Posted on 06/22/2012 8:26:03 PM PDT by Kaslin
A June 16-18 YouGov.com poll (at Page 25) reported that 47% of Americans in a sample of 1,000 U.S. citizens 18 and over had heard or heard about President Barack Obama's June 8 claim that "the private sector is doing fine."
The reaction of John Sides, an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at George Washington University, as picked up by Byron Tau at the Politico, is that this "low" percentage shows that "even after national headlines, some kinds of stories just don’t register to busy Americans who have more things to do than follow every jot and tittle of the news." You've got to be kidding me; 47% is amazingly high.
Even before getting to a most fundamental but underappreciated point, let's look at the survey itself, which contains at least three elements indicating that awareness on the part of likely voters, especially those who are likely to be undecided at this point, is much higher:
But the far bigger point is one which was made back in 2005 (the link is from 2007, but the underlying post which is no longer available was published in 2005) by Allan Hoffenblum, who is currently Publisher and Co-Editor of the California Target Book®, and who appears to be far more in touch with the real world than Mr. Sides:
Hoffenblum divides the electoriate into two groups, the “14%’ers” and the “86%’ers.” The “14%’ers” are actively involved in politics, they participate in local elections, and they keep themselves up-to-date on what is happening in their communities. The other 86% don’t much care about politics and don’t spend any effort informing themselves about what is going on.
The informed “14%’ers” are much more partisan than the uninformed “86%’ers” and get their information from a much more diverse range of sources. The “86%’ers” — when they learn anything — tend to get their information through television and advertising.
One could argue that improvements in news access thanks to technology and the advent of the Tea Party movement have increased the percentage who are relatively engaged by a bit. But it seems naive to claim that it's even 20% now.
Having established that, Obama's "the private sector is fine" comment has broken through to anywhere from 34% (if absolutely every engaged person is aware of the remark and their percentage of the population is now 20%, leading to a result of dividing the remaining 27% who are aware by 80% who are disengaged) to 38% (if the engaged are still 14%, the result of 33% divided by 86%). To the extent that any of the engaged somehow missed Obama's remark, that serves to increase the percentage of the disengaged who were aware of it.
That strikes me as amazing -- and certainly not comforting to Team Obama, considering the remark's obvious toxicity. Mitt Romney and the Republican Party's candidates for national office have 4-1/2 more months and what appears to be a lot of not-so-good private sector news on the horizon to remind voters of what Obama said.
What's also amazing is that someone like the Politico's Tau either couldn't or wouldn't (I vote for the latter) see through what appears to be particularly desperate spin disguised as expertise from someone who at the very least leans quite a bit to the left and buys the Pew-generated garbage that "there hasn’t been 'blatant (press) bias' toward Obama."
We have 4 months to pound it into the rest.
I wish I could get my service in front of 150+ million people.
The half that know about the quote are the half that vote.
I have little confidence anymore in the general public. They should have a show called American ***hole instead of American Idol, but it would be hard to decide the winners.
There were two sentences (in the article) that really really stood out...
“The other 86% don’t much care about politics and don’t spend any effort informing themselves about what is going on.”
“The “86%’ers” — when they learn anything — tend to get their information through television and advertising.”
And therein lies the problem.
The 86% will get the info from John Stewart, CNN, and the occasional times when they’ll pick up their local newspapaper - the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Minneapolis StarTribune, etc.
These above-mentioned sources are unabashedly liberal and their reporting is anything but fair and impartial. Trying to convince a significant section of the 86% that they need to use their brain is asking way too much.
After all, this is the crowd that cares more about who’s gonna win “American Idol” or how many apps they have on their iPhone. Not surprisingly, this group will favor Obama and the Democrats.
I’m not throwing in the towel but when you see what we’re up against, it’s a little depressing.
“Busy” Americans, or semi-literate victims of public schools?
I also found the 46 % encouraging. Indies must be watching Obie. It is rather entertaining, I must admit, watching them disintegrate under the scrutiny.
The gay group disrespecting the White Hut will be yet another exploding cigar. Very classy, BO very friggin’ classy. A 50 state sweep may yet happen. So sad, because a job well done by a black man...our first black president could have solved race relations for all intents and purposes
If the media had shown outrage about it as they did some of Bush’s comments about the economy, I’m sure more people would know.
Should we contrast the media’s reaction to “The private sector is doing fine” to their reaction to “Mission Accomplished”?
AMEN.
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