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Valerie Jarrett: NY-23 tells you "where the leadership is."
By: J.P. Freire
Associate Commentary Editor
11/02/09 1:06 PM EST
Valerie Jarrett was on with George Stephanopoulos this weekend, and it appears that Democrats have very much seized on the theme of "Poor Dede, Maligned Moderate." When one of the president's top advisers runs with the theme, especially with a response as canned as hers, it's clear the Democrats are attempting to define the middle ground while moving to the left.
Most notable is her attempt to conflate party with principle, particularly in this clip. She also goes on to mention that fewer people identify as Republicans, and instead choose the term "independent."
That may be true, but Jarrett's insinuation, that people are moving away from the Republican party because of so-called extremism is dead wrong.
Gallup found that more people are identifying as conservative at the start of July, before the height of town hall madness and the swooping overreach of the health-care package.
Despite the results of the 2008 presidential election, Americans, by a 2-to-1 margin, say their political views in recent years have become more conservative rather than more liberal, 39% to 18%, with 42% saying they have not changed. While independents and Democrats most often say their views haven't changed, more members of all three major partisan groups indicate that their views have shifted to the right rather than to the left.
In the context of NY-23, it looks like conservatives are trying to retake the reins of a party that has claimed, but failed, to be conservative. To paraphrase Obama's mentor, the Republicans' chickens have come home to roost.
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