An Internet hub for moderates, centrists, and independents, with domestic and international news, analysis, original reporting, and popular features from the left, center, and right

« Now What?

It’s Time For Ron Paul to Go Bye-Bye »

Race & Reading Between the Lines

Posted by SHAUN MULLEN, TMV Columnist in At TMV.
Jan 9th, 2008 | Comments

01abradley.jpgMy blogging buddy Will Bunch raises a creepy question this morning: Did the Bradley Effect play a role in Hillary Clinton’s strong showing against Barack Obama in New Hampshire?

The Bradley Effect is the name that pundits give to a disturbing trend first noticed in elections in the 1980s where white voters told pollsters they supported a black candidate and then voted for a white candidate once they got into the voting booth.

The effect is named for former Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley (photo), who ran for governor of California in 1982, built a comfortable lead in polls over Republican rival George Deukmejian but lost on Election Day. The same thing apparently happened to Virginia gubernatorial candidate Douglas Wilder, who led in the final polls in 1989 by nine percentage points but just barely won.

As Bunch notes:

“If white voters were misleading pollsters about their intentions in 2008, it would surely undercut the media storyline that Americans are transcending race in politics.”

G. Terry Madonna, a whip-smart political scientist and pollster with whom I worked for years, isn’t jumping to that conclusion.

He tells Bunch that he believes Clinton’s better field operation, a lower youth turnout for Obama than in Iowa and a late rush of independents toward John McCain on the Republican side made the difference.

While we’re sort of on the subject, the white-dominated news media does a notoriously-bad job of gauging black voter preferences. This is because they succumb to the easy temptation to treat blacks as a monolithic bloc and not people with as many world experiences and points of view as anybody else.

So you read it here first:

Obama cannot take for granted that black voters will gravitate to him just because he is black. (And probably won’t.) He will have to earn their votes just like Clinton, who at this point in the campaign probably has more black support than he does.

  • JSpencer
    I hope it isn't the Bradley effect. Not that I think racism is gone, it obviously isn't.
    I'd just like to think there are enough intelligent people in this country (who vote) that it wouldn't
    show up as an obvious trend in politics. I realize how naive that sounds, and after the last
    two elections any illusions I might have had about the intelligence of the average American
    voter were pretty well dashed. That said, I still have a bit of lingering idealism mixed with the
    cyncism.
  • flyerhawk
    Hillary was polling at 2-4% prior to Iowa. A quick euphoric bump from Iowa subsided and the women of New Hampshire, for whatever reason, decided that it was time to vote based on gender, as did the men apparently.
  • cosmoetica
    You cannot have it both ways.

    When it seemed Hillary was losing, women whined it was sexism- just look at the comments here: http://themoderatevoice.com/at-tmv/newsweek-blo... and here: http://themoderatevoice.com/society/sexism/1694...

    It was not sexism that put O ahead, nor was it racism why he lost.

    NH is an old state, w fewer kids. The seniors turned out, the kids did not, and the indies wanted to have McCain beat Romney more than O beat Hill.

    But, now people are already talking of Hillary as inevitable again.

    Sheeple, and they are the problem, not the candidates.

    Dr. E's post on the pollsters is something all should read: http://themoderatevoice.com/politics/voting/169...

    Polling is not a science any more than psychology nor economics are.

    BTW, Joe: Can you make the Disqus comment boxes larger? I can only see 2-3 lines max when typing. It's really annoying.
  • cosmoetica, the comment box issue will be fixed later today.

    And your right, you can't have it both ways. I agree with Tom Brokaw; we all will just have to wait and see until the final vote is counted. Sorry. Predictions mean squat in this presidential race.
  • kate08
    I'm with JSpencer, I hope it isn't the Bradley effect, and I really don't think it is (at least for the most part). I think Hillary's tears and cry of sexism may have helped her to win. I noticed her ratings went up yesterday after the tears and "iron my shirt" guy, specifically on www.fittobepres.com. Obama still has the most support on that site, but the other candidates are catching up.
  • shaun
    As someone who from long practice put the outlines of my New Hampshire story together before the polls closed, I was a little chagrined when I awoke from a nap to see that Clinton had eked out a win.

    But as I am fond of saying, polls are a snapshot in time and that time ends before a voter enters a polling place.

    It is my view that Obama stayed pretty steady but Clinton surged at the very, very end. That is not poor polling, that's something that is impossible to poll.

    Pick a reason for Hillary's surge. Mine is that there was an 11th hour epiphany about her among a fair number of voters who looked themselves in the eye and realized that the choice was between charm and experience . They opted for experience.
  • kritt11
    It may or may not be this effect, but, there was a lot of reporting about the large number of NH primary voters who were undecided until the last minute. That certainly would have created the same results. It seems also that some of the pundits were expecting the demographics in NH to break down for Obama and Hillary the way they did in Iowa.

