LF: 56% View Feds As Threat to Individual Rights (Rasmussen Poll)

Title: 56% View Feds As Threat to Individual Rights (Rasmussen Poll)
Source: Rasmussen Reports
URL Source: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/pub ... as_threat_to_individual_rights
Published: Jun 30, 2013
Author: Scott Rasmussen
Post Date: 2013-06-30 01:25:35 by Hondo68
Keywords: None
Views: 853
Comments: 1

The United States was founded on a belief that governments are created to protect certain unalienable rights. Today, however, more voters than ever view the federal government as a threat to those rights.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 56% of Likely U.S. Voters now consider the federal government a threat to individual rights rather than a protector of those rights. That’s up 10 points from 46% in December.

While 54% of liberal voters consider the feds to be a protector of individual rights, 78% of conservatives and 49% of moderates see the government as a threat.

Overall, only 30% believe the feds today are a protector of individual rights. Fourteen percent (14%) are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on June 2-3, 2013 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

Democrats continue to view the federal government much more favorably than other voters do. While 76% of Republicans and 61% of voters not affiliated with either major party regard the government as a threat to individual rights, a plurality (47%) of voters in President Obama’s party consider it a protector of those rights instead.

In recent years, roughly half of all voters have described the federal government as a threat to their rights.

Forty-three percent (43%) believe the Justice Department secretly obtaining phone records from Associated Press reporters and Fox News’ James Rosen was primarily an attempt to intimidate the media. Thirty-four percent (34%) believe the department’s actions were primarily out of concern for national security.

Fifty-one percent (51%) of black voters consider the federal government a protector of individual rights. Sixty-one percent (61%) of whites and 58% of other minority voters view the government as a threat to those rights.

Sixty-eight percent (68%) of the Political Class think the federal government is a protector of rights. Seventy-one percent (71%) of Mainstream voters disagree.

Rasmussen Reports is a media company specializing in the collection, publication and distribution of public opinion information.

We conduct public opinion polls on a variety of topics to inform our audience on events in the news and other topics of interest. To ensure editorial control and independence, we pay for the polls ourselves and generate revenue through the sale of subscriptions, sponsorships, and advertising. Nightly polling on politics, business and lifestyle topics provides the content to update the Rasmussen Reports web site many times each day. If it's in the news, it's in our polls. Additionally, the data drives a daily update newsletter, the Rasmussen Report on radio and other media outlets.

Some information, including the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll and commentaries are available for free to the general public. Subscriptions are available for $3.95 a month or 34.95 a year that provide subscribers with exclusive access to more than 20 stories per week on Election 2012, consumer confidence, and issues that affect us all. For those who are really into the numbers, Platinum Members can review demographic crosstabs and a full history of our data.

Scott Rasmussen, president of Rasmussen Reports, has been an independent pollster for more than a decade. To learn more about our methodology, click here.

The voters know that their elected officials are tyrannical slavemasters, but will they leave the D&R plantation?

I figured it would be more like 91%, especially when it comes to their "rights" of getting free schitt... Section 8 Housing, Food Stamps, Welfare... etc... etc... etc...