The Determination Gap

Remember that silly WaPo/ABC poll from yesterday — the one with the D+11 skew? Well, it gets funny:

Fifty-three percent of Americans now oppose the law overall, while just 39 percent support it – the latter the lowest in more than a dozen ABC/Post polls since August 2009. “Strong” critics, at 40 percent, outnumber strong supporters by nearly a 2-1 margin in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates.

Two-thirds continue to say the high court should throw out either the entire law (38 percent) or at least the part that requires most individuals to obtain coverage (29 percent) or face a penalty; just a quarter want the court to uphold the law as is.

A rigged poll can’t show more than 39% support for ObamaCare.

(Hat tip, Ed Morrissey.)

Reminds me of something from the Michael Brown Show a couple weeks ago. We were talking about the “enthusiasm gap” for the GOP contenders, and there’s no denying it exists. But let me tell you what I saw in 2010.

I live in the heart of Colorado’s GOP country. In fact, I live in the most Republican part of the heart of Colorado’s GOP country. It’s so Republican, I usually vote straight-ticket Democrat in local races, just to try and keep them honest. Election days here tend to be low-key affairs, since the winners are all pretty much determined months in advance during the GOP primary. In an area where the registered Democrats can be counted on the fingers of one hat, this should come as no surprise.

But Election Day 2010 was different.

The lot at my polling place was so crowded, I had to park a couple blocks away. Cars were arranged so that it looked like they were playing rollerball. Inside, it was packed asses to elbows. Despite the crowds, the mood wasn’t grim or surly or anything like that. People were polite. People were friendly. But mostly they were quiet.

I didn’t hear any talk about the wonderful candidates or how excited anyone was to vote for them or the great things they expected. “Let’s get this done” seemed to be the prevailing mood.

And that’s exactly what happened, all across the country.

So there might have been an enthusiasm gap, even in 2010. But there sure as hell wasn’t a determination gap — at least not on the Right or in the great middle of the electorate. And if you look around, that quiet determination is still there. Yes, very few people are excited about Mitt Romney. But there are millions still quietly determined to undo the damage of the last few years.

ObamaCare has, even if you take WaPo/ABC at face value, half of Democrats down in the dumps. The real number is probably higher. The Stimulus was a big, fat fail. Oil and gas are busy creating high-paying jobs, even as the Administration stands in their way, and shovels wasted dollars at dream energy. Dodd-Frank sits on consumer credit like the Fat Lady on a unicycle. The Democrats have absolutely nothing to get enthused about. Well, there is the far left of the party — maybe 15% of the electorate. They get excited about OWS and phony wars on women and drumming up race wars in Florida. But you can’t win with 15%.

So don’t forget that President Obama has also suffers an enthusiasm gap. It’s probably not as bad as Romney’s, but it’s no less real. But it’s the determination gap which should have David Axelrod positively quaking in his combover.