This week, a poll finally asked a question that really cuts to the chase:
Which better describes how you feel about the way things are going in the world these days?
Started me wondering:
What’s up with a goofy idiom like “going to hell in a handbasket”?
The mainstream media loves to bash big business and praise big government, but guess what … the American people don’t seem to buy it.
Each year, Gallup asks which is the bigger future threat: big business, big government or big labor.
For 50 years, big government has won that horse race … usually by a pretty big margin.
But, post 9-11 and during the Obama honeymoon period, the government-as-a-threat numbers dipped a bit.
That improvement was short-lived.
Most recently, the numbers have hit historic highs with about 70% thinking that big government is the biggest threat.
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The breakdown by political party affiliation has a few surprises to offer …
Since the political environment is heating up for the Presidential race …
Here’s an interesting infographic from Pew calibrating something that everybody knows …
Democrats are becoming more liberal Republicans are getting more conservative … and the moderate middle-ground between the parties is getting smaller, and smaller and smaller …
About 40% of Democrats think that Republicans are destroying the country … and, about 40% of Republicans think that Democrats are destroying the country.
Here’s the finding that I found most interesting …
During last Friday’s press conference, President Obama criticized opponents to his policies as having “half-baked ideas” and speaking “mumbo jumbo” … and, he said that Congress should tighten gun control laws because “the polling says the majority of Americans understand we should be changing these laws “ and “Congress should act on behalf of the majority” Source
Today, we’ll just deal with the last part: acting on behalf of the majority.
First, I was pleased to hear the President come out in favor of majority rule.
A couple of notable examples suggest that it’s a change of heart.
Let’s start with his Iran Deal.
What does the polling say?
According to a Quinnipiac University poll ….
“American voters oppose 57% to 28%, the nuclear pact negotiated with Iran …. 58% say the nuclear pact will make the world less safe.”
Hmmm.
Looks like a majority to me. A sizable majority.
But, full steam ahead…
Or, how about my predictable, favorite example ….
YouGov ran a poll asking a national sample which states were viewed favorably … and which were viewed unfavorably.
Then, they ranked states based on the net difference between favorable and unfavorable views.
The winner: sunny paradise Hawaii.
Interestingly, the rest of the top 10 is dominated by northern and mountain states.
Guess which state has the lowest favorability rating …
Thanks to social media, today’s teens are the first to have a complete record of their whole lives — their thoughts, their actions, and their friends.
Eric Schmidt — Google chairman and ex-CEO — worries, however, that they’ll be the first who’ll never be allowed to forget their mistakes.
Schmidt says: “People are now sharing too much.”
More specifically, privacy pundits say that it just takes your name, zip code and birth date to ID you and start linking your online and offline personal data … forever.
Now, Pew has published a research study re: teen’s online habits .
Here are the Pew results …
Since, I started preparing my taxes this weekend, I got curious …
Pew Research says that overall, 33% of Americans say they do their own taxes while 56% say someone else prepares their taxes.
A majority of Americans (56%) have a negative reaction to doing their income taxes 1 in 4 say they hate doing them.
Among those who dislike or hate doing their taxes, most cite the hassles of the process or the amount of time it takes:
About a third (34%) say they either like (29%) or love (5%) doing their taxes.
Here are some details re: the “likers” and lovers …
Recently, a poll finally asked a question that really cuts to the chase:
Which better describes how you feel about the way things are going in the world these days?
Started me wondering:
What’s up with a goofy idiom like “going to hell in a handbasket”?
Since, I started preparing my taxes this weekend, I got curious …
Pew Research says that overall, 33% of Americans say they do their own taxes while 56% say someone else prepares their taxes.
A majority of Americans (56%) have a negative reaction to doing their income taxes 1 in 4 say they hate doing them.
Among those who dislike or hate doing their taxes, most cite the hassles of the process or the amount of time it takes:
About a third (34%) say they either like (29%) or love (5%) doing their taxes.
Here are some details re: the “likers” and lovers …
Fusion.net surveyed 1000 people aged 18-34 about everything from politics to dating.
One finding: The millennials are say they’re engaged ahead of the all-important 2016 election.
