An interesting article in today's WaPo about the grassroots machine being developed by the Bush campaign. According to article:
"Bush's campaign has an e-mail list totaling 6 million people, 10 times the number that Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean has, and the Bush operation is in the middle of an unprecedented drive to register 3 million new Republican voters. The campaign has set county vote targets in some states and has begun training thousands of volunteers who will recruit an army of door-to-door canvassers for the final days of the election next November."
The article goes on to point out that this program has been made possible by Bush's huge campaign war chest.
Whether you like Bush or not, this is exactly the sort of grassroots engagement that good government types have been advocating for years. The irony is that Bush's refusal to work under the federal campaign spending guidelines makes this possible. There's a lesson here: if you want a strong and vibrant democracy, you need to spend more, not less money in politics.
Sunday, November 30, 2003
Tuesday, November 25, 2003
Ruy Teixeira is one of the best analysts of American politics today. But in his recent web piece on the LA Times Poll he errs in his analysis of moderate voters. According to Teixeira:
"DR has commented a number of times recently on how disaffected independent voters seem to be with Bush and his policies. The breakouts provided by The Los Angeles Times from their most recent poll provide a window on another electoral group that’s disaffected—really disaffected—with Bush and his policies. This one’s a moose of a group, moderate voters, who constituted 50 percent of the voters in the 2000 election."
Moderate voters are, to be sure, a big part of the electorate, but according to the LA Times polling people (I called them on the phone), moderates only made up 32 percent of the poll respondents. Liberals were 25 percent and conservatives were 40 percent (the other three percent didn't give their ideology). As a result, the shift in moderates Teixeira comments on has less of an impact than he suggests. Furthermore, he's right that on a number of important issues, such as right track/wrong track, Bush "understands people like me," and approval of Bush's handling of Iraq, moderates are heavily against Bush. But on a number of other important questions, moderates are split or lean in a Bush/Republican direction. For example, on Bush' job approval, moderates approve by a 49-45 margin. On whether they like or dislike Bush as a person, moderates like him by a 67-26 margin. On approval of Bush's handling of the war on terrorism, moderates approve by a margin of 56-35. Moderates agree that Bush is a strong leader 62-30, and consider him "honest and trustworthy," 52-34.
Whether these questions are more or less important than the ones cited by Teixeira is open to debate. The point is that Bush is in a much stronger position than many analysts, including Teixeira, suggest.
"DR has commented a number of times recently on how disaffected independent voters seem to be with Bush and his policies. The breakouts provided by The Los Angeles Times from their most recent poll provide a window on another electoral group that’s disaffected—really disaffected—with Bush and his policies. This one’s a moose of a group, moderate voters, who constituted 50 percent of the voters in the 2000 election."
Moderate voters are, to be sure, a big part of the electorate, but according to the LA Times polling people (I called them on the phone), moderates only made up 32 percent of the poll respondents. Liberals were 25 percent and conservatives were 40 percent (the other three percent didn't give their ideology). As a result, the shift in moderates Teixeira comments on has less of an impact than he suggests. Furthermore, he's right that on a number of important issues, such as right track/wrong track, Bush "understands people like me," and approval of Bush's handling of Iraq, moderates are heavily against Bush. But on a number of other important questions, moderates are split or lean in a Bush/Republican direction. For example, on Bush' job approval, moderates approve by a 49-45 margin. On whether they like or dislike Bush as a person, moderates like him by a 67-26 margin. On approval of Bush's handling of the war on terrorism, moderates approve by a margin of 56-35. Moderates agree that Bush is a strong leader 62-30, and consider him "honest and trustworthy," 52-34.
Whether these questions are more or less important than the ones cited by Teixeira is open to debate. The point is that Bush is in a much stronger position than many analysts, including Teixeira, suggest.
Monday, November 24, 2003
David Horowitz has come out in opposition to the Federal Marriage Amendment. Good for him, but I think he misunderstands the nature of the amendment process. Here's Horowitz:
"They [conservatives] should not be politicizing the constitutional process by encouraging the radical idea that rewriting the Constitution is a handy alternative to winning American hearts and minds and resolving these conflicts in the legislative process. If conservatives seek a constitutional change to achieve culture war victories that could have been won through legislative means, the Left will only escalate its own efforts to do the same and the last protective membrane of our polity will have been torn to shreds."
