Self-Identified Conservatives: The Largest Segment of the 2010 Electorate

Last week I argued that President Obama and the Democrats failed to anticipate the counter mobilization created by passage of the health care law. And while some of the ghosts of health care haunted Democrats this past Tuesday, other White House and Democratic policies pursued in the last two years, like the stimulus bill and cap-and-trade, also contributed to this backlash.

Yesterday’s exit polls show that four years of a Democratic majority in Congress and two years of Obama in the White House might have also created an additional outcome among voters – a larger share of self-identified conservatives in the electorate.