UPDATE: I’ve looked at more numbers. Consider this: the percentage of people who think 9/11 was an inside job is equal to the percentage of people who think the Ground Zero mosque is a good idea.—–

There is no great split in the United States of America on the issue of the Ground Zero Mosque. Sixty-eight percent of Americans oppose it.In fact, using the same metric — CNN Opinion Research polling of 1,000 Americans — more American have doubts about Barack Obama’s birth story than support the mosque.Consider that for a minute. Delving into the data, 27% of Americans believe Barack Obama was probably not born in the United States and 29% support building the Ground Zero mosque. If we can call the former group “fringe,” surely we can call the latter group fringe as well.Add to the 27% who think Obama was not born in the United States the 29% who think he was born in the United States, but are not definitely sure and more American have doubts about Barack Obama’s birth story than support the mosque.Therein lies the great problem for the Democrats and why Barack Obama has locked in a Democratic disaster come November. In essence, the Democrats have lost the ability to connect with normal people at a moral level. The Democrats’ inability to address the question of “should the mosque be built” after answering the question of “could the mosque be built” is a cultural turning point for independents. Just as normal people ran screaming from the “San Francisco Democrats” 26 years ago, they will now reject the second coming of the San Francisco Democrats.Democrats were already looking at losses in November. Historically, the party in charge of the White House loses votes in the midterm elections. The odds were already against the Democrats.With high and stagnant unemployment, the economy more likely than not back on the downturn, unstable foreign policy, things heating up in the Middle East, and a general feeling of angst and outrage over the elitist attitude of Washington, the Democrats were going to get a drubbing anyway.But there has been for a while a silver lining for the Democrats. Generic Republicans still are more unpopular than generic Democrats in pretty much all the polling. Barack Obama siding with the Ground Zero mosque will change that dynamic and it will crush any Democrat hope of mitigating losses in November.The 29% of Americans who Barack Obama has decided to line up with are convinced that the 68% who oppose the mosque are prejudiced bigots who hate all muslims. Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a man whose first reaction to the Time Square bombing plot was to blame people upset about Obamacare passing, has ceded being the face of that fringe to Barack Obama.Seventy percent of independents oppose the Ground Zero mosque. The Democrats are screaming at the top of their lungs that we should all be talking about the economy because they know they are getting crushed on the mosque issue with independents. Think about that — the Democrats would rather get beaten up over the economy than over the mosque.The reason is simple. Barack Obama’s support of the 29% fringe who support the mosque destroys the silver lining in all the polling. For the longest time independents have still liked Democrats more than Republicans because they thought culturally the Democrats were still on their side.Today they see that is not the case. The Democrat elites that independent voters have loathed for forcing Obamacare, pushing cap and trade, etc. are now proclaiming as bigots the 70% of independents who oppose the mosque. Never mind that an equal percentage also believe the organizers of the mosque have the constitutional right to build the mosque. This overwhelming majority are still bigots to the Democrats and elite opinion leaders. That will not stand as normal people — the ones who vote out of civic responsibility but turn their noses up to the day in and day out political fight will fight this slander.Barack Obama has now locked in a Democrat disaster in November because in lining up with the fringe who support the mosque, he, as leader of the Democratic Party, is declaring his party’s values are those of the elite, not normal Americans.