Polling getting no satisfaction

Jay Cost:

Richard Morin, The Washington Post's polling director, had an interesting piece in yesterday's edition. Morin argues that, in states Bush carried in 2004, his job approval numbers have slid so much that we can no longer really think of many of them as "red".

Writes Morin, "States that were once reliably red are turning pink. Some are no longer red but a sort of powder blue. In fact, a solid majority of residents in states that President Bush carried in 2004 now disapprove of the job he is doing as president. Views of the GOP have also soured in those Republican red states." This conclusion is entirely unjustified by the evidence he cites - for four reasons.

The first two problems are different types of invalid causal inferences. Bush's job approval is down nationwide - of this there is no dispute. Morin, however, takes this as a sign that the GOP's electoral coalition is cracking up. In other words, according to Morin, Bush's job approval is a reliable indicator of the change in the ideological/partisan dispositions of the public. Is this valid? Can we infer that individual red voters are turning blue based upon the fact that Bush is losing ground among them? No way. It is true that it could signal this, but it is also just as likely to signal a whole host of other sentiments.

Consider a few alternatives. Conservatives might be angry with Bush for being too liberal on issues like spending and immigration. It is unlikely that they will move into the Democratic column. Moderates and independents might be upset because Bush now seems to be incompetent - but this does not imply a lasting increase in electoral power for Democrats. This is an evaluation of Bush's person that we cannot assume affects his party's electoral fortunes. These explanations are just as reasonable as Morin's. Many more are equally reasonable as well. Thus, to infer that it is the decline of conservatism or Republicanism is invalid.

The second problem has to do with his argument about the GOP's standing. Morin asserts that, in red state America, voters now trust Democrats more than Republicans to handle the most important issues of the day. He sees this as a sign of an electoral shift. However, take a close look at the history of this question (#9 found halfway down this page), noting the generally heavy and persistent Democratic skew that has been extant for almost 15 years. This is the case despite the fact that the public has increasingly trusted the GOP to run the government over the same period of time. This question thus seems to have much in common with the generic congressional ballot - both are poor indicators of the partisan sentiment in the nation because both tend to point toward the Democrats regardless of what actually happens. This question, therefore, is not a valid indicator of the future of our electoral alignment. [N.B. Morin mentions that throughout Bush's first term, the GOP had a strong majority on this indicator in red states. There is no public data to evaluate this claim, but the evidence that is extant - on the nation as a whole - implies that the assertion is problematic. The question was never asked in 2004. It was only asked once in 2003. Before 9/11, the Democrats had plurality support on this question. It was only between 9/11/01 and the midterm of 11/12/02 that the GOP had a definite nationwide plurality. This works out to be only about 29% of Bush's first term. In this way, it paralleled congressional job approval - which historically favors the Democrats, but bounced toward the GOP between these dates.]

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There is more. Satisfaction questions leave a false assumption that dissatisfaction can be interpreted as a vote for Democrats, when the opposite may be the case. For example, some critics of the war may want more aggressive action, not withdrawel. Pollers for some reason refuse to ask the most pertinent question about the war. Do you want to lose?