DR has commented a number of times recently on how disaffected independent voters seem to be with Bush and his policies. The breakouts provided by The Los Angeles Times from their most recent poll provide a window on another electoral group that’s disaffected—really disaffected—with Bush and his policies. This one’s a moose of a group, moderate voters, who constituted 50 percent of the voters in the 2000 election.

Start with the classic right direction/wrong track question: the public thinks, by 50 percent to 40 percent, that we’re on the wrong track. Pretty negative in and of itself, but moderates think we’re on the wrong track by double the margin: 55 percent to 36 percent.

Move on to the question of whether Bush “understands the problems of people like you”. The public thinks he doesn’t by 51 percent to 42 percent—bad enough, but moderates are a stinging 58 percent to 34 percent against Bush on the question. Ouch.

Then check out these data on Iraq. The public disapproves of Bush’s handling on Iraq by 51 percent to 45 percent, while moderates disapprove by 56 percent to 38 percent, three times the margin. The public--just barely--says “the situation in Iraq was worth going to war about” by 48 percent to 43 percent (by comparison, 77 percent in April said they supported the decision to go to war). Moderates however are just the reverse, saying Iraq wasn’t worth going to war over by 50 percent to 45 percent.

And how about these figures: by 59 percent to 31 percent the public now says the outcome of the Iraq war has not been worth the cost in US military lives. And moderates agree with this sentiment by an amazing 73 percent to 17 percent, a 56 point margin. Similarly, by 57 percent to 35 percent the public believes the outcome of the Iraq war hasn’t been worth the financial costs to the US; moderates agree by a 69 percent to 25 percent margin.

Turning to the economy where the US is allegedly turning the corner, these data show that Bush has a long way to go before his performance is going to win the endorsement of moderate voters. By 20 points (56 percent to 36 percent), these voters still disapprove of his handling of the economy. By 19 points, (59 percent to 40 percent), they still think the economy is doing badly.

And when it comes to whether they voters think the country or they themselves are better off than when Bush came into office, these voters are really negative. By a stunning 64 percent to 10 percent, they say the country is financially worse off, not better off, than when Bush took office. And by 32 percent to 12 percent, they say they themselves are financially worse off, not better off, than they were three years ago (the rest say their situation hasn’t changed much).

But perhaps they’re grateful to Bush because his policies have made a bad situation better than it otherwise would have been? Moderates overwhelmingly reject this particularly ludicrous GOP talking point: 78 percent say that Bush’s economic policies have either made the country’s economy weaker (48 percent) or had no effect (30 percent). Just 13 percent believe his policies have actually made the economy stronger.

Perhaps it should come as no surprise then that moderate voters appear quite willing to toss Bush out of office in 2004. When registered voters were asked whether Bush deserves to be re-elected or not, a narrow plurality—46 percent to 42 percent—said he did not. But moderate voters were quite a bit more definite: by a whopping 25 point margin—55 percent to 30 percent—they don’t think Bush deserves to be re-elected.

Results were similar when voters were asked specifically whether they would vote for Bush in 2004 or the Democrat running against him. Registered voters favored the Democrat by modest 4 point margin, but moderates favored the Democrat by a healthy 17 points.

Let’s put these results in context. In 2000, Gore carried moderate voters by 8 points and just barely won the popular vote. This means that, if the Democrats carry moderate voters by a wider margin in 2004, as they are now with ease, then they are quite likely to also win the popular vote by a solid margin. And that is likely to translate into a margin in the electoral college that even the Supreme Court can’t undo.

So DR says: watch those moderates. They’re potentially Bush’s bane and the Democrats’ salvation. And that’s more than moderately encouraging news.