[Democratic pollster] Stanley Greenberg does interesting work—for example, he identified Affirmative Action as a key issue in the 1980s, something that both Democratic and Republican Establishments absolutely did not wish to hear.
A recent Greenberg report, The Very Separate World of Conservative Republicans, got some publicity because he found that “the self-identifying conservative Republicans who make up the base of the Republican Party” and who drive current unrest are not “racist“.
(He also found that immigration, that’s I-M-M-I-G-R-T-I-O-N, was one of the top issues for these conservatives, although rarely explicitly mentioned even at Tea Parties).
Gallup adds that 35% of independents now identify as “conservative”.
What this means is really astonishing: you could virtually win the U.S. Presidency with conservative support alone. (…)
There are issues to hand that would mobilize that “conservative”/ white base and reach beyond it as well. Immigration, of course—Gallup reports that 50% of Americans say immigration should be decreased, up from 39% a year ago; (…) —Rasmussen reported this spring that an incredible 84% of Americans want English to be the official language of the U.S.
For that matter, gay marriage is now 0-31, having lost in every single state where it has been put to a popular vote, most recently in Maine, despite the GOP’s almost total elimination from New England. VDARE.COM does not take a position on gay marriage, but there’s no doubt that opposing it could be a devastating tactic for a party brave enough to speak up.
There is, however, one big difference between the Goldwater-Reagan insurgency and the situation today: the institutionalized Beltway Right, solidly entrenched after some thirty years with their snouts in the Washington D.C. trough.
