by Mark Silva
t's cool to be a Democrat again.
At least, that's what the Gallup Poll has found, looking back over the past year's surveys: Among people who self-identify with one party or another, the percentage picking the Democratic Party was eight points higher than the share checking Republican last year. That's the biggest advantage for the Democrats since 1988, when the Reagan years were nearing an end.
The margin was 36 percent Democratic, 28 percent Republican - which also means a lot of ground is claimed by people without allegiance to either of the major parties: Tne independent-and-other-party share of the public has grown from 33 percent in '88 to 36 percent in last year's surveys.
The numbers come from a year of stand-alone polls, consisting of more than 30,000 interviews. That puts the margin of error at about 1 percent.
They show that "Democrats have gained ground against Republicans in each of the last five years, going from a deficit of two points in 2003 to the most recent eight-point advantage,'' Gallup reports today. "Additionally, the 36 percent of Americans who identified as Democrats last year matches the high point in Democratic identification since 1988, when it was also 36 percent.
"But since fewer Americans identified as Republicans last year (28 percent) than in 1988 (31 percent), the Democratic advantage was larger in 2008,'' Gallup notes.
This was a pretty good base on which President Barack Obama, Democrat from Chicago, might build the electoral advantage that he achieved in November - though that party advantage was of little help for the Democratic nominee in 1988, when President George H.W. Bush was elected.
Oh yeah, Michael Dukakis. 111-426 in the Electoral College.
Seems candidates do have something to do with the results.
"The Democratic Party is currently riding a winning streak in party affiliation, which has manifested itself in the party's decisive victories in the 2006 and 2008 elections,'' Gallup's Jeffrey Jones suggests. "Barack Obama's election and popularity will surely help to advance the Democratic policy agenda -- something the party had difficulty doing the last two years with a narrow Senate majority and George W. Bush in the White House.
But "itt is not clear at this point whether the Democratic Party can return to the days when it enjoyed consistent double-digit advantages in party identification from the late 1950s through the early 1980s,'' Gallup adds. " The challenge for the party is to keep the positive momentum going while governing with total control of the legislative and executive branches of government.
"Clearly, much of the Democratic momentum in recent years has been the result of dissatisfaction with the way the Republicans were governing the nation. The Republicans, in turn, will attempt to regroup as the minority party and win back some of the support they have lost in recent years.''
Comments
More interesting than the dem side of the chart, I see that w had achieved the highest level of success on the chart, followed by the lowest of lows all within 4 years. It would be interesting to see the longer timeline of that graph. Face it pugs, you got your way in 2000 with control of all branches, and you completely messed it up for your party and the country.
Posted by: Xcellentform | January 23, 2009 12:29 PM
Yawn. Silva and his merry band of screamers are celebrating an 8-point edge while almost half the country still says they don't identify with either party. This number shifts with the political winds and as soon as the Obama high wears off they'll actually have to do something.
Posted by: Jeff | January 23, 2009 3:27 PM