But the amendment process IS the legislative process. You need 2/3 of both house of Congress and 3/4 of the state legislatures to amend the Constitution. That seems to require "winning American hearts and minds," to say the least.
The problem with the amendment is two-fold. First, the majority of American don't support it. Some polls even show a majority of gay marriage opponents don't want the amendment. Second, amending the Constitution to formally discriminate against a particular group of people is odious in the extreme, regardless of whether the process is "legislative" or not. Rather than arguing over procedures, I wish Horowitz had addressed the issue directly. Gays and lesbians are full and equal citizens, and the state cannot deny them the rights, privileges, and benefits that it provides to other citizens as a matter of course. To do otherwise is prejudice, plain and simple.
"They [conservatives] should not be politicizing the constitutional process by encouraging the radical idea that rewriting the Constitution is a handy alternative to winning American hearts and minds and resolving these conflicts in the legislative process. If conservatives seek a constitutional change to achieve culture war victories that could have been won through legislative means, the Left will only escalate its own efforts to do the same and the last protective membrane of our polity will have been torn to shreds."
But the amendment process IS the legislative process. You need 2/3 of both house of Congress and 3/4 of the state legislatures to amend the Constitution. That seems to require "winning American hearts and minds," to say the least.
The problem with the amendment is two-fold. First, the majority of American don't support it. Some polls even show a majority of gay marriage opponents don't want the amendment. Second, amending the Constitution to formally discriminate against a particular group of people is odious in the extreme, regardless of whether the process is "legislative" or not. Rather than arguing over procedures, I wish Horowitz had addressed the issue directly. Gays and lesbians are full and equal citizens, and the state cannot deny them the rights, privileges, and benefits that it provides to other citizens as a matter of course. To do otherwise is prejudice, plain and simple.
Sunday, November 23, 2003
In Saturday's NYT, historian Sean Wilentz plays the great counterfactual of our time, "What if Kennedy Had Lived?" According to Wilentz:
"There's no question that Johnson was able to carry forward Kennedy's domestic agenda because of the 37 House seats gained by the Democrats in the 1964 elections, a landslide that produced a working majority for progressive legislation for the first time in a quarter century. But Kennedy was a more popular figure than Johnson. Had Kennedy lived to run against Barry Goldwater, the Democrats probably would have picked up 50 more liberal legislators."
Is there even the slightest bit of evidence for this? LBJ won in 1964 with 61% of the vote. This is the highest for any presidential candidate, before or since, so it seems unlikely that JFK would have improved on this by enough to carry an additional 13 seats.
"There's no question that Johnson was able to carry forward Kennedy's domestic agenda because of the 37 House seats gained by the Democrats in the 1964 elections, a landslide that produced a working majority for progressive legislation for the first time in a quarter century. But Kennedy was a more popular figure than Johnson. Had Kennedy lived to run against Barry Goldwater, the Democrats probably would have picked up 50 more liberal legislators."
Is there even the slightest bit of evidence for this? LBJ won in 1964 with 61% of the vote. This is the highest for any presidential candidate, before or since, so it seems unlikely that JFK would have improved on this by enough to carry an additional 13 seats.
Wednesday, November 19, 2003
In today’s WaPo, Harold Meyerson is again running different electoral strategies. As he sees it, the Democrats need to hold all the states won by Gore and win Ohio. Meyerson also points out, correctly that Democratic lead among Ohio’s registered voters has increased by 1 point since 9/11. That’s correct as far as it goes, but Meyerson doesn’t really discuss just how difficult it will be for Democrats to hold the states won by Gore. The Pew survey cited by Meyerson shows that in 6 states won by Gore, the Republicans have surged into lead among registered voters. These states (Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Washington, and Vermont) constitute 79 Electoral College votes. In contrast, only Mississippi and Maine with 10 Electoral College votes have seen the Democrats take the lead in party registration from Republicans. Of course, having a lead in registered voters doesn’t translate into winning the state, but it does show how much the Democrats have slipped since 9/11.
