Poll: 1 in 10 say they're Tea Party activists

source

Washington (CNN) -- Ten percent of Americans say they have actively supported the Tea Party movement, and those Tea Party activists are older, better educated and more religious than the general public, according to a new national poll.

Very interesting especially considering my other thread about Oklahoma's Tea Party.

While the sample rate is not huge, it does address some interesting points on religion and conservative versus liberal leanings in the country at the present time. Furthermore, it gives a strong indication of how policies of the current administration are being received. But if anyone had asked me if I thought that 10% of the population had attended or donated money to a Tea Party function, I would have said no way.

Of the Tea Party activists questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Wednesday morning, seven of 10 call themselves conservatives.

Not exactly an even sampling. 70% conservatives. I wonder why they didn't do a 50/50 poll of conservatives and liberals.

Those who are familiar with the movement are divided right down the middle -- 27 percent support the Tea Party movement, and 27 percent oppose it.

If polls meant anything, this one would, I'm afraid, be skewed by the sampling.

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic

The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation national poll was conducted April 9-11, with 1,008 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

1008 by telephone somewhat explains a few things on the skewed chart. Also consider the age and gender sampling, most middle aged to older males are conservative. Remember that the 50+ crowd would put them squarely with the hippies of the 60's. That recanted their pasts and voted Reagan.

While free love was pretty liberal. Most of them changed as they grew older and saw things from different perspectives. And wasn't there a post earlier this year (or late last year) about many Democrats changing their status to Republican in advance of the fall elections?

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
Not exactly an even sampling. 70% conservatives. I wonder why they didn't do a 50/50 poll of conservatives and liberals.

Right from the cuff I'd say that's pretty indicative of an overall nationwide shift towards fiscal conservatism by the nation as a whole over the past 2 years. The majority of American voters are fed up with ballooning national debt, BH. If it had been a partisan question ala "Do you most closely identify yourself as Republican or Democrat" and 70% said "Republican," I'd agree with you entirely. Truth of the matter is, the GOP has exactly demonstrated that they are conservatives of late and the Democrats are light years away...

Conservative and liberal are NOT political parties nor are they a partisan issue. They are core political values. Furthermore, virtually every poll taken of late as shown a very similar 70%-ish portion of the voter base which now consider themselves more conservative than liberal.