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WHY DO LIBERALS HEART MCCAIN? That more liberals are showing their support for John McCain publicly may be frustrating, but should also come as no surprise -- liberals have been for some time his single strongest group of supporters. This was well-documented by the Pew Research Center report Beyond Red and Blue in May 2005. The Pew Center found that liberals -- defined as people who were "the most opposed to an assertive foreign policy, the most secular, and take the most liberal views on social issues such as homosexuality, abortion, and censorship....strongly pro-environment and pro-immigration" -- were twice as supportive of McCain as any GOP sub-group:
Sen. John McCain is extraordinarily popular among Liberals, drawing a positive rating among this group that is actually a bit higher than among Republicans generally (66% vs. 61%). However, his favorability ratings among GOP typology groups are significantly lower than Giuliani's or those of the president and other administration officials....McCain, despite being anti-choice, hawkish, and a supporter of the Patriot Act, was, according to the survey, the liberal fantasy of what a Republican candidate should look like. Why this should be so is another question entirely, though it certainly seems to have something to do with the power of emotional appeals in politics and McCain's capacity for agenda setting, since it appears to have little to do with his stands on the issues.John McCain's extensive popularity among Liberals is evident in early opinions about the 2008 presidential race. Overall, about a third of the public (32%) say they would like to see McCain nominated as the GOP candidate, slightly more than the number who favor Giuliani (27%). But much of McCain's strength comes from the Liberal group. Fully 55% of Liberals say they most want to see McCain win the GOP nomination; that is more than double the percentage in any GOP group that wants McCain to capture the nomination.
--Garance Franke-Ruta
