While we're definitely not planning on using the new delivery service by Burger King that's being tested in the D.C. metro area, like most people, we're a bit sapped of energy after hard work. This year is an election year, and we're running harder than ever, so tired has almost become a normal state of mind for us.
That said, as we're looking at how the 2012 political landscape is beginning to shape up, one side of the standard political divide seems not only a bit more lacking in energy, but frankly disheartened. Both poll numbers and political action across the country are beginning to make it clear which side of the political ledger may be more ramped up this year - and it may not be who you expect.
Take the latest GOP debate on Monday in South Carolina.
The crowd at the event was obviously riled up, and some of the moments they cheered and jeered were actually pretty inappropriate. Yet it was clear that those people attending the debate were conservative, leaning extremist, and they were fired up - especially on the idea of cutting taxes.
Yet, new data from the Pew Research Center says the majority of Americans think they currently pay the right amount of taxes, and that a near majority think the total tax revenues the federal government are taking in are LESS than they should be. In fact, another recent study also made clear that Americans see significant and rising inequality between rich and poor - including majorities of persons in all three major political designations (Republicans, Democrats, and Independents). In short, Americans know the government needs more tax dollars - and they think it's high time the rich actually pay at least as much as the rest of us.
Looking at political actions, the enthusiasm seems to point even more strongly to a political left that's far more fired up and ready to go than their counterparts on the right.
Yesterday, in Wisconsin, Democrats gathered more than one million signatures to recall extremist Republican Governor Scott Walker. That number is almost double what was necessary to recall tthe governor, and represents nearly a quarter of all the votes cast in Wisconsin in 2010. Democrats got all those signatures in just sixty days, in one of the most difficult states in the nation to collect signatures.
Left-leaning Wisconsinites weren't the only ones cheering their own efforts on Tuesday.
Just next door in Michigan, a group collecting signatures to repeal the anti-democratic and highly draconian "Emergency Manager" law only needs to collect 161,000 signatures - and they say they already have nearly 200,000. They're temporarily delaying turning in their paperwork, however. They just want to make sure the number of signatures they have is so overwhelming, like in Wisconsin, that there will be NO question as to the will of the people.
This says nothing regarding the embarrassingly low Republican voter turnout numbers in both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primaries, along with a GOP nomination process that is all but over (even though the 24-hour news media continues valiantly stringing the process along).
All that, and in the first official poll of the 2012 season, taken by Public Policy Polling, President Obama is already posting a five-point lead on Mitt Romney, before the President has even begun seriously campaigning. Meanwhile, the President's re-election committee - the group with far and away the most money so far of ANY campaign in 2012 - is just BEGINNING to secure its media buys.
We're with most of you - certain that this year, many of the most important elections at all levels will be fought by impassioned groups on many sides of different issues.
Even so, there is an increasing amount of evidence that no matter how hard Republicans and sane conservatives cheer this year, their hearts just may not be in it to win it.
