As a Texas resident, I was halfway surprised to see that one of the 3 states where El Supreme still enjoys 50%+ support wasn't this big red state (Idaho, Utah, and Wyoming are the strongholds, it seems). "Halfway surprised" because my own unscientific and unapologetically anecdotal feel here "on the streets" in Dallas is that he's roundly hated, though not for consistently admirable reasons. Some people hate the Iraq War (frustratingly, generally the same folks who gave me grief for being against it back in March 2003), the Katrina response, and all that -- but quite a few dislike Bush from the right. He's too soft on immigration, he spends too much on government programs, gave money to Africa for AIDS, that sort of thing. Or it's a bizarre, inconsistent agglomeration of both left-ish and right-ish criticism, as if the disaffected folks aren't quite sure what angle to take on the man from Crawford. They just know they don't like him, on some sort of gut level. And there's
more nerve endings in your gut than in your brain.
-B.
Carl Remick wrote: [I suppose anyone able to believe in Mormonism is capable of believing in anything ... even George W. Bush. Still, the free-floating credulousness of Utah residents is awesome.]
June 4, 2006
In a Solidly Conservative State, a Loyal Core of Support for Bush
By TIMOTHY EGAN
PROVO, Utah — Here in what may be the reddest city in the reddest of states, where Democrats sometimes gather like lost souls at the one Starbucks, most people are standing by President Bush.