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by Frank James
Here's a problem with the entrance and exit polls that has gone under the radar. Not the kind that had anything to do with the screwy polling in last night's New Hampshire Primary but certainly one that needs fixing. Pollsters apparently aren't asking Democrats if they self-identify as evangelicals.
They ask the question of Republicans but not Democrats, even though there are many evangelical Democrats. Maybe not as many as Republicans but they do exist in some numbers.
Pollsters may be harboring a stereotype of evangelicals as entirely Republicans and thus dismissing the need to ask the question of Democrats. But it's definitely a question they should add to their surveys.
Katie Barge, communications director of the group Faith in Public Life, a group that strives to the impact of progressive people of faith on public policy, blogs today on the organization's website about this omission.
They did it again! Just as in Iowa, yesterday’s media-sponsored Election Day poll failed to ask Democrats in New Hampshire if they were evangelical. Voters from both parties were asked about their church attendance and if they were Protestant, Catholic, Mormon, Other Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Something else, or None. But only Republicans were
asked if they were born-again or evangelical Christian.
The Religion Newswriter's Association named "Democrats courting people of faith"
the #2 religion news story of 2007; all of the leading Democrats speak openly and extensively about their religious faith. Two weeks ago, a Boston Globe story with the headline, “In N.H. churches, candidates find a different breed of evangelical” quoted Rev. Bruce Boria, pastor of New Hampshire’s largest evangelical church, which attracts about 2,000 people each Sunday: "It kind of makes me laugh sometimes when they lump evangelicals all in one group…At my church, there have been people who have opened their homes to Barack Obama" and a variety of other candidates from both parties.
It would be informative to know the percentage of evangelicals who voted for Democrats yesterday. It would be informative to know which Democratic candidates were helped or hurt last night by Democratic evangelical turnout. It was certainly informative to learn this morning that the Republican evangelical vote split pretty evenly among McCain, Romney and Huckabee.Asking only Republicans about their religion shows that the media is still stuck
on the outdated and false notion that evangelical Christians are the GOP's
political property. No party can own any faith. Evangelicals have broadened
their agenda to include care for the planet, the poor and the stranger, and as a
result are increasingly independent politically. Exit polls need to abandon the
hidebound frames of the culture war -- evangelicals already have.Election Day exit polls are conducted by Edison Media Research/Mitofsky International for the National Election Pool (NEP), a consortium of ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Fox News, NBC News and the Associated Press.
The media sponsors of the NEP still need to fix this problem before any more primary votes are cast.
Comments
Maybe they think that democrat and evangelical are incompatible terms. You know, sort of like how "The Swamp" thinks the terms "democrat" and "black" are synonyms.
Posted by: Jeff | January 9, 2008 3:51 PM
They would not respond as evangelicals as they would not want to be considered hippocrites.. Dems may be liberals, moderates, or to some, (loonies ) but a true democrat, would not be an evangelical christian as defined by the Republicans, otherwise they would be republicans.
Posted by: Gary H. | January 9, 2008 4:01 PM
Maybe they think that democrat and evangelical are incompatible terms. You know, sort of like how "The Swamp" thinks the terms "democrat" and "black" are synonyms.
Posted by: Jeff | January 9, 2008 3:51 PM
Hey Billy/Jeff,
Are you going to stick around after your hero, "Let's stay in Iraq for 100 years" McCain gets his butt handed to him this time or are you going to runaway and pout like you usually do?
Stick around Mr. College Republican, I'm going to rub your nose in John McCrazy's upcoming crash and burn until the cows come home.
Posted by: John E | January 9, 2008 4:11 PM
I admit you don't normally associate evangelical with democrat, but they are out there. My New Years resolution is to stop being redundant and saying Racist Republican. Just saying Republican gets the point across to everyone on how you view minorities.
Posted by: jackson | January 9, 2008 4:35 PM
Very simply,we believe in separation of church and state.
No little fish's on my bumper.
Posted by: Raving Loon | January 9, 2008 5:01 PM
This article is a feeble excuse by the DNC Swamp to give publicity to some fringe Leftie group.
However, FPL does have a point. Voters of both parties should be asked the same questions by pollsters.
Just another reason why polls, and the media outlets (like the DNC Swamp) that publicize these polls, aren't trusted.
Posted by: Bruce | January 9, 2008 5:10 PM
Why has no one mentioned the weather in Iowa or NH? Weather plays a somewhat significant role in voter turn out. How would things have gone if it was sleeting-- rather than the unseasonably warmer temps that occured during the caucus and primary?
Posted by: Vivian | January 9, 2008 6:13 PM
"Just another reason why polls, and the media outlets(like the DNC Swamp)that publicizes these polls, aren't trusted"
Bruce, I've been gone for a while but I seem to recall not being able to read any of your posts without some inane, self-serving poll attached.
Since your only line of defense is to attack the source, something you've been doing for two years now, I can only assume you are the same bruce.
Posted by: Bubba | January 9, 2008 8:50 PM
During the 1950s, when I was in my 20s and totally ignorant of political philosophies, a friend gave me two books on that subject. One book was written by a liberal and one by a conservative. I read both books and knew I was a liberal, and so I have remained.
