- Article
Hurricane Sandy's Predictably Small Effect On The Election
In case you hadn't heard, there was a big storm right before the election. Despite no real evidence, pundits, and even some scholars, have tried to demonstrate an effect of Hurricane Sandy on the election outcome. Is it possible that it had an effect? The likelihood that the ...
17 Nov 2012 - Article
Romney Relies On Race To Attack Obama On Welfare
Mitt Romney has stuck with his theme of attacking President Obama over "gutting" the work requirement for welfare. In an often-aired television commercial, Romney's claims that Obama "quietly" dropped the requirement that welfare recipients find work and instead they "just send you a check". As Romney's ad loosely indicates, ...
12 Sep 2012 - Article
The Surprising and Symbolic Power of Unions
Unions may be powerful in shaping opinion, even if their political influence is on the wane. It may seem like a long time ago now, but just a few weeks back, the political news was all about Scott Walker beating a recall bid in Wisconsin. At the time, it was ...
05 Jul 2012 - Article
Interpreting Gay Marriage Poll Results: Don’t do the Bump and Wiggle
In 1960, Richard Neustadt wrote Presidential Power, in which he told students of politics that presidential power was the “power to persuade.” Neustadt wasn’t so much talking about shifting public opinion, but Sam Kernell introduced that wrinkle in 1986. On May 9, President Obama announced that his opinion ...
31 May 2012 - Article
Recent Changes in Support for Same-Sex Marriage: Is There a Difference Across Races?
YouGov is in the field each week on Saturday mornings with a nationwide, 1,000-person survey. Today, we're going to look at the surveys before and after President Obama’s ABC interview during which he came out in support of same-sex marriage. The interview made news for days --- and was the ...
19 May 2012 - Article
Guns, Public Opinion, and Trayvon Martin
Tragedies inevitably raise political questions. Politics, despite its tawdry reputation, is essentially a competition over matters of fundamental importance. So, when the story of the killing of Trayvon Martin made national news it is not surprising that political posturing soon followed. Ultimately, because politics are involved, any resolution to ...
23 Apr 2012 - Article
Success, Faith, and Politics
Previously, I wrote about the divide between liberals and conservatives over the value of college: liberals are far more likely than conservatives (by 20 percentage points) to believe that college is important to financial success. Since then, I've been asked by several people, "then what do conservatives believe is important ...
28 Mar 2012 - Article
The Politicized Value of College
When Rick Santorum chided President Obama for encouraging all Americans to go to college, he received widespread criticism, but it may still have been good politics.According to new survey data, the value of college has been politicized and it is an issue on which liberals and conservatives are worlds ...
15 Mar 2012 - Article
Fighting Over What's Real: Why Food Stamp Association Could Be Critical
Leading up to the 2010 election, Model Politics published several posts about the distorted view typical Americans have of those who live around them – overestimating the presence, by large amounts, of everything from illegal immigrants to the number of people making over $250,000. The greatest misperception, however, ...
30 Jan 2012 - Article
Do Americans Care about Politics?
We expected that most Americans would place a high value on the party of their Congressmen...55% of respondents they would not pay even $1 to place their preferred party in power.
10 Dec 2010