Ask and ye shall receive

As a follow-up to my post from last week regarding polling on the question of whether the GOP is purposely sabotaging economic recovery in order to defeat President Obama next year, I thought I’d bring my dear readers’ attentions to the results of two new polls released today that cover similar territory.  I had mentioned that the Suffolk University poll from last week was just crying out for additional data to help discern a trend or not, and it appears we have some further data to work with now.

First off, a Washington Post/ABC News poll of 1,004 adults, with a 3.5% margin of error asked the following question:

Which of the following statements comes closest to your point of view? Statement A: (President Obama is making a good faith effort to deal with the country's economic problems, but the Republicans in Congress are playing politics by blocking his proposals and programs.) Or Statement B: (President Obama has not provided leadership on the economy, and he is just blaming the Republicans in Congress as an excuse for not doing his job.)

Compare the wording to that of last week’s Suffolk University poll:

Do you think the Republicans are intentionally stalling efforts to jumpstart the economy to insure that Barack Obama is not reelected?

The WaPo/ABC poll is not as clear with respondents about the political intent of any perceived economic sabotage on the GOP’s part – referring to “playing politics” rather than “to insure that Barack Obama is not reelected” – but the underlying message is essentially the same: do you think the GOP is purposely making the economy worse for political purposes?  The results:

Which of the following statements comes closest to your point of view? Statement A: (President Obama is making a good faith effort to deal with the country's economic problems, but the Republicans in Congress are playing politics by blocking his proposals and programs.) Or Statement B: (President Obama has not provided leadership on the economy, and he is just blaming the Republicans in Congress as an excuse for not doing his job.)

Obama making a good effort: 50
Obama has not provided leadership: 44
Both (vol.): 2
Neither (vol.): 2
No opinion: 1

And once again, the results of the Suffolk poll:

Do you think the Republicans are intentionally stalling efforts to jumpstart the economy to insure that Barack Obama is not reelected?

Yes 49
No 39
Undecided 12

Okay then!  Seems like there could be something more to this meme now.  Greg Sargent pulls out the internals of the WaPo poll, providing more points of interest:

The toplines: Americans agree with the first statement over the second one, 50-44. According to numbers sent my way by the Post polling team, this is more pronounced among moderates and independents:

* Independents favor statement one over statement two by 54-40.

* Moderates favor statement one over statement two by 57-37.

The overall number is lower, at 50 percent, because a hilariously meager nine percent of Republicans believe this to be the case.

Who likes to have their side accused of “playing politics” with anything?  It just sounds offensive when we’re talking about real peoples’ lives and the overall economy, no wonder only 9% of Republicans agree with statement #1.

Our third poll of the day, which Talking Points Memo’s Brian Beutler argues constitutes a “trend,” (I would agree) is one commissioned by the liberal blog DailyKos:

Also on Monday, liberal blogger Markos Moulitsas publicized the top lines of a PPP poll he commissioned, which closely mimic the the Post/ABC survey: “50% think GOP intentionally stalling economy, incl 51% of Indies, & 15% of GOPers. Details Tuesday.”

So here we have three polls showing broadly similar results to similarly-worded questions (although the exact wording of the DailyKos poll will be out tomorrow) and which also show that a majority of independents ascribe to some version of the notion that the GOP is deliberately sabotaging the economy.  As we are all surely aware now, the vast and growing “middle” of the electorate is where the true electoral battleground lies for 2012 (and virtually every modern election) so it would appear that President Obama has the upper hand with this crucial slice of the populace, no?  Steve Benen, echoing Greg Sargent, notes the inherent danger of the polls’ findings for the President:

Though in theory, it should, this won’t necessarily give President Obama a boost. The degree of national cynicism is so intense, many Americans may simply assume Republicans are sabotaging the national economy, but take their frustrations out on the president anyway. As Greg noted, “The number who see Obama as a strong leader is now upside down (48-51), suggesting yet again that even if Americans understand that Republicans are deliberately blocking Obama’s policies, they may conclude that his failure to get around them just shows he’s weak or ineffectual.”