    Reporters from NH who appeared on C-span observed that race has not been a real factor up in their state, and Obama DID gain ground in NH after his Iowa victory. It seems like a destructive topic, since no one can prove it either way and even if they could, nothing would change. I look at Obama as having the ability to reach past the old boundaries and hit on new themes with younger voters , despite the fact that he hasn't even been in the US Senate for a full term and lacks the extraordinary connections of the Clintons. From that perspective, he's doing astonishingly well.
  • cosmoetica
    Obama actually has more time in political office than Hillary, and a far longer record of doing things than she does. Perhaps they were small community accomplishments, but Hillary has not exactly got a great track record.

    The electorate are sheeple, and change only when desperate. The Iowans were a bit more moved to change while those in NH were not.

    And Hill's 'experience' is what made her an enabler to this war you hate, rather than stick to principles.
  • kritt11
    Cosmo-A lot of the Democratic candidates have enabled the war. I don't excuse them totally, but the post/911 atmosphere in DC was intensely jingoistic. Obama's voting record since being in the US Senate is almost identical to Hillary's. And I don't really hold state office-holding in the same light as national office-holding. Plus Bill Clinton is still a big factor in the experience category, though he may hurt her somewhat because of other baggage from the 90's that Obama lacks.
  • Somebody
    Woe is the commenters and posters at TMV who so desperately wanted to see the great far left Idealogue Obama crowned King O.

    Even the guys on cnn said last night that Obama is considerbly left of Clinton and hes going to have to pony up. What I see transpiring in the Democratic party is the PROGRESSIVES are themselves trying to take the party Hostage.

    The very thing they scream in anguish about the FAR RELIGIOUS RIGHT is exactly what they themselves are trying to do. Take the party hostage with their far left "PROGRESSIVE" agenda.

    It is why I have chosen to endorse Hillary. She is left actually but I think she will have moderate stances that include all Americans. After 8 years of a president in which its only been the right that matters, the Progressives want to take the White House hostage and make only the left matter.

    Obama is a far left Idealogue thats going to have to fess up. He is no uniter. If anything he will be as big a divider as we could ask for in the White House.
  • cosmoetica
    Somebody: To you a corpse can be an ideologue, you're so off on your own planet.

    Kritt: Don't vote for the enablers. What you are saying is why Hil shd not be Prez- she blows w the wind and folds under pressure.
  • kritt11
    Somebody- Obama's voting record is almost identical to Clintons (since he's been in the US Senate) Also he has a significant amount of Republican support and has express a willingness to cross the aisle and appoint qualified members of the GOP for his cabinet. I really don't see him as much of an ideologue since he is railing against ideological divisions in his speeches.

    Cosmo- Obama voted present over 100 times in the state Senate. Not exactly a profile in courage. He can criticize Clinton for voting for the war, but I'm not convinced he wouldn't have done the same since he's matched her vote for vote on funding it.
  • kritt11
    BTW, I gave it some more thought and realized it very well could be the Bradley effect. Like others, I sincerely hope not. I thought the other cases of it occured during general elections where white voters crossed party lines after saying they were voting for the black candidate of their own party.
  • DLS
    "Woe is the commenters and posters at TMV who so desperately wanted to see the great far left Idealogue Obama crowned King O."

    Gushing over him, gushing in advance over every moment's indication that Clinton was going to quit after losing New Hampshire (she is in the best position to remain in the race after Feb 5 even if she's not in first place overall!) ... and it's simply comical, the distorted hindsight (ranging into the delusional) in attempting to explain what happened and predict what will happen next.

    "Progressive" as used in this context by you and others always has been a misnomer.

    I'm surprised that Clinton hasn't tried to latch the older-voter vote, in order to proceed to attack the other groups, by saying she's the most qualified on Social Security and Medicare, and that anyone else but her threatens the security of these programs.

    I would not be surprised if she bussed in some older voters (where are the Iraqi-style IEDs in the road when they'd be so much appreciated?) -- on a shopping or gambling trip, yes, that's it. They just happened to stop by (multiple) polling places, heh, heh.

    I'm looking forward to the Clinton "subway voters" in both New York and New Jersey on February 5.
  • G_Hendricks
    A Hillary-sponsored bill: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s...

    An Obama-sponsored bill: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s...

    Guess who's more ethical and principled and has the better voting record.
  • cosmoetica
    Kritt: He ran for the Senate opposing the war. Yes if I were in Congress I'd not vote a penny for it, but look at all the halfwits who'd scream 'you're killing our troops!'
blog comments powered by Disqus
© 2005-2009 The Moderate Voice | Site design by Elegant Themes | Site customization, hosting, and security by Enxit Group, LLC