This article has it right.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-goldberg-bear-20110927,0,7798892.column
By July 2009, Gallup found Americans had attitudes that were "conspicuously incongruous with the results of the 2008 elections." The 2010 midterm elections showed just how incongruous.
Of the myriad miscalculations made by Obama, among the most fateful has to be his assumption that a repudiation of George W. Bush was synonymous with a repudiation of conservatism.
Moreover, notes Brookings Institution scholar William Galston, a domestic policy advisor under President Clinton, the average voter thinks the Democrats are much more liberal than the average liberal does. "So when independents, who see themselves as modestly right of center, say that Democrats are too liberal, average Democrats can't imagine what they're talking about."
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-goldberg-bear-20110927,0,7798892.column
By July 2009, Gallup found Americans had attitudes that were "conspicuously incongruous with the results of the 2008 elections." The 2010 midterm elections showed just how incongruous.
Of the myriad miscalculations made by Obama, among the most fateful has to be his assumption that a repudiation of George W. Bush was synonymous with a repudiation of conservatism.
Moreover, notes Brookings Institution scholar William Galston, a domestic policy advisor under President Clinton, the average voter thinks the Democrats are much more liberal than the average liberal does. "So when independents, who see themselves as modestly right of center, say that Democrats are too liberal, average Democrats can't imagine what they're talking about."