Voters’ understanding of the political process is severely limited, and many Americans likely fail to appreciate the role Congress must play in policymaking. There are no doubt plenty of voters thinking, “Sure, Republicans are sabotaging the economy, but why can’t Obama just go around them?” unaware of the fact that, on a grand scale, this isn’t an option. (emphasis added)

Indeed, President Obama’s failure to “get around” Congress is the true reason why he’s embarked on his “jobs tour” the past couple months – taking his message directly to the people of America, urging them to contact their Congressmember and tell them to act on jobs and the economy.  In a broad sense, it appears the efforts are paying off, according to Josh Marshall.  Furthermore, the amount of braying from the GOP about “class warfare” from the President has increased proportionally as his jobs message has caught on.  Witness Rep. Eric Cantor’s aborted speech about “income inequality” (note: he canceled the speech when it was revealed that Occupy protesters planned to respond to him by exercising their free speech rights) and Rep. Paul Ryan’s speech to the conservative Heritage Foundation largely predicated on the notion that America needs to preserve its heritage of economic mobility through surprise! not raising taxes on the wealthiest among us.  (Note: he’s wrong about our economic mobility rates compared to other countries.) 

So where does all of this data leave us now?  Well it would seem that President Obama needs to work closely with the Democrats in Congress to present a focused message (not easy with Democrats, ever) regarding the GOP’s obstructionism.  Pushing the “sabotage” message, in concert with more polling data showing similar results to those presented here, will force the media to cover the sabotage meme more widely and thus put the Republicans on defense on job creation – exactly the situation they hope not to find themselves in heading into a still-very-unsettled GOP presidential primary season and an election year.  President Obama’s rather limited moves last week on student loan reform, homeowner relief and jobs proposals for veterans might represent a good-faith show of effort for those skeptical independents and moderates doubting his leadership, and they could marginally influence his standing with those key constituencies.  But overall, those moves show the Presidency’s economic weakness vis-à-vis Congress, and the relative ineffectiveness of the Executive branch’s sprawling bureaucracy to help improve peoples’ lives in a truly meaningful way.  Coordinated actions between the Executive and Legislative branches are what is needed, but until Obama and the Democrats can find leverage points to force the Congressional GOP’s hands on job creating legislation, it is unlikely the President will be able to do much more than chip away at the margins of the economic problems facing this country, winning message or not.

Is the GOP purposely sabotaging economic recovery for political gain?

What do you think?

A Suffolk University poll was released today that polled registered voters in Florida and asked a key question:

Do you think the Republicans are intentionally stalling efforts to jumpstart the economy to insure that Barack Obama is not reelected?

Now, I have been telling many of my friends and relatives (much to their collective chagrin, I’m sure) that the political and economic situation in the country – continued high unemployment, political stalemate in Congress, a disillusioned citizenry – means that, politically, the Republicans would have the most to gain electorally if the economy remains stagnant.  As Bill Clinton’s pollster James Carville famously quipped in 1992, “it’s the economy, stupid.”  Conventional political wisdom (and a fair amount of political science research) points to the notion that, electorally, the president generally bears the most responsibility for the state of the economy in voters’ eyes, rightfully deserved or not. 

The corollary to this situation we face today is that, in a cynical political calculus, the Republicans can increase their chances of taking the White House in 2012 if they actively work against economic recovery.  It sounds sinister to even suggest such a thing, doesn’t it?  Well, what do you think the popular view of the situation is among Florida voters?

Do you think the Republicans are intentionally stalling efforts to jumpstart the economy to insure that Barack Obama is not reelected?

Yes 49

No 39

Undecided 12

49%…that’s something, ain’t it?  Meanwhile, the partisan split on the polling is quite fascinating as well:

As expected, most registered Democrats (70 percent) agreed that Republicans are intentionally hindering the economy and hurting Obama, but independents (52 percent) and even some Republicans (24 percent) also agreed. (emphasis added)

Independents are often regarded as the lily-white souls who just can’t bear partisan conflict in politics, so the fact that 52% are siding with Obama on this question might reflect a majority view among that crucial demographic that the obstruction is coming from only one party.  The 24% of Republicans who agree with the question could reflect a small group of Republican voters who are willing to acknowledge such scorched-earth tactics from the GOP, and they may even approve of such tactics in order to defeat President Obama.  There is at least one big caveat to drawing too much out of these poll numbers; it’s not a national poll, it’s only Florida voters, so the applicability to other voter groups is negligible.

All that being said, however, this poll represents something new for this election cycle: acknowledgment that the political calculus for Republicans favors maintaining and/or increasing the economic misery for the American populace.  Left-leaning writers and bloggers have been discussing this issue for months, but the fact that such a notion has penetrated into the rarefied air of a respected polling organization’s survey questions is something entirely new. 