That’s a good thing, except …
One question revealed how alarmingly uninformed they are about politics …
Last week, Sen. Chuck Schumer caused a stir in Democrat ranks’ by observing that President Barack Obama’s insistence on revamping the healthcare system was, in Schumer’s words, “misguided” and was a major cause of the GOP’s mid-term election romp & stomp.
Schumer is still all for massive healthcare changes.
His observation is strictly political.
His reasoning:
“Democrats were targeting the uninsured, a population that makes up only about 5 percent of registered voters. Only about one-third of the uninsured are registered or eligible to vote.” Source
Schumer’s on the right track, but misses a bigger point: When people are forced to give up something they have, they overvalue the loss and try hard to recoup it.
Think, the higher premiums and changed doctors that millions of folks have had had to endure.
Behavioral theorists have long observed that most people are risk adverse and, due in part to an “endowment effect”, they “value” losses greater than gains.
Endowment Effect: People tend to ascribe a higher value to things that they already own than to comparable things that they don’t own. For example, a car-seller might think his sleek machine is “worth” $10,000 even though credible appraisers say it’s worth $7,500. Sometimes the difference is due to information asymmetry (e.g. the owner knows more about the car’s fine points), but usually it’s just a cognitive bias – the Endowment Effect.
The chart below illustrates the gains & losses concept.
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For example, would you take any of these coin flip gambles?
Most people pass on #1 and #2, but would hop on #3 and #4.
OK, now let’s show how all of this relates to ObamaCare.
This was a wild week for ObamaCare.
First, there’s the steady stream “You’re stupid, America” videos from Prof. Jon Gruber.
Then, the 2nd Annual Open Enrollment period started for the Federal Health Insurance Exchange.
No big news there.
But, the combo of Gruber and the Open Enrollment, got the pollsters springing into action … with the politicos spinning like tops.
A couple of Gallup polls made news … with seemingly contradictory results.
The first was headlined:
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The second poll reported that moe than 70% of the folks who got their insurance through the Federal Exchange rated it as “good” or “excellent” …
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Seems contradictory, right?
Is it 37% or 70%?
Let’s drill down a bit to reconcile the numbers …
The United States Elections Project estimates that only 36.6% of eligible voters cast a ballot on Tuesday.
That’s pretty ironic since the Dems were, before the election, boasting about their predictive analytics and their unstoppable get-out-the-vote organization.
I haven’t been hearing much on the news about the GOTV machine that failed to get-out-the-vote.
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So, what happened? Here are a couple of hypotheses to ponder (more…)
The election results looked a lot different than the pollsters predicted.
Pat Roberts was supposed to lose … he won by a comfortable margin.
Joni Ernst “might” eek out win … she romped.
Mark Warner was supposed to be popping champagne corks by 8 o’clock … he got less than 50% and the VA race hasn’t been officially called yet.
What happened?
Nate Silver’s 535 has nailed the symptoms … but not the cause.
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Bottom line: Silver’s crew observes that there was an average 4-point polling bias in favor of the Dems ….
Former darling of the left for having predicted President Obama’s hefty win over Mitt Romney, stats-jock Nate Silver has given his final pre-election prediction:
76% chance that the Republicans take control of the Senate today … with odds trending their way.
Silver’s prediction slides between the high-end Washington Post (97%) and CNN (95%) … and the low-balling New York Times (70%).
That means that there’s a 100% chance that Silver gets neither savant accolades, nor hoot-calls … his prediction is stuck in the middle.
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Excerpted from USA Today …
Studies also have shown that voters don’t always remember accurately just who it was they backed before.
Why?
“Voters who defect from their party … are more likely to ‘forget’ this over time and to report a vote more consistent with their current party identification”
“Reports of past vote also correlate with current preferences.”
That’s to say, if the candidate gets elected and disappoints, some voters revise history and claim that they never voted for the bum.
A recent USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll in a half-dozen states with key Senate races underscore the point.
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Here’s what’s going on …
This week, a poll finally asked a question that really cuts to the chase:
Which better describes how you feel about the way things are going in the world these days?
Started me wondering:
What’s up with a goofy idiom like “going to hell in a handbasket”?