Furthermore, all of this talk of ground game, GOTV efforts, and targeting crucial states is for naught if the Democrats can’t at least get to within spitting distance of 50 percent of the vote. And the Pew survey, along with most others, suggests that such a prospect is looking unlikely. Bush’s approval ratings have fallen substantially from their post-9/11 highs, but he’s still in the mid to high 50s. That’s a pretty good position to be in. This means that for the Democrats things have to get worse for them to have a chance at knocking off Bush. That’s looking less and less likely with the economy. On social issues, if anything, the recent ruling on gay marriage will further add to the Republican advantage here. That leaves Iraq, and here the Democrats not only have to hope for decreased support for Bush, but (and most crucially) the majority of voters has to see the Democratic nominee as a credible alternative to Bush on this issue. And there’s no evidence of that happening yet.
Furthermore, all of this talk of ground game, GOTV efforts, and targeting crucial states is for naught if the Democrats can’t at least get to within spitting distance of 50 percent of the vote. And the Pew survey, along with most others, suggests that such a prospect is looking unlikely. Bush’s approval ratings have fallen substantially from their post-9/11 highs, but he’s still in the mid to high 50s. That’s a pretty good position to be in. This means that for the Democrats things have to get worse for them to have a chance at knocking off Bush. That’s looking less and less likely with the economy. On social issues, if anything, the recent ruling on gay marriage will further add to the Republican advantage here. That leaves Iraq, and here the Democrats not only have to hope for decreased support for Bush, but (and most crucially) the majority of voters has to see the Democratic nominee as a credible alternative to Bush on this issue. And there’s no evidence of that happening yet.
Sunday, November 16, 2003
I ran a regression with change in the Democratic vote from Landrieu to Blanco as the dependent variable. As independent variables I used % white in the county, % for Bush in '00, and % for Duke in '91. Both the % white and the % for Bush are statistically insignificant, but the Duke variable is highly significant (p<.000). For each 10 point change in the Duke vote, Blanco did about 4.6 points better than Landrieu.
Yesterday's Louisiana governor's race was closely watched if for no other reason than the Republicans nominated a non-white candidate, Indian-American Bobby Jindal. Despite running somewhat better among blacks than most Republicans, Jindal still lost the election mostly because his Democratic opponent, Kathleen Blanco, ran particularly well among whites, even in some of the most rural and conservative parts of the state. How much of a role did white racism play in white voting behavior? In counties where David Duke ran below his statewide average (39%) in the 1991 governor's race, Blanco only averaged 2 percentage points better than Democrat Mary Landrieu in last year's US Senate run-off. In counties where Duke did better than average, Blanco ran 7 points better than Landrieu. Finally, in counties won by Duke, Blanco did 11 points better than Landrieu.
Thursday, November 13, 2003
Here's Gore Vidal interviewed in LA Weekly:
"The USA PATRIOT Act is as despotic as anything Hitler came up with — even using much of the same language. In one of my earlier books, Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace, I show how the language used by the Clinton people to frighten Americans into going after terrorists like Timothy McVeigh — how their rights were going to be suspended only for a brief time — was precisely the language used by Hitler after the Reichstag fire."
I'm not a big fan of the USA PATRIOT Act, but "as despotic as anything Hitler came up with"? Anything? Remember, Hitler came up with lots of things.
Also, what exactly did Hitler say after the Reichstag fire. According to one witness, Hitler shouted:
"There will be no mercy now. Anyone who stands in our way will be cut down. The German people will not tolerate leniency. The communist deputies must be hanged this very night. Everybody in league with them must be arrested. There will no longer be any leniency for Social Democrats either."
Say what you will about the Bush administration, but these facile comparisons to the Nazis only trivialize the true horrors of that regime.
"The USA PATRIOT Act is as despotic as anything Hitler came up with — even using much of the same language. In one of my earlier books, Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace, I show how the language used by the Clinton people to frighten Americans into going after terrorists like Timothy McVeigh — how their rights were going to be suspended only for a brief time — was precisely the language used by Hitler after the Reichstag fire."
