With a lot of discussion this week about whether health care reform is getting more popular I was particularly interested to see what our numbers would show in Colorado. That's because we'd polled the state in August on it, right as the debate was really kicking off, and now had the passage of seven months to see what impact everything that's happened since has had on public opinion.
The answer? Not much. The numbers are amazingly unchanged from last summer. Then 73% of Democrats supported it. Now 72% do. 8% of Republicans supported it then. Now 9% do. 36% of independents supported it then. 36% of independents support it now. For everything that's happened basically no one's changed their mind.
Colorado's just one state- albeit a very important swing state- and I'll be interested to see where our national polling falls this week. But my sense is that folks made up their minds a long time ago and haven't really changed them. If we do find an uptick on the national level I imagine it will come with Democratic voters. A month ago we found Barack Obama's approval with Democrats at 83% but support for health care with them at 66%. It would not be surprising as he's become more and more vocal on the issue to see some of the Obama supporting/health care ambivalent Democrats become Obama supporting/health care supporting Democrats.
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This is the same Colorado sample that showed results strongly skewed toward Democrats, compared to nonpartisan polling.
If you had a sample that wasn't Democrat-friendly, you would likely have seen the health care takeover getting more unpopular.
As Obama became more vocal about his healthcare plans, his approvals fell further and further. If he wasn't such a rigid ideologue, he would drop such an unpopular proposal before he does any more harm to his party and his own standing.
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