Behavioral theorists have long observed that most people are risk adverse and, due in part to an “endowment effect”, they “value” losses greater than gains.
Endowment Effect: People tend to ascribe a higher value to things that they already own than to comparable things that they don’t own. For example, a car-seller might think his sleek machine is “worth” $10,000 even though credible appraisers say it’s worth $7,500. Sometimes the difference is due to information asymmetry (e.g. the owner knows more about the car’s fine points), but usually it’s just a cognitive bias – the Endowment Effect.
The chart below illustrates the gains & losses concept.
=====
For example, would you take any of these coin flip gambles?
Most people pass on #1 and #2, but would hop on #3 and #4.
OK, now let’s show how all of this relates to ObamaCare.
First, a definition lifted from Wiki:
Buyer’s remorse is the sense of regret after having made a purchase. It is frequently associated with the purchase of a big ticket item such as a car or house.
It may stem from fear of making the wrong choice, guilt over extravagance, or a suspicion of having been overly influenced by the seller.
Buyer’s remorse is thought to stem from the post-decision cognitive dissonance that arises when a person makes a difficult decision.
Factors that affect buyer’s remorse include resources invested, the involvement of the purchaser, whether the purchase is compatible with the purchaser’s goals, and what positive or negative evidence the purchaser encounters post-purchase that confirms or denies the purchase as a good idea.
= = = = =
Bet you can guess where this one is going.
Remember the 2012 election when Obama squared off against Romney?
Obama won the election with 51% of the popular vote.
My, how things have changed.
Recent Pew Poll …
Slim majority of folks agree that President Obama “cares about people like me”.
There are still believes: 51-49 on “trustworthiness”
But, less than half agree that he’s a “strong leader” who is “able to get things done”.
Source: Pew
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Poll didn’t ask”faithfully executes laws” or “able to raise big money for political campaigns”
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A recent Gallup poll reports that 72% of Muslims approve of the job that President Obama is doing.
78% of Mormons dis-approve …
More generally, the President is under-water with Christians … above water with non-Christians and atheists … and still has Jewish support.
Hmmm.
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Answer: A compelling, bi-partisan majority of U.S. politicians and citizens.
The question aroused my interest since it’s commonly implied that only Bush, Cheney and a handful of Neocons were on board with the invasion decision.
First, let’s look at the blowhard politicians.
The 2002 Iraq War Resolution passed the House 296 (68%) to 133 (31%) … with 81 Democrats voting for it.
In the Senate, the vote was 77 to 23 … with 29 of 50 Democrats voting for it …. Among the notable Dems voting yes: Biden, Clinton, Kerry, Hagel … Side note: Obama wasn’t in the Senate yet.
Below is a summary of the vote … click for details re: how each Senator & Congressional Rep voted.
Now the bigger question: Did Congress vote the will of the people?
Interesting infographic from Pew calibrating something that everybody knows …
Democrats are becoming more liberal Republicans are getting more conservative … and the moderate middle-ground between the parties is getting smaller, and smaller and smaller …
About 40% of Democrats think that Republicans are destroying the country … and, about 40% of Republicans think that Democrats are destroying the country.
Here’s the finding that I found most interesting …
Well, it depends on your metric.
In terms or raw number of murders, Chicago has led the league for the past 2 years … with 412 murders in 2013 alone.
As should be expected, big cities dominate the top 10 list … partly a matter of sheer population size.
Source: Daily Beast
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To be statistically fair, let’s adjust the numbers to reflect population size.
Which U.S. city has the highest per capita murder rate?
Thanks to social media, today’s teens are the first to have a complete record of their whole lives — their thoughts, their actions, and their friends.
Eric Schmidt — Google chairman and ex-CEO — worries, however, that they’ll be the first who’ll never be allowed to forget their mistakes.
Schmidt says: “People are now sharing too much.”
More specifically, privacy pundits say that it just takes your name, zip code and birth date to ID you and start linking your online and offline personal data … forever.
Now, Pew has published a research study re: teen’s online habits .
Here are the Pew results …
At our house, we play a game that I affectionately call “Guess the Food”.
