CNBC & Rasmussen Polls: Americans Favor Return to the Gold Standard
In this interview, Ron Paul never actually implies that he has been appeased by the GOP, as the title suggests, but he does point towards a poll he saw on television in which it is demonstrated that a majority of Americans favor a return to the gold standard or something similar. This separate poll at CNBC.com demonstrates similar, although fewer than 20,000 individuals have taken it, and their interest in gold in the first place is likely what led them to it.
Nonetheless, it has been well known that the gold standard is popular in parts of the US mainstream. Ron Paul cited Rasmussen polls in January 2012 demonstrating that, with voters, gold is popular.
Scott Rasmussen, in October, polled 1,000 voters on gold and found it popular, especially if characterized as a way to constrain big government and big banks.
In November, American Principles in Action commissioned the Polling Company to drill deeper into the implications for the early contests in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.
The Polling Company found that advocating the gold standard would move votes where they most matter. The gold standard is highly popular with tea party voters, movement conservatives and others disproportionately likely to attend the Iowa caucuses or vote in the New Hampshire and South Carolina primaries.
Restoring the gold standard — the classic American monetary policy destroyed by Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon — turns out to be a potential “sleeper issue,” and an under-exploited one. It could tip the scales of this race.
In the poll, 57% of those surveyed favor a return to the gold standard, with just 17% unfavorable to the idea.
According to Rasmussen, The majority of voters across nearly all demographic groups favor the gold standard if it would dramatically reduce the power of central bankers and political leaders over the economy.
This evidence suggests further that there could be strong political motives behind the Romney and Ryan campaign taking up the banner of a return to gold standard so as to win over the blowback from loose monetary policy and the strong progressiveness of Barack Obama’s rhetoric.
