Best News You’ll See All Week: America Is Moving Dramatically To The Left

For the first time, social conservatives no longer outnumber social liberals.

For the first time since Gallup started asking the question, the number of Americans who identify as socially liberal is the same as those who identify as socially conservative. In a highly overlooked poll released late last week, Gallup found 31 percent of Americans say they are liberal or very liberal, and 31 percent of Americans say they are conservative or very conservative on social issues.

Today, the highest number ever of Democrats say they are liberals, and the lowest number ever of Republicans say they are conservative.

“Americans’ growing social liberalism is evident not only in how they describe their views on social issues but also in changes in specific attitudes, such as increased support for same-sex marriage and legalizing marijuana,” Gallup reports. “These longer-term trends may be attributable to changing attitudes among Americans of all ages, but they also may be a result of population changes, with younger, more liberal Americans entering adulthood while older, more conservative adults pass on.”

And more good news.

“The 2016 presidential election will thus be contested in a more socially liberal electorate — and a less economically conservative one — than was true of prior elections.”

 

Image by Elvert Barnes via Flickr and a CC license