Here’s the way it works …
My wife Kathy asks want I want for dinner tonite. I answer. She then explains why that’s not a good answer and asks the question again. I answer again, she explains again and repeats the question … until I guess the right food.
After decades of playing the game, I’ve gotten pretty good and can usually guess what I want for dinner by the 3rd or 4th guess.
OK, let’s tie that in to ObamaCare …
Pew recently released poll results that indicate an approval / disapproval gap of 14 percentage points (55% disapprove to 41% approve)
And, as in earlier surveys, Pew reports opposition to the law is more intense than support: 43% of the public disapproves of the law very strongly – about 80% of the disapprovers — and only 26% approve of the law very strongly – a gap of 17 percentage points.
Geez, given 8 million sign-ups, how can that be?
During 2013, the left-leaning Washington Post slapped President Obama with a slew of Pinnochios.
The year ended with PolitiFact.com – a branch of the left-leaning Tampa Bay Times — giving President Obama their “Lie of the Year” award for his infamous oft-repeated “Like your plan, keep you plan …Like your doctor, keep you doctor”. Source
So, it shouldn’t surprise anybody that, in a recent poll, 61% of the people polled said that President Obama lied on important issues some or most of the time
Only 15 % said that he never lied.
The drill-down number get more interesting …
Holy smokes.
First, a dude from Hangover asks him: “What’s it like to be the last black President?”
Then, some dullard named Jolly rides the anti-ObamaCare train to victory in a Florida Congressional election.
And, finally, more bad polling from WSJ / NBC (which I assume offset one another re: political bias)
The top line: Approval slides to 41% … an all-time low.
Here are some nuggets that I found interesting in the polls details ..
Mass media was making a big deal when the President’s approval scores bounced from the low 40s to the mid-40s after the SOTU address.
Premature victory dance?
Today;s Gallup daily tracking poll put Obama right back at the presidential Mendoza line: 40%.
Source: Gallup
Results are consistent with the other major polls tracked by RealClearPolitics …
When 5 or 6 million folks who like their health insurance, lost their health insurance … the Administration pooh-poohed the number as a “small sliver”.
Hmmm.
Let’s try another angle …
The Kaiser Family Foundation reports that 1 in 10 Americans think that ObamaCare has impacted them directly.
That’s about 30 million folks
And, was the impact good or bad?
I always roll my eyes when the President declares that ObamaCare is the law of the land and nobody wants to re-litigate it..
I hate to resort to facts, but, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a majority of the country now views the law unfavorably .. only 34% view it favorably.
The trend isn’t good for the President’s claim.
And, remember the uninsureds – the folks that ObamaCare was designed to help?
Some interesting nums from Gallup …
Based on recent polling, about 1 in 3 Americans are “not familiar” with ObamaCare-ACA.
Thefolks who are least likely to be familiar with the law are youngsters and DEMOCRATS … i.e. Obama’s prime constituency.
Go figure
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And, digging deeper, the numbers get even more interesting …
I guess that since it’s Halloween, Rasmussen felt obligated to put that question to a broad sample of Americans.
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37% said that gov’t workers would outperform zombies.
Blacks are more than twice as likely as whites and other minority Americans to believe the government workers would do a better job than zombies.
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37% said that zombies would outperform gov’t workers … a tie.
Men are more likely than women to think zombies would do a better job running the country.
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26% called it a “push”.
Happy Halloween !
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The government shutdown was jolting to Congressional (and GOP) already low ratings.
Pundits were projecting a big positive bump for the President.
That was an eternity ago.
You know, a couple of weeks.
Then the spotlight turned to the ObamaCare fiascos … the web site mess and the loss of Obama-guaranteed health insurance policies.
Worm turned.
Latest NBC-WSJ poll reports an all-time low Presidential approval rating of 42% … down 5 percentage points from earlier in the month … and. down 10 percentage points from January.
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What’s driving the drop?
All the pundits are saying that President Obama is winning big as the GOP’s ham-handles the government shut down.
Hmmm.
Apparently the pundits don’t look at the numbers.
On Friday, Obama’s sagging approval ratings dropped to 41% in Gallup’s daily tracking poll.