I'm not a big fan of the USA PATRIOT Act, but "as despotic as anything Hitler came up with"? Anything? Remember, Hitler came up with lots of things.
Also, what exactly did Hitler say after the Reichstag fire. According to one witness, Hitler shouted:
"There will be no mercy now. Anyone who stands in our way will be cut down. The German people will not tolerate leniency. The communist deputies must be hanged this very night. Everybody in league with them must be arrested. There will no longer be any leniency for Social Democrats either."
Say what you will about the Bush administration, but these facile comparisons to the Nazis only trivialize the true horrors of that regime.
Wednesday, November 12, 2003
In today's WaPo, Harold Meyerson analyzes the results of the recent Philly mayor's race. He claims that John Street's victory resulted, in part, from a massive voter registration drive among Philly's minority community. Among other claims, Meyerson states that Congressman Chaka Fattah registered 86,000 new voters in the last 3 months and that efforts are underway to register another 85,000 by next November.
I looked into this a bit more and I think Meyerson is grasping at straws. First, there's no way that Fattah registered 86,000 new voters in the last three months. In May 2003, there were about 912,000 registered voters in Philly. By November, that had only risen to 958,000, an increase of only 46,000 voters. Of those 46,000, only about 34,000 were registered Dems. This is an increase over May, but the number of registered Democrats in the city is the lowest since 1998 and 40,000 fewer than in November 2000.
As for registering an additional 85,000 voters in the coming year, well, that's a tall order. Right now, about 86% of the city's voting age population is registered. Adding another 85,000 voters would raise that to 93%. Given that some portion of the voting age population population either can't register (because of non-citizen status, criminal convictions, mental incompetence, etc.) or won't register, I'd guess that 93% would represent about 100% (perhaps more) of those willing and eligible to register.
Today, even with these voter registration efforts, Philadelphia's Democrats make up 9.4% of Pennsylvania's voters. That's down from 9.8% in 2000. Even if they can add an additional 85,000 voters, and all of them are Democrats (both dubious propositions), that would only make Philadelphia's Democrat's 10.5% of the electorate. That would help the Democrats, but it's nothing that fundamentally changes either Pennsylvania or national politics.
Finally, let's say the Democrat's sweep Pennsylvania in 2004 as a result of these efforts. So what? Gore won the state in 2000 and he still lost the election. What are Democrats doing in states that Gore lost, such as Kentucky, to bring them into the D column? Furthermore, due to population changes Pennsylvania lost 2 electoral votes and overall, Gore's 267 electoral votes in 2000 will only be 260 electoral votes in 2004.
Where does Meyerson propose getting those extra states?
I looked into this a bit more and I think Meyerson is grasping at straws. First, there's no way that Fattah registered 86,000 new voters in the last three months. In May 2003, there were about 912,000 registered voters in Philly. By November, that had only risen to 958,000, an increase of only 46,000 voters. Of those 46,000, only about 34,000 were registered Dems. This is an increase over May, but the number of registered Democrats in the city is the lowest since 1998 and 40,000 fewer than in November 2000.
As for registering an additional 85,000 voters in the coming year, well, that's a tall order. Right now, about 86% of the city's voting age population is registered. Adding another 85,000 voters would raise that to 93%. Given that some portion of the voting age population population either can't register (because of non-citizen status, criminal convictions, mental incompetence, etc.) or won't register, I'd guess that 93% would represent about 100% (perhaps more) of those willing and eligible to register.
Today, even with these voter registration efforts, Philadelphia's Democrats make up 9.4% of Pennsylvania's voters. That's down from 9.8% in 2000. Even if they can add an additional 85,000 voters, and all of them are Democrats (both dubious propositions), that would only make Philadelphia's Democrat's 10.5% of the electorate. That would help the Democrats, but it's nothing that fundamentally changes either Pennsylvania or national politics.
