New Pew poll: huge partisan gap on safety net, environment, unions, EEO, immigration, regulation
and many others.
Similarly, although members of both parties express skepticism about how well government regulation of business works, 80% of Democrats say that a “free market economy needs regulation to serve the public interest.” Republicans are evenly divided on that question. Tea Party Republicans by a 2-1 majority reject the idea that regulation is needed.
About three-quarters of Democrats, for example, say that the government has a “responsibility to take care of people who can’t take care of themselves.” Among Republicans 54% reject that idea, and only 40% agree. That question illustrates the strong conservative shift within the Republican party. In the final years of the Reagan administration, 62% of Republicans agreed on the need for a safety net.
When Pew first began its surveys, Americans’ views about the environment showed no significant partisan divide – nearly 90% of Democrats, independents and Republicans agreed on a need for “stricter laws and regulations to protect the environment.” Today, after several decades of increasing environmental regulation, a huge, 46 point partisan gap exists on that question. Democrats’ views on the need for more regulation have remained steady, and independents’ have shifted a relatively small amount. Republican support further environmental regulation has plummeted: 47% now say yes.
Views on immigration and immigrants show a similar pattern. A decade ago, about half the adherents of both parties said that immigrants “threaten traditional American customs and values.” Today, 60% of Republicans express that views, but among Democrats, the number has dropped to 40%.
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-pew-partisan-divide-poll-20120604,0,3088351.story
There is lots more at the link. Just when you think that republican politicians are significantly crazier than their base, you see a poll like this which shows how far their base has shifted to the right into crazyland.
The survey results themselves are at http://www.people-press.org/2012/06/04/partisan-polarization-surges-in-bush-obama-years/ .
= new reply since forum marked as read
Perhaps because the gap is shrinking faster than Squaw Valley ski lift sales in July? 
the charge against NAFTA and the WTO with Democrats and independents catching up with them.
They didn't cover that in this poll. The only things close to it were with "should we concentrate more on problems at home" and with immigration.
Between 2007 and 2009, the percentage of Republicans favoring more of domestic focus increased 12 points (from 67% to 79%). In the current survey it has risen to 86%, as high as it has ever been in a political values survey.
By contrast, the percentage of Democrats saying the U.S. should focus more on problems at home fell between 2007 and 2009, from 87% to 79% and has remained about the same since then (80%). The current survey marks the first time that a higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats says that the nation should focus less on problems abroad and more on problems at home.
Much of the change in views about immigration policy has occurred among Democrats and independents. About six-in-ten Democrats (58%) favor greater restrictions on immigration, compared with 84% of Republicans – largely unchanged in recent years. And three years ago, 77% of independents agreed that greater restrictions on people coming to live in this country were needed. That is down to 69% today.
When these questions were first asked twenty years ago, there was virtually no difference between the views of Republicans (78% agree), Democrats (74%) and independents (75%).
I doubt that Pew is avoiding polling about globalisation because they are afraid that Democrats have finally joined republicans and independents in opposing trade agreements like NAFTA and the WTO. Pew polls on so many issues that they must have to decide what to include and what to exclude each time.
I will be as interested as you to see what their numbers show the next time they poll on this.
I think the increasing tendency of republicans to look inward and animosity towards immigrants shows that they are continuing to trend against all things international including trade, but we'll see when the next poll is released.
"all things international" so we may have to give them so credit for consistency. 