The interesting thing is that I was then a serious evangelical Christian. I believe my political thinking was influenced by the New Testament concept of love for one another, Christian charity, early Christian ideas about communal life, and Jesus idea that "in as much as you have done it unto the least of these, you have done it unto me."
So, there does exist within evangelical Christianity a paradigm for liberal thinking.
This, however, was before Evangelicals got energized over such problems as abortion, gay rights, women's rights, and whether non-Christians are fit to rule.
The word "Evangelical" means something quite different today than it did in the 1940s and 1950s.
Yes, pole takers ought to ask Democrats if they are Evangelicals. Not all Evangelicals are alike.
Posted by: DKB | January 9, 2008 11:04 PM
So bruce--Media outlets like The Swamp CAN'T be trusted because they DO post these polls?
This article is a feeble excuse by the DNC Swamp to give publicity to some fringe Leftie group.
However, FPL does have a point. Voters of both parties should be asked the same questions by pollsters.
Just another reason why polls, and the media outlets (like the DNC Swamp) that publicize these polls, aren't trusted.
Posted by: Bruce | January 9, 2008 5:10 PM
or, they can't be trusted because they DON'T post these polls?
From www.realclearpolitics.com, the recent national polls of Democrats that the Swamp has managed to avoid reporting on:
Average 11/01 - 11/18 - Clinton 44.3, Obama 22.9, Edwards 12.1--Clinton +21.4
Rasmussen 11/15 - 11/18 750 LV 41 24 13 Clinton +17.0
FOX News 11/13 - 11/14 397 RV 44 23 12 Clinton +21.0
Gallup 11/11 - 11/14 485 A 48 21 12 Clinton +27.0
American Res. Group 11/09 - 11/12 600 LV 46 21 11 Clinton +25.0
Cook/RT Strategies 11/08 - 11/11 376 RV 39 22 12 Clinton +17.0
AP-Ipsos 11/05 - 11/07 474 RV 45 22 12 Clinton +23.0
NBC/WSJ 11/01 - 11/05 Adults 47 25 11 Clinton +22.0
CNN 11/02 - 11/04 467 RV 44 25 14 Clinton +19.0
Pretty consistent picture. Pretty overwhelming Clinton lead in all these polls.
No wonder the "Swamp" reporters didn't want their readers to know all this polling data.
Posted by: Bruce | November 19, 2007 7:41 PM
Posted by: smarter than a fifth grader | January 9, 2008 11:59 PM
Bubba et al., if the NH poll results--even the EXIT polls showed Obama winning--don't convince you that polls are untrustworthy, nothing will.
As that general in New Orleans said, you're "stuck on stupid".
Posted by: Bruce | January 10, 2008 8:58 AM
Hey Bubba,
♬
Welcome back,
Your dreams(ha ha) were your ticket out.
Welcome back,
To that same old blog that you laughed about.
Well the names have all changed you old head banger,
But it's the same old people behind every doppelganger!
Who'd have thought they'd toll ya (Who'd have thought they'd cajole ya)
Here where we need ya (Here where we need ya)
Yeah we tease Bruce a lot cause we've got him on the spot, welcome back,
Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back.
Posted by: C.Morris | January 10, 2008 9:14 AM
Hey Billy/Jeff,
Are you going to stick around after your hero, "Let's stay in Iraq for 100 years" McCain gets his butt handed to him this time or are you going to runaway and pout like you usually do?
Stick around Mr. College Republican, I'm going to rub your nose in John McCrazy's upcoming crash and burn until the cows come home.
Posted by: John E | January 9, 2008 4:11 PM
Boy, college democrat here is an angry one!
As for the one hundred years thing, McCain has said he meant as a military presence. As long as American soldiers aren't dying there's nothing wrong with keeping a military base there. The same way we've kept bases in Japan, Germany (Rammstein Air Force Base, for instance) and Korea for the last 50 years.
Posted by: Jeff | January 10, 2008 10:48 AM
DKB, I was going to write a snarky post about how Republicans are more likely to blindly believe in myths and thus are more likely to be "Evangelical", but your post brought me back to reality that there are a lot of folks out there that live by their creed. I hope you are doing a lot of teaching and writing.
Posted by: DD | January 10, 2008 11:47 AM
Pollbot bruce,
How many times last year did I counter your pathetic cherry-picked polls with a more well-rounded sample that proved you were wrong? I wish I would have saved them. You never responded to any of them after I handed you your arse.
For you to question the intent of any reporter or polls is the exact definition of a hypocrite.
Another fmaous quote that decribes you well:
"You can't fix stupid"
Posted by: Bubba | January 10, 2008 2:04 PM
The evangelicals have Nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus Christ.
Posted by: Mrs. Jesus | January 11, 2008 1:34 AM
Hi Mrs. Jesus
“The evangelicals have Nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus Christ” I do not agree with this words will you please clarify more brief, if so I'm thank full.
Posted by: God | January 14, 2008 6:11 AM