Posted on 10/21/2008 7:29:32 AM PDT by SmithL
In a presidential campaign that has provoked an array of questions about race, one of the most persistent has been whether white people lie to pollsters about whether they would support a black candidate, a theory known as the Bradley effect.
Pundits often discount black candidates' leads in polls, saying support never materializes at the voting booth.
But many political experts say that while racism inevitably will play a role in whether some voters will choose Sen. Barack Obama, white people being surveyed seem to be pretty honest with pollsters about their biases.
The Bradley effect is an idea based on former Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley's unsuccessful race for governor of California in 1982. Though a Field Poll showed the African American candidate ahead of his opponent, George Deukmejian, by as much as seven points in the week before the election, Bradley lost the race. Pollsters theorized that some white voters said they would support Bradley but did the opposite once they got into the voting booth.
In this presidential race, in which Obama is ahead of his rival, Sen. John McCain, according to numerous polls, many say they are concerned about racism but not a Bradley effect.
"We are picking up prejudicial sentiment in this race, and there are a core group of people who say they will not vote for Obama because he is black," said pollster John Zogby. "But I think we are in a post-Bradley-effect America. We have honorable bigots. They say they won't vote for him, and then they don't vote for him."
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
He said that is why independents are still on the fence.
Murtha claims Pa. is racist.
Isd the SF Gate implying that people are more openly racist than they were in 1982? I find that hard to believe. In fact, I find it hard to believe that they beleive it either.
I didn’t vote for Gore and I didn’t vote for Kerry, and I certainly won’t be voting for Obama - guess that makes me one of those “honorable bigots.”
I don’t think there is such a thing as the “Bradley effect”.
Bradley was a liberal democrat and media polls showed him ahead(big surprise). When he lost the MSM didn’t want to admit their polls were flawed so they made up a story about how white voters are racist and how they lie to pollsters. They keep repeating it with the theme MSM biased polls aren’t wrong, white voters are racist.
So...Dems are racist and independents are racists. Seems only Republicans are not racist.
I agree. A lot of blue collar dems, and older people are not comfortable with a black President, only because they think that they will not matter once he’s in office.
You know, the racial bonding thing that Powell showed Sunday?
These people are missing the point of the ‘Bradley Effect.’
It’s not about white people who won’t support a candidate because he is black.
It’s about white people lying to pollsters and claiming they support the black candidate out of political correctness, when really they don’t.
It all well and good that some who don’t support 0bama because he’s black are being honest about it with pollsters.
But even if all of them were (and they’re not) that would not have any effect on the ‘Bradley Effect’.
Pollsters will never know how many people are just saying what they think they’re supposed to say.
And there is more pressure on people in this race to support the ‘right’ candidate than any other in recent history.
Is this really even about race at all, or just peer pressure and herd mentality?
Forget Bradley effect, I’d call it the Obama effect.
Many of the Dem Primary races showed him ahead by the polls but Hillary would win.
It will happen in the General Election with McCain winning.
So the fish wrap SFC chooses to call it racism instead of the Bradley Effect. Notice they don’t address the large number of primaries in which Osama was ahead large but lost to Hillary.
No point in letting the facts get in the way of a good story.
It will hurt him more than it did Bradley, and not because he is black but because he is so red that even many dems can’t vote for him but are unwilling to admit it.
Based on the latest Battleground poll, if the Bradley effect is any whole number greater than zero, Obama has a problem.
No. It makes you a rational voter.
My suspicion is that most white voters today don’t give a tinker’s damn about ethnicity or race. Politics trumps everything. I think that most independent voters who are voting for Obama are doing so because
1) McCain is a lousy candidate running a pathetic campaign
2) McCain’s age
3) Anger at Bush
4) Concern about the economy and the perceived connection that the Administration is responsible.
The above do not reflect my views. I voted for McCain already. I think he is the lesser of the two evils and I think Palin might even be able to take over some time during the term of his office due to his age and Palin is eminently more qualified to be President than McCain, Obama, or Biden.
Nope.
In fact I'm not voting for 0bama for pretty much the same reasons...but, I guess according to the author since I'm Black I'd be an honorable sellout.
The so-called “Bradley Effect” may not have been that at all..... the pollster under-sampled rural and other Republican districts, and did not take account of a gun control measure on the ballot which hyped turnout among pro-2nd Amendment, anti-Democrat voters, from what I’ve read. It was more of an instance of a bad pollster trying to cover his tracks and rationalize how he blew it.
I don’t know about the “Bradley Effect” as far as people lying to pollsters, but the fact is, many Democrats who aren’t being polled will never vote for a black man.
I don’t know if there is or isn’t a Bradley Effect. I do know that too many FReepers seem to be counting on it. And that worries me.
I’m not sure if there really will be a Bradley effect this time around, but there very well may be an “Obama-in-the-White-House-with-Pelosi-and-Reid-running-Congress-scares-the-hell-out-of-me” effect.
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