On Mon, Jun 10, 2013 at 3:06 AM, djconner <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > On Monday, June 10, 2013 1:24:24 AM UTC-4, PGage wrote: >> >> I don't disagree with any of this, but I think it is important to >> underline again that for the most part the problem with the Gallup poll was >> not the crass partisanship of Rove or Morris, or even the crass marketing >> of CNN and MSNBC. Gallup was committed to a particular polling model which >> rested heavily on what they viewed as a proprietary likely voter screening >> algorithm. This model is conservative not in the partisan sense, but in the >> sense that it assumes the future will be like the past. If the partisan and >> ethnic and age turnout had been similar to 2004 and before, then CNN would >> have been right. The problem with their model was that it was not dynamic - >> it did not account for how the composition of likely voters was changing, >> and was likely to continue to change given underlying national demographics. >> >> > What might be interesting is how this plays out in the next election, > where the same problem might occur in the other direction. Is the > 2008-2012 voting pattern the "new normal," or did it happen that way > because Barack Obama is a unique candidate whose specific set of > circumstances is unlikely to be replicated? > You are pretty much making the point that Gallup was making in the last cycle, except they thought Obama's unique draw was limited to the 2008 election and would not extend to 2012. But there has been a trend predating Obama, going back at least since near the turn of the 21st century, of increasing voter participation by Hispanics. 2008 may have shown some acceleration of this trend (I believe Nate and others who got 2012 right accounted for this), but neither the 2008 nor 2012 voter composition was atypical in light of that longer trend. To be clear, there is nothing inevitable about Black, Hispanic and (to a lesser extent) Asian and younger voters supporting the Democratic nominee. It certainly is possible to imagine a set of circumstances in which at least some of those groups are at least somewhat more likely to support the Republican. And there is something unique about Obama that is relevant here - probably not his ethnic status as much as his modern and absurdly effective targeted GOTV (get out the vote) operation. This probably did get more people with what historically would be considered marginal levels of interest in the election to actually vote (and here the various early voting options really helped). But the increasingly larger makeup of Black and Hispanic voters in the US is fairly likely to be a fact of political life over the next several cycles (implying not that it will reverse, but may plateau at some point in the future). This is the conundrum facing the Republican Party right now, reflected in their deep ambivalence over Immigration Reform. On the one hand they (correctly) think that Hispanic voters will continue to punish them at the polls for their tough stand on undocumented workers (more than anything else this is what castrated the Republican Party in California - Hispanics got politically sensitized after Republicans used Immigrant-bashing to win the State House several times in the 90s). On the other hand, anything resembling real Reform is likely to make Hispanics even more likely to vote (there still is some reluctance on the part of a significant fraction of Hispanic US citizens to do anything that brings them into contact with what is perceived to be part of the US government bureaucratic process, and this would be reduced if deportation issues were clarified). One way or the other, the chances of us seeing a presidential election without at least one Hispanic on the top or bottom part of the ballot for at least one party over the next 12 to 16 years are extremely low. -- -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
