The Anti-Tea Party
by digby
Chris Hayes has a nice post up about the enthusiasm gap among the Tea Party and the Anti-tea party (what, you haven't heard about them?) which is composed of young people and African Americans who still have faith in the administration and the Democrats. And it's fairly heart breaking:
That is the tragic and perilous irony of this political moment: the people with the most faith in the president and the Democratic Party are the hardest hit by the continuing economic disaster; it's this brute fact that's driving the so-called enthusiasm gap between liberals and conservatives. More than frustration with the lack of a public option or anger at a White House that seems to relish insulting the "professional left," the flagging enthusiasm among Obama's '08 base is the product of a kind of cognitive dissonance between hope and reality. "Like a lot of people in my generation, I was really inspired by you and by your campaign and message that you brought," a 30-year-old law school graduate told the president during a live town hall on CNBC recently. "And that inspiration is dying away. It feels like the American Dream is not attainable to a lot of us.... I really want to know, is the American Dream dead for me?"
The part that I highlighted above was always a hazard of the 2008 campaign. There was almost no where to go but down, even in the best of circumstances. And we are not in the best of circumstances. I assume they believe that "when the economy turns around" that enthusiasm will return in time for Morning in America in 2012. I just hope they have a Plan B.
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