Matt Yglesias <http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2010/02/how-popular-is-the-t\ ea-party-movement.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign\ =Feed%3A+matthewyglesias+%28Matthew+Yglesias%29> puts yesterday's poll which showed <http://politicalwire.com/archives/2010/02/08/tea_party_finds_support_in\ _iowa.html> 33% of Iowans support the "tea party" movement into context, noting that "38% of Americans have a favorable view of Cuba and 36% are favorably disposed toward socialism, but I don't see anyone writing newspaper articles about how a populist wave of socialism is sweeping the country."
"The number of Iowans who like the tea party movement is smaller than the number of Americans who want marijuana legalized or the number of Americans who believe the government has had secret contact with extra-terrestrials." http://politicalwire.com/archives/2010/02/09/the_tea_party_in_context.ht\ ml#ixzz0f4yFpXFE <http://politicalwire.com/archives/2010/02/09/the_tea_party_in_context.h\ tml#ixzz0f4yFpXFE> See also: Poll: Tea Party candidates come in last USA TODAY - Days after Sarah Palin headlined the nation's first Tea Party convention, a Rasmussen Reports poll released today shows that a generic "Tea Party candidate" would come in third in a theoretical three-way congressional contest. The poll found that 36% of voters would support a Democratic candidate on a generic ballot, 25% would back the Republican and 17% would go for the Tea Party pick. Twenty-three percent of respondents are undecided. In early December, the same poll showed the Tea Party in second place and the GOP in third. Unchanged between the polls, according to Rasmussen, is that 41% of voters have a favorable view of the conservative movement. The poll of 1,000 likely voters was taken Feb. 7-8, just after the national Tea Party convention in Nashville. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. http://snipurl.com/ubjg2 [content_usatoday_com]
