The Crowbar

Greg Sargent of the blog The Plum Line gives us a great example of the broken reasoning process of the intellectually hollow modern liberal. Referring to new CBS/New York Times poll, Sargent concludes:

There’s a truly weird disconnect underlying public opinion right now: Americans are overwhelmingly convinced that Republicans are not pursuing a bipartisan health care compromise in good faith, but the public wants Obama to keep trying to find common ground with them anyway.

The poll finds that an overwhelming majority of 64% think Republicans are opposing Obama’s health care plans mostly for political reasons. But it also finds that an equally large number, 65%, say Democrats shouldn’t pass a bill without Republicans — even if they think it’s right for the country — and should instead compromise to win over some GOPers.

This shows, I think, that Democrats have convinced the public that the GOP wants Obama and Dems to fail at all costs. But they’ve failed to make the case to the public that GOP obstructionism may leave them no choice but to go it alone in order to realize reform.

Should Sargent’s conclusions be trusted? Unfortunately for Sargent’s credibility, he conveniently overlooks some pertinent factors.

Factors

First I submit this statistic: RCP poll average Congressional Job Approval, retrieved 9/25/2009: 26.8% Approve, 64% Disapprove. Secondly, I submit RCP’s poll average for President Obama’s Job Approval, retrieved 9/25/2009: 52.5% Approve, 40.7% Disapprove.

Thirdly, I submit the fact that the CBS/NYT poll, regarding Health Care, framed the debate as Obama vs. Republicans in Congress. Two poll questions mention Democrats in Congress, Seven mention Republicans in Congress, Four frame Republicans in Congress vs. Obama, Zero mention Democrats AND Republicans in the same question.

Fourthly, I submit that the CBS/NYT poll found that 53% of those polled believe Democrats support Obama’s Health Care plan for “political reasons.” The difference is 11% between Republicans and Democrats who are believed to be motivated by politics. Politicians being political – imagine that!

Without doubt, the reality of the situation is that the leader of the liberal side of the healthcare debate is Obama and that the Republicans have no readily identifiable elected leader; they’re just generic “Republicans in Congress.” Who doesn’t hate Congress? The pollmakers could safely take advantage of American’s general disgust with Congress and their general approval Obama and still appear to be honest in their methodology. What this poll avoids is pitting the ideas against each other; it instead focuses on the personalities, where Obama has the overwhelming advantage. For those polled who want full coverage for all, why not ask them whether they are willing to foot costs of significantly higher taxes, drastically reduced quality-of-care, and the possibility of manipulation of their health care in the name of “social justice?”

Sargent’s Sophistry

So then, Sargent believes this poll is evidence that the public “overwhelmingly” believes that the  GOP wants “Obama and Dems to fail at all costs?” LOL. If you’re a deeply partisan hack reflexively spinning poll results in your favor you may believe such a thing.

Sargent fails to realize (or is psychologically unable to fathom) that what appears to be cognitive dissonance (public wants Obama to cooperate with EVIL politically motivated Republicans) has other, more plausible explanations – like the poll questions skewed the results against “Republicans in Congress” or asking whether politicians do things for “political reasons” is just a dumb question.

If Democrats follow Sargent’s advice to “go it alone” and force a ‘public option’ (or ‘co-op’) through budget reconciliation, the likely result will be an angry public, of whom 84% are already covered, according to a new CBS/NYT poll.

Update: Hotair has more on how the CBS/NYT is skewed but telling.