Finally, let's say the Democrat's sweep Pennsylvania in 2004 as a result of these efforts. So what? Gore won the state in 2000 and he still lost the election. What are Democrats doing in states that Gore lost, such as Kentucky, to bring them into the D column? Furthermore, due to population changes Pennsylvania lost 2 electoral votes and overall, Gore's 267 electoral votes in 2000 will only be 260 electoral votes in 2004.
Where does Meyerson propose getting those extra states?
Saturday, November 08, 2003
Following up on the Iraq-Halliburton story, I checked the contributions of Halliburton employees to the current presidential candidates in this election cycle. So far, there only seems to be 3 direct contributions. One is for $2000 to Bush/Cheney 2004 and two contributions of $500 each to the Clark for President campaign.
I've just had a chance to look over the Center for Public Integrity's recent report on the campaign contributions of contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. The report claims to be a damning expose of political cronyism and kickbacks. Maybe I'm missing something, but I just don't see the relationship. First, as others have pointed out, there's no clear relationship between the size of contracts and the amounts contributed. Second, as a recent WaPo op-ed by the Clinton administration official in charge of federal procurement pointed out, there's no evidence of political influence in the contracting process. Third, as the CPI report shows, these were contributions to Democrats AND Republicans. I quote:
"According to the Center's analysis, the companies, their political action committees and their employees contributed a total of nearly $49 million to national political campaigns and parties since 1990. Donations to Republican Party committees—the Republican National Committee, the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee—outpaced those to Democratic committees, $12.7 million to $7.1 million. Among individual candidates, President George Bush received more money from these companies than any other, a little over $500,000."
They don't include a breakdown of contributions for each company by party, so for all we know, the top contractors might have given as much of more of their contributions to Democrats rather than Republicans. Also, not the "since 1990" formulation. Looking just at party contributions, that amounts to contributions of about $1.5 million a year total, with about $0.98 million for the GOP and $0.55 million for the Dems. Also, this is spread out over about 70 companies, leaving an average contribution of about $21,000 per company.
Again, maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see much smoke here and certainly no evidence of a fire.
"According to the Center's analysis, the companies, their political action committees and their employees contributed a total of nearly $49 million to national political campaigns and parties since 1990. Donations to Republican Party committees—the Republican National Committee, the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee—outpaced those to Democratic committees, $12.7 million to $7.1 million. Among individual candidates, President George Bush received more money from these companies than any other, a little over $500,000."
They don't include a breakdown of contributions for each company by party, so for all we know, the top contractors might have given as much of more of their contributions to Democrats rather than Republicans. Also, not the "since 1990" formulation. Looking just at party contributions, that amounts to contributions of about $1.5 million a year total, with about $0.98 million for the GOP and $0.55 million for the Dems. Also, this is spread out over about 70 companies, leaving an average contribution of about $21,000 per company.
Again, maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see much smoke here and certainly no evidence of a fire.
Sunday, November 02, 2003
Today's Washington Post has some interesting poll numbers. Perhaps most striking, there is no gender gap in either Bush's job approval numbers or in whether or not people think the war in Iraq was worth fighting. To see if this was a one-poll fluke, I went back and looked at these questions for 2003. These are the results:
"All in all, considering the costs to the United States versus the benefits to the United States, do you think the war with Iraq was worth fighting, or not?"
Date Men Women Difference
10/26-29 55 54 +1
10/9-13 58 50 +8
9/10-13 63 59 +4
8/7-11 61 62 -1
7/9-10 60 55 +5
4/27-30 71 68 +3
The margin of error (MOE) in each poll was +/- 3 percentage points. The only time the difference between men and women fell outside the MOE was in the 10/9-13 survey. In all other polls, the difference between men and women was statistically insignificant.
Where did the gender gap go? I don't know, but so much for the idea of women being more pacifistic than men or more sensitive to losses of life.
