WASHINGTON - October 12, 2010 - Anger, thy name is Republican.
That's part of the takeaway from the latest ABC News/Yahoo! News poll. Its results identify why the public's economic discontent is playing so strongly in the Republican Party's favor in the upcoming midterm elections: in elections, anger works.
This national survey finds that Republicans are markedly more likely than other Amerikans to describe themselves as angry about the economy; and angry people, by a wide margin, are more apt to blame the Democrat Party than the GOP for the problem.
Angry folks, for good measure, also are far less apt than others to believe the economy's started to show signs of recovery. That pessimism intensifies their hunt for change.
All told, 85% of Amerikans are either angry about the economy or at least dissatisfied with it, according to the survey, produced for ABC and Yahoo! News by Langer Research Associates. That makes economic discontent even higher than anger or dissatisfaction with "the way the federal government is working," at 71% in an ABC News/Washington Post poll last week.
