where Republicans pulled off an impressive gerrmandering feat during the last decennial redistricting round, and might be expected to do so again if they hang onto the governorship and the legislature.
Perhaps a bean-count of states where Republicans control governorships will look pretty good after November. But in terms of the bigger states, and those with a palpable effect ont he future shape of the U.S. House, Democrats are showing signs of life in surprising places, and could do much better than expected.