As Steve Benen notes, this single poll cries out for verification and/or contradiction, but that can only be done by further polling – polling that will have its results reported by the media, which will be forced to actually acknowledge the nature of the “sabotage” question asked, thus potentially raising the question in the minds of the viewing American public.  Such a situation does not bode well for the GOP, as their strategy of getting away with massive legislative obstruction (as seen in Sen. Mitch McConnell’s blocking of a vote on the President’s infrastructure bill in the Senate today) relies upon the median voter not grasping the nuances of parliamentary procedure in Congress to directly link such obstruction to the GOP’s actions.  Hiding in plain sight, as it were, with plausible deniability built-in.

For a long while, such actions appear to have worked, in a Pyrrhic sense, what with President Obama’s approval rating steadily dropping since mid-June. And yet, Congress has not been immune from blowback. Congress’ collective approval rating is now averaging 12.7%, according to RealClearPolitics.  Congressional approval ratings are historically virtually always lower than those of the President, but with a CBS News/NY Times poll recently showing Congress to only have a 9% approval rating (the lowest ever recorded since the poll was first launched) Americans are increasingly angry at their elected representatives these days.  The flipside of President Obama’s dropping poll numbers from the summer, as seen in the link above, are that his positives are now increasing again as he has honed his message on jobs and the economy.  All the GOP has had to offer are a bunch of blockades of legislative procedure and empty “jobs proposals” full of the same sorts of ideas they’ve been promulgating since Reagan’s presidency. 

Our politics is beyond broken these days, it is now actively heartless too.  Our representatives seem not to have much of an inkling of what “representing” Americans means, given the widespread and massive suffering amongst and all around us.  Witness Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA), Chair of the Armed Services Committee, writing to the New York Times to argue contra Paul Krugman that he is anything but a closet defense Keynesian:

Congress is charged by the Constitution with providing for the common defense by raising and supporting our armed forces. We don’t spend tax dollars to protect American jobs, but to protect American lives. As such, it is accurate to point out that cuts in defense spending will cripple a critical industry, result in huge job losses and erode our ability to provide for the common defense. (h/t Kevin Drum)

I don’t know, is it just me, or does it not seem that “protecting American jobs” seems like exactly what we ought to be spending our precious and vanishing tax dollars on in the interest of “common defense”?  Have you seen our defense budget lately?  Methinks the Pentagon is doing just fine, thank you.  Why not use some Congressional intervention on behalf of the American people, rather than defense contractors, who have had bonanzas yearly since the “War on Terror” began?

Would that we had representatives working on our behalf…perhaps Congress ought to be the next venue for some Occupy-flavored civil disobedience?

New layout, and some good reading

I’m experimenting with a new site layout to try and make my blog more reader- and user-friendly (and more orange!)  Please feel free to comment and/or make suggestions about the design in the comments section if you’re so inclined.

While I have a more substantive post in the works concerning my personal suggestions for the upcoming November 2 elections here in California to be posted later this week, I figured I’d throw some great articles/blog posts I’ve been reading out there in case people are interested.

Election Polling: For the past couple months this election season I’ve been closely following DailyKos’ Steve Singiser for his nightly Polling and Political Wrap.  As I’ve noted previously, there is no doubt that DailyKos is a liberal site, but the fact is, Singiser provides an invaluable service in collecting the day’s polling data and providing some analysis of the results in an easy-to-read format.  From what I can tell, Singiser posts the Wrap each evening (aside from weekends) around 7-8PM PST, so if you’re excited about/dreading the elections this year and you’d like to follow the polling action as it develops, I can’t recommend a better source.

Speaking of election polling, the Pew Research Center for People & the Press released a groundbreaking study today documenting the fact that many pollsters rely on a fairly outdated polling methodology that tends not to contact voters whose sole telephone in their home is a cell phone (including yours truly and many other young voters).  This may be skewing polling data in favor of Republicans by 4-6 percentage points according to Pew’s research.  Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo picks up the thread:

I would strongly recommend that Democratic enthusiasts not start adjusting the polls they're seeing by a 4-6 point margin. I will, shall we say, believe this one when I see it. It's also important to note that a number of national pollsters are already incorporating cell phones. Where the real vulnerability comes is in state and district polls and robo-pollsters -- like Rasmussen, PPP and SurveyUSA.

Again, in the past the differences usually seemed too small to figure significantly into the prediction equation. But this could be the cycle where that changes.

So yes, we’ll see what happens this election, and if pollsters have to make major alterations to their sampling models going forward.  It may seem trivial, but there’s nothing like polling to set the tone of an election season, and if those polls are incorrect (think Dewey defeats Truman) people could stay home because they think their team will lose, when in fact the opposite may be true.