New polling released this week by the Pew Research Center reports that large numbers of Americans both distrust their government and theoretically want to empower their government to do more, believing that the proper role of government is to protect people from themselves.
"Just 20% say they trust the government in Washington to do the right thing just about always or most of the time," reports Pew, noting that this finding has held steady over time, "chang[ing] very little since former President George W. Bush's second term in office." Only 8 percent of survey respondents describe the federal government as "responsive to the needs of ordinary Americans."