Here's the breakdown of Bush's approval rating:
Date Men Women Difference MOE
10/26-29 57 55 2 3
10/9-13 56 49 7 3*
9/30 57 51 6 5
9/10-13 60 56 4 3
8/7-11 61 55 6 3
7/9-10 60 58 2 3
4/27-30 72 70 2 3
4/16 75 72 3 5
4/9 78 76 2 5
4/3 74 68 6 4.5
3/23 74 64 10 4*Approve/Disapprove Only
3/20 72 63 9 5 Approve/Disapprove Only
2/19-23 64 56 8 3*Approve/Disapprove Only
2/6-9 59 59 0 3
Differences outside the margin of error (MOE) are marked with an asterisk. The 3/23, 3/20, and 2/19-23 polls asked only approve or disapprove of the president's job performance. All other surveys asked whether respondents strongly approve/disapprove or just approve/disapprove.
Again, there's no gender difference to speak of.
"All in all, considering the costs to the United States versus the benefits to the United States, do you think the war with Iraq was worth fighting, or not?"
Date Men Women Difference
10/26-29 55 54 +1
10/9-13 58 50 +8
9/10-13 63 59 +4
8/7-11 61 62 -1
7/9-10 60 55 +5
4/27-30 71 68 +3
The margin of error (MOE) in each poll was +/- 3 percentage points. The only time the difference between men and women fell outside the MOE was in the 10/9-13 survey. In all other polls, the difference between men and women was statistically insignificant.
Where did the gender gap go? I don't know, but so much for the idea of women being more pacifistic than men or more sensitive to losses of life.
Here's the breakdown of Bush's approval rating:
Date Men Women Difference MOE
10/26-29 57 55 2 3
10/9-13 56 49 7 3*
9/30 57 51 6 5
9/10-13 60 56 4 3
8/7-11 61 55 6 3
7/9-10 60 58 2 3
4/27-30 72 70 2 3
4/16 75 72 3 5
4/9 78 76 2 5
4/3 74 68 6 4.5
3/23 74 64 10 4*Approve/Disapprove Only
3/20 72 63 9 5 Approve/Disapprove Only
2/19-23 64 56 8 3*Approve/Disapprove Only
2/6-9 59 59 0 3
Differences outside the margin of error (MOE) are marked with an asterisk. The 3/23, 3/20, and 2/19-23 polls asked only approve or disapprove of the president's job performance. All other surveys asked whether respondents strongly approve/disapprove or just approve/disapprove.
Again, there's no gender difference to speak of.
Saturday, November 01, 2003
Victor Davis Hanson has an excellent piece in the National Review online analyzing the rising tide of anti-semitism. This development is one of the most depressing and worrisome things I've ever seen. Mark Strauss had an excellent piece (Anti-Globalization's Jewish Problem") in the most recent Foreign Policy magazine. In it, he analyzed the union of "brown, green, and red" with anti-semitism as the common thread. Just more evidence that underlying all of this is fascism--the revolt against modernity, the infatuation with nihilism and death, the idealization of identity and volk, the rejection of reason, and, of course, hatred of Jews. An how ironic that it's coming from the left rather than the right. On the other hand, it was national "socialism" after all, wasn't it?
Here's Eric Alterman on critics of Paul Krugman:
"It's no accident that it is mostly liberals who tend to inspire this bit of illogic, and nobody does it better than Krugman. The so-called Krugman Truth Squad, led by wannabe Ayatollah Andy Sullivan, succeeds in nothing so much as embarrassing itself with its small-minded obsessiveness about matters that the Princeton by way of Yale, MIT and Stanford economist clearly understands better than they do."
Whether you love or hate Krugman, what an astounding display of elitism. Krugman is clearly an intelligent and well-educated man, but the two are not the same thing. One of the worst aspect of the current left is its often sneering disdain for those without Ivied credentials.
"It's no accident that it is mostly liberals who tend to inspire this bit of illogic, and nobody does it better than Krugman. The so-called Krugman Truth Squad, led by wannabe Ayatollah Andy Sullivan, succeeds in nothing so much as embarrassing itself with its small-minded obsessiveness about matters that the Princeton by way of Yale, MIT and Stanford economist clearly understands better than they do."
Whether you love or hate Krugman, what an astounding display of elitism. Krugman is clearly an intelligent and well-educated man, but the two are not the same thing. One of the worst aspect of the current left is its often sneering disdain for those without Ivied credentials.
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