GOP Messaging: Mission Fail

Peter Brown of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute writes about their new poll, which indicates that there is no appetite for the Republican message these days:

Consider this: Four out of five voters think politicians in Washington, D.C., should limit the pay of executives at companies that get federal bailout money. Three in 10 voters embrace the historically un-American notion that government should control the pay for executives of firms that don’t get any cash from Uncle Sam — the kind of trust in government over the private sector that only a few years ago would have seemed laughable. The sentiment may be unprecedented, but so too is the federal assistance to private industries to keep them in business.

Republicans twisted themselves into pretzels yesterday opposing compensation limits to bank executives, despite the fact that 81% of Americans support it. You could see their relief when Melissa Bean and the New Democrat Coalition offered up an amendment to gut the bill -- 165 of them flocked to the floor to join with 63 corporatist Democrats to pass it.

Says Brown: