New policy mood data from Jim Stimson

UNC's Jim Stimson just updated his estimate of policy mood -- a measure of public demand for more government across a range of issues that I frequently highlight here. Here's a graph showing his current estimates of yearly mood for 1952-2008 where higher values indicate greater liberalism:

The new data indicate that demand for more government in 2008 was at its highest level since 1992 (though not as high as the postwar peaks in the 1958-1968 period). With that said, however, it's important to note that demand for government tends to move in the opposite direction of the party in power -- increasing during the Eisenhower years, declining after the Great Society, increasing during the Reagan-Bush 41 period, declining when Bill Clinton took office, and then increasing during the Bush 43 years. Along the same lines, we should expect demand for government to decline substantially over the next few years given that Democrats control both Congress and the White House. Pundits are writing off the GOP much too quickly.

(Note: See Stimson's books Public Opinion In America, The Macro Polity [with Erikson and Mackuen], and Tides of Consent for much more on policy mood.)