State of the electorate.(Insider Report)

Evenly Divided and Increasingly Polarized, a study recently published by the liberal Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, is intended to assess "the public's political values" in this presidential election year. Based on 80,000 interviews conducted over a three-year period, the report "shows that the electorate that split 50-50 in the last presidential election is now evenly divided in partisan affiliation." While the Republican Party has made substantial gains, however, its prospects for continued dominance "are imperiled by rising discontent with national conditions and unease with the situation in Iraq."

In politics, declared Soviet ruler Vladimir Lenin, the central question is kto kogo--"Who does what to whom?" Partisan politics often partakes of this sensibility: Those out of power tend to be more suspicious of government than those momentarily in control of it. This tendency is reflected in the Pew study, which found: "The widespread hostility Republicans felt toward the federal government has dissipated now that their part controls all of the levers of power in Washington.... ...