[Vision2020] Totally unscientific poll

[Ron Force]

Ah, but do people make up their minds on the basis of issues? Louis Menand
had a review in the New Yorker on books about voter behavior:

"...Skepticism about the competence of the masses to govern themselves is as
old as mass self-government. Even so, when that competence began to be
measured statistically, around the end of the Second World War, the numbers
startled almost everyone. The data were interpreted most powerfully by the
political scientist Philip Converse, in an article on “The Nature of Belief
Systems in Mass Publics,” published in 1964. Forty years later, Converse’s
conclusions are still the bones at which the science of voting behavior
picks.

Converse claimed that only around ten per cent of the public has what can be
called, even generously, a political belief system. He named these people
“ideologues,” by which he meant not that they are fanatics but that they
have a reasonable grasp of “what goes with what”—of how a set of opinions
adds up to a coherent political philosophy. Non-ideologues may use terms
like “liberal” and “conservative,” but Converse thought that they basically
don’t know what they’re talking about, and that their beliefs are
characterized by what he termed a lack of “constraint”: they can’t see how
one opinion (that taxes should be lower, for example) logically ought to
rule out other opinions (such as the belief that there should be more
government programs). About forty-two per cent of voters, according to
Converse’s interpretation of surveys of the 1956 electorate, vote on the
basis not of ideology but of perceived self-interest. The rest form
political preferences either from their sense of whether times are good or
bad (about twenty-five per cent) or from factors that have no discernible
“issue content” whatever. Converse put twenty-two per cent of the electorate
in this last category. In other words, about twice as many people have no
political views as have a coherent political belief system.

Just because someone’s opinions don’t square with what a political scientist
recognizes as a political ideology doesn’t mean that those opinions aren’t
coherent by the lights of some more personal system of beliefs. But Converse
found reason to doubt this possibility. When pollsters ask people for their
opinion about an issue, people generally feel obliged to have one. Their
answer is duly recorded, and it becomes a datum in a report on “public
opinion.” But, after analyzing the results of surveys conducted over time,
in which people tended to give different and randomly inconsistent answers
to the same questions, Converse concluded that “very substantial portions of
the public” hold opinions that are essentially
meaningless—off-the-top-of-the-head responses to questions they have never
thought about, derived from no underlying set of principles. These people
might as well base their political choices on the weather. And, in fact,
many of them do...

...Seventy per cent of Americans cannot name their senators or their
congressman. Forty-nine per cent believe that the President has the power to
suspend the Constitution. Only about thirty per cent name an issue when they
explain why they voted the way they did, and only a fifth hold consistent
opinions on issues over time...

Whole thing at: http://www.newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/?040830crat_atlarge

Another scary fact:

As the nation prepares to watch the presidential candidates debate foreign
policy issues, a new PIPA-Knowledge Networks poll finds that Americans who
plan to vote for President Bush have many incorrect assumptions about his
foreign policy positions. Kerry supporters, on the other hand, are largely
accurate in their assessments...
-----
Majorities of Bush supporters incorrectly assumed that Bush favors including
labor and environmental standards in trade agreements (84%), and the US
being part of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (69%), the International
Criminal Court (66%), the treaty banning land mines (72%), and the Kyoto
Treaty on global warming (51%)...

http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Pres_Election_04/html/new_9_29_04.html



**********************************************
Ron Force          Moscow ID USA
rforce at moscow.com
**********************************************

I don't really think it is a debate either. I think it is just a controlled
presentation of the Presidential Candidates. I think the content is pretty
predictable.

I want to watch to see if Kerry tries to appeal to women voters. Believe it
or not, Kerry is down about 5 points amoung women. The first Democrat to do
so in a long time. If he can bring his support amoung women to the
traditional 55% instead of 47% as he is now, he will bring himself tied with
Bush. I think the best way to do that is to point out that in the next four
years Bush will appoint many members of the Supreme Court and Federal Courts
throughout the country. Roe v. Wade and the women's right to choose will be
put taken away. The State will cease control of the Women's body.


Donovan J Arnold

PS, now that Kerry is ahead in Ohio, Kerry is leading in the electoral
college with about 280 electoral votes. Edwards is also in Ohio today. The
question is, is Kerry planning to take Ohio, or is he just sucking up time
and energy from Bush so he can get Florida?