Republicans continue to shed support

From New Hampshire:

Two local legislators have resigned their leadership positions in the House.

Six-term State Rep. and House Deputy Majority Leader Matt Quandt, R-Exeter, and House Whip Tim Copeland, R-Stratham, gave their resignations in opposition to what they called attacks against public employees...

"I just couldn't do it anymore. Delivering their message goes against my grain, so I did the right thing and resigned," he said. "What they're doing, going after the public employees and pensions just isn't right."

Harold Meyerson looks at the big picture.

For even as Republicans have imperiled themselves on the national level, they also seem to be committing political hara-kiri in one statehouse after the next. Republican governors who took office this year or last — the ones as determined as Ryan to do a wholesale rewrite of America’s social contract — have approval ratings that we normally associate with strains of bacteria. What’s more, they’re tanking in many of the swing states that will be key in next year’s presidential election...

Admittedly, it’s a tough time to be a governor, in an economy in which being a governor means having to whack some popular programs. But the Democratic governors of the nation’s two biggest blue states — California’s Jerry Brown and New York’s Andrew Cuomo — both have approval ratings higher than their disapprovals.

The 2010 election brought my home state of Minnesota a Republican legislature and a Democratic Governor (Mark Dayton). At this point, Dayton is standing firm in stopping the kind of havoc other states are experiencing.

After laying waste to the GOP's fiscal agenda by vetoing the entire budget, DFL Gov. Mark Dayton followed up by punching a hole in their social agenda.

On Wednesday, Dayton vetoed restrictions on abortion and symbolically vetoed a move to put a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage on the 2012 ballot.

At this point, we're facing a government shut-down on July 1st, but Gov. Dayton is holding tight to his promise to solve the budget problems in a balanced way that includes an increase in taxes on the top 2%. Polling shows that the people of the state are with him.

Yesterday, Public Policy Polling released their latest survey which found that 51 percent of Minnesotans approve of the work Governor Dayton has done so far...