Americans trust your average Tea Partier more than they do Nancy Pelosi and her congressional cohorts. Hopefully, she won’t shed too many tears over that fact.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 52% of U.S. voters believe the average member of the Tea Party movement has a better understanding of the issues facing America today than the average member of Congress. Only 30% believe that those in Congress have a better understanding of the key issues facing the nation.
When it comes to those issues, 47% think that their own political views are closer to those of the average Tea Party member than to the views of the average member of Congress. On this point, 26% feel closer to Congress.
Finally, 46% of voters say that the average Tea Party member is more ethical than the average member of Congress. Twenty-seven percent (27%) say that the average member of Congress is more ethical.
Granted, it’s easy to have a higher approval rating than Congress (which usually hovers in the single digits, or about what my IRA has earned since Obama took office). Even so, it’s clear that voters trust the regular Joes in the street far more than the pols in Congress.