With a 52% disapproval rating, that puts him 11 points underwater in a poll that generally leans a bit to the left.
If you think that Gallup is an outlier, then keep reading …
Right when you think trust in government has bottomed out, Gallup releases a new poll.
Gallup is reporting Less than half of Americans trust the government to handle any kind of problems, anall-time low..
According to Gallup. just 49% of Americans have a great deal or fair amount of confidence in the federal government to handle international problems
The previous low was 51 percent in 2007.
And, that’s the good news.
Trust is even lower on domestic issues.
It has been a couple of years since I glanced at ASCI Customer Satisfaction numbers.
And, I was a bit surprised by the numbers …
During the 1990s, there was a pronounced drop in customer satisfaction … aggregated across all categories of products.
But since 1997, there has been a steady improvement … reaching new historic highs.
Here are the details by product category …
Recent polls have indicated that there is very low public support for military action against Syria.
Gallup says that 68% of Americans say the United States should not use military action in Syria to attempt to end the civil war there.
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Ditto a Reuters/Ipsos poll that says “Americans strongly oppose U.S. intervention in Syria’s civil war and believe Washington should stay out of the conflict even if reports that Syria’s government used deadly chemicals to attack civilians are confirmed,”
More specifically, “about 60 percent of Americans surveyed said the United States should not intervene in Syria’s civil war, while just 9 percent thought military action should be taken.”
A historical context puts an interesting paint job on these numbers …
You may remember that the BLS reported tha, for July, the unemployment rate continued its decline … all the way down to 7.4%.
Good news. right.
Not so fast …
That’s 41% according to Gallup which has been scoring Obama higher than most polls for the past couple of months.
A majority now disapprove of the job the President is doing.
The trend is down … despite the recent campaign-like swing, an appearance on Leno and, finally, a press conference.
Looks like the “phony scandals” line – which has garnered most of the attention – isn’t exactly catching on.
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RealClear Politics’ poll-of-polls now puts Obama at 43.6% approve, 51% disapprove … putting the President underwater by 7.4 percentage points.
Several polls put the President underwater by more than 10 percentage points … only CBS has his approval higher than his disapproval.
Here’s a recap of all the polls in the average …
A recent Pew survey has captured a lot of headlines claiming that an increasing percentage and number of Millennials to move back with mom and dad due to the bad economy, rising college enrollments and declining marriage rates.
The headlines are technically true but, in my opinion, are very misleading.
Here’s why …
A question I’ve asked before: Have you ever listened to one of President Obama’s weekly internet-radio addresses?
I haven’t … and don’t know anybody who has.
More broadly … do you listen to his speeches?
The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan hit the nail on the head on ABC’s This Week Sunday.
“I think every president in the intense media environment we have now, certainly every two-term president, gets to a point where the American people stop listening, stop leaning forward hungrily for information.
I think this president got there earlier than most presidents. And I think he’s in that time now.”
That presents a context the President’s current speech tour aimed at bolstering support for ObamaCare and quashing the “phony scandals”.
How’s that working out?
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The RealClearPolitics poll-of-polls has Obama’s approval rating underwater … under the 45% Mendoza Line … and trending down.
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While Gallup & Rasmussen – the polls I average to read what’s happening — have Obama’s approval pegged at 45% and 46%, respectively ….
Two polls – Reuters & The Economist – peg Obama’s approval at only 41%.
Ouch
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Maybe Peggy Noonan is right …
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According to a new Gallup poll, not many people … less than 1 in 4
That’s down from 46% in 1993 … twenty years ago.
Old folks (30%) cut the most slack; college educated folks (15%) cut the least.
Not surprising, liberals (26%) trust TV news more than conservatives (18%)
All of which leads to a bigger question: if folks don’t trust government, corporations, media … what’s left?
Who to trust?
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According to the latest FoxNews poll …
About 3 in 4 Americans think Congress should continue its investigations into the recent government scandals … slightly more for the IRS targeting, slightly fewer for the Benghazi cover-up.
The poll didn’t ask about the phone-internet surveillance flap.
Bottom line: Even if you discount the numbers because its Fox, it looks like some nerves were touched …
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