Support for Health Care Reform Continues to Drop

The bump in support for the Democrats’ health care plans that resulted from President Obama’s speech to Congress and associated media blitz is now history, as support for those plans is at a new low among voters:

Just 41% of voters nationwide now favor the health care reform proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats. That’s down two points from a week ago and the lowest level of support yet measured. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 56% are opposed to the plan.

It’s easiest to follow the trend graphically:
Rasmussen401.jpg
Just as bad for Democrats, if not worse, is the intensity gap: those who strongly oppose the Democrats’ proposals outnumber those who strongly support them by nearly two to one. Currently, 46 percent of seniors are “strongly opposed” to the Democrats’ plans. Most Democrats still favor some sort of health care reform, but independents have decisively lined up with Republicans in opposing the Democrats’ proposals.
At this point, it seems unlikely that there is anything Democrats can do to turn public opinion around. Neither their expensive advertising campaign nor their risible attempt to paint opponents of government medicine as “racists” has succeeded. I assume they will pass something–anything!–within in the next six months or so, just so they can say they did. But it is doubtful that most Democrats will be willing to jam something that transparently means government-controlled medicine down the throats of an unwilling American electorate.

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