A closer look at the NY Times/CBS Poll
© Bryan Zepp Jamieson
3/4/5
http://zeppscommentaries.com/Politics/snapshot05.htm

It was the kind of news story that might get a sentence of twenty-five
words on CNN, and no mention at all on Faux News: "The most recent New
York Times / CBS news poll shows that support for President Bush remains
steady at a 49 approve and 44 disapprove level."

It's not a major story, by any means. Putsch is the least popular
president in the wake of an election in US history, and the public is
sharply divided on him. This is well known.

But the New York Times included a 32 page report, and as you might
guess, it provided a more comprehensive - and more encouraging - picture
of what is happening in the United States than CNNs' quick duck and
Faux's stony silence might indicate.

You know all that noise about how the election provided a mandate for
Putsch's policies, and how the whole country is red except for a few
effete enclaves in Hollywood and New York City? It's ********, is what
that is. The polls shows that Americans hold a deep antipathy to the
"pro-business" fascist policies of the GOP, and that on the so-called
"culture wars" the religious right is not only not gaining ground, but
they are actually falling behind.

Take, for example, the question of whether the country is on the right
track or the wrong track. Respondents, by a 52-42 margin, thought it was
pretty much on the wrong track, not the sort of numbers you expect to
see less than six weeks after an inauguration. The numbers were actually
an improvement for Putsch from 56-39, and reflect an erroneous belief
that the election in Iraq actually was some sort of triumph for the
administration. Since in the past few days, hundreds have died in bomb
blasts, the US death toll has passed 1,500, and even judges on Saddam's
tribunal have been assassinated, eventually the voters will notice that
the election did not bring freedom and democracy to Iraq.

Another question that will not thrill the admin was "What do you think
is the most important problem facing this country today?" Only 5% said
Social Security, indicating that the administration's efforts to instill
a sense of crisis in order to push the privatization scam wasn't going
too well. Leading categories of public concern were ones the admin
doesn't want the public dwelling on: the war in Iraq (11%), the economy
(11%) and jobs (9%) Another 8% named Iraq/Osama bin Laden. Less than ½
of 1% mentioned abortion, taxes, or Medicare, three items the GOP likes
to push as national crises, although 5% considered the state of health
care in America the most serious problem.

If people really voted with their pocketbooks (and back when the US had
honest elections, they did) then Putsch would already be history; since
only 38% approve of his handling of the economy. By more than a 2 to 1
margin (60-29) Americans are flat-out alarmed at the increase in deficit
spending under Putsch. If the interview the Comptroller-General of the
United States gave the Canadian magazine MacLean's, in which he cited
America's $43 trillion in total debt and said the country is going
broke, gets the attention it deserves, Putsch's numbers will drop even
lower. Ninety percent of Americans consider the deficit to be serious,
which may explain why the various right wing economists who were saying
a little debt was actually good for us seem to have dried up and blown away.

Of course, voters still don't quite grasp what causes the annual
deficits. Asked what Medicare should do about the skyrocketing cost of
prescription drugs, only about 1 in five said to raise Medicare rates
and only 1 in six thought benefits should be cut. Half thought Medicare
should "just absorb the costs."; while simultaneously saying that the
health care system was seriously flawed (only 13% thought it needed only
minor change and nobody thought it was good just the way it is).

While people vaguely support Putsch on how he's handling North Korea
(most likely because he isn't really doing much of anything there) they
are less impressed (40-45) with how he's handling Iraq, or Iran (44-40).
Only in the wholly imaginary "war on terrorism" does Putsch do well,
getting a positive mark of 61-33.

One of the more interesting poll results was on how people thought the
economy was doing. Only 4% thought the economy was doing very good,
which isn't too unusual (that number climbed into double digits - as
high as 29% - only during Clinton's second term in all the surveys
dating back to 1990. Negative numbers are of greater concern to a
politician, since they are the ones that spur voters to arms. The number
who think the economy is fairly bad or very bad is at 42%. That's
actually kind of reassuring for Putsch, since the voters don't tend to
turn into peasants with pitchforks until that number gets up around 70%
or so, as happened in 1993.

Asked if the administration shared the priorities of most Americans,
however, only 31% said they did. That's a catastrophically low number
for a President who claims to have just received a mandate from the
pipples. Asked how they felt those priorities pertained in foreign
policy, the poll holds scant comfort for Karl Rove; only 37% of
Americans felt George represented them well in that regard. Further, by
a 51-47 margin, Americans felt uneasy, as opposed to confident, in
Putsch's ability to handle any international crisis. And we're supposed
to believe the people really elected this guy?

Incidently, reports of the death of the Democratic Party may be a bit
premature. Thirty-five percent of Americans consider themselves
Democrats, opposed to 29% who say they are Republicans. Compare to the
first time the question was asked, in January of 1992: 35% Democrat, 29%
Republican. Not much change there, by my calculations.

Rumor has it the GOP is spending $1.8 billion in order to push the SS
privatization scheme, and certainly many tax dollars are being spent
illegally on government propaganda meant to reduce confidence in the
Social Security program. However, by a huge (63-31) margin, the people
don't trust Putsch's efforts at "reforming" Social Security.
Pseudo-libertarians of the far right will be dismayed to lean that the
vast majority of Americans (79%) believe the government should provide a
decent standard of living for the elderly. Incidently, in 1996, 60% of
Americans believed Social Security wouldn't be there when they retired.
Less than half (49%) believe that now, which suggests that GOP efforts
to convince people that SS is in crisis aren't working out. A total of
3% thought Social Security was a failure and should be ended. And I'll
bet than none of those 3% considered SS a significant factor in their
retirement plans, which would involve golden parachutes and seven digit
annuities.

Finally, only 17% of respondents thought the privatization scheme was a
good idea, once they learned that their benefits would be cut, no matter
how much their private accounts actually earned.

On the culture wars, the blob squad isn't getting much of anywhere. Over
a third of Americans (35%) believe that abortion should be available for
all women. Another 40% think it should be available, but more tightly
controlled. And 23% want it banned. The anti-abortion nuts have actually
lost a little ground over the past four years. Further, by a 57-41
margin, Americans favor either gay marriage or civil unions.

Only one in four Americans attend church every week. One in five never
go. Most (29%) go "a few times a year." While 29% see themselves as
evangelical or "born again," the vast majority (69%) do not.

At 23%, the number of Americans who call themselves "liberal" is a bit
above the 15 year average of 20%, and the number of self-described
"conservatives" (including neo-fascists) is 35%, right about their 15
year average.

Even the war isn't playing well any more. Only 46% felt the US did the
right thing in invading Iraq, and 50% felt the US should have stayed
out. Even after the fall of Saigon, the Vietnam war had better numbers
than that!

In short, the American people are not enthusiastic about Putsch or his
policies, foreign or domestic, and they certainly aren't veering more
and more to the right. Indeed, they seem to be moving back toward
traditional American liberalism, if only slightly.

So never mind what Faux News tells you: America hasn't gone mad yet.