Brookings: Topics - Voter Turnout

The Week After Pakistan's General Election

Madiha Afzal — Mon, 20 May 2013 15:07:00 -0400

The week after May 11, all Pakistanis can stand tall and be proud of what they have accomplished. We have shown that we are among the bravest citizens of any country in the world, participating in massive rallies leading up to the election, and turning out to vote on election day in record numbers, despite the Taliban threats and violence. We were also decisive, handing the PML-N a landslide victory, yielding the PPP a massive blow and giving third-party status to the PTI.

While a small number of results may turn out to be affected by vote rigging and irregularities, these election results truly reflect the voice of the Pakistani people. My research using election results and development funds data from the 1990s shows that Pakistani voters are not irrational: they will vote for the candidate or party, who provides them the most benefits, and against those they see as having wronged them. For its resounding victory, the PML-N deserves nothing but congratulations, genuine goodwill and support for tackling the monumental tasks it faces. Nawaz Sharif has shown maturity in his last five years in the opposition and exudes determination going forward. These characteristics will serve him well in office.

Imran Khan deserves accolades for energising Pakistan’s vocal urban youth, as well as many older, educated, and previously politically unengaged urbanites in turning out to vote. As such, the increase in voter turnout to around 60 per cent must, at least, partly be attributed to his efforts. The PTI is now a formidable third party in Pakistan, fundamentally changing the structure of the Pakistani party system and democracy as we know it. According to my calculations based on data from the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) website (as of May 16), of Punjab’s 138 National Assembly constituencies where the PTI was not the winner (it won eight National Assembly seats in Punjab) and where results were not withheld, the second runner-up candidate belonged to the PTI in 48 constituencies. That is an impressive achievement, one which the PTI and Mr Khan must be very proud of. It demonstrates that the PTI has made considerable inroads in Punjab.

The passion of Mr Khan’s followers in documenting and protesting vote-rigging, ballot stuffing and other illegal activities at polling stations over the last week also deserves commendation and heralds the arrival of a Naya Pakistan, one in which citizens speak up when they are wronged, a Pakistan which demands fairness and justice.

The passion of Mr Khan’s followers in documenting and protesting vote-rigging, ballot stuffing and other illegal activities at polling stations over the last week also deserves commendation and heralds the arrival of a Naya Pakistan, one in which citizens speak up when they are wronged, a Pakistan which demands fairness and justice. Mr Khan’s appeal to the ECP to look into vote-rigging in 25 constituencies should be taken very seriously, whether it changes the results of the election in his favour or not. Regardless of whether ballot-stuffing happened in four constituencies or 40, it is illegal, and a truly fair electoral system should tolerate no instance of it.

But let’s talk for a minute about where the PTI did very well — Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Mr Khan’s party won 17 out of its 27 National Assembly seats there, and a plurality in the K-P provincial assembly, winning 35 seats out of 99. Mr Khan’s supporters on social media have hailed the Pashtuns as visionaries, as being more progressive than the rest of Pakistan. Photographs of a modern Peshawar skyline in 2018 as the outcome of five years of a provincial PTI government are doing the rounds. But are the Pashtuns really the idealists they are being made out to be, the path-breakers to a Naya Pakistan? What about the role of the Taliban in all this?

The truth is a lot less romantic than the PTI stalwarts would proclaim. We know that the PTI is the only party that was able to effectively campaign in K-P given the Taliban’s brutal and unrelenting assault on the ANP. True, the ANP faced a disadvantage as the incumbent provincial government, which supervised over a terrible five years in K-P. Nevertheless, it is astounding that it got no sympathy for the bullets and the bombs it took for Pakistani democracy. Not from the voters of K-P, and not from the active PTI protesters who were out at Teen Talwar and Lalik Chowk protesting alleged election fraud in Karachi and Lahore. What do these newly mobilised youth think of the fact that the Taliban essentially handed the K-P to the PTI?

Regionalism and provincialism, already reflected in the election results, have become even more pronounced in this past week as blame is assigned for not embracing Mr Khan’s vision, and class fissures have opened up. The Punjabis are being maligned by PTI supporters outside Punjab for being misguided, and rural Punjabis denigrated by urban Punjabis for being irrational. No one is thinking of Balochistan at all, where turnout was dismal amid security concerns. The truth is that the PTI energised and engaged a minority, the urban young, who did not, in the end, garner it significant voting power in parliament.

This is not to discount by any means the notable performance of the PTI candidates as runners-up in Punjab’s constituencies. But the irony is that those who got the PTI over the finish line are the residents of K-P, a very different segment from the elite Lahore and Karachi base, who consider themselves the PTI’s face. In the end, the illusion generated by massive rallies in Lahore and Islamabad belied the truth that the PTI represented but a minority of Pakistan’s population. Mr Khan led an extraordinary campaign, and over the next five years, he can make significant inroads where he does not yet have a base: in rural Punjab and in Sindh and Balochistan.

Authors

Madiha Afzal

Publication: Tribune

Barack Obama's Recipe for Electoral Success

William A. Galston — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 10:00:00 -0500

After a hard-fought presidential campaign, President Obama was reelected with a narrow margin in the popular vote but a sizeable win in the Electoral College. Nearly every swing state fell into his column, and it appears that Mitt Romney took back only two states (Indiana and North Carolina) that Obama had seized in 2008. Defying the predictions of a year ago, Democrats actually gained in the Senate, but they did not come close to regaining control of the House. So divided government continues for at least two more years.

Obama won with a massive outpouring of votes from the core of his coalition—young adults, minorities, unmarried women, and lower income families. Despite numerous indications to the contrary during the campaign, voters under 30 constituted a slightly higher percentage of the electorate than they did in 2008. So did Latinos, who went for Obama by an overwhelming margin of 71 to 24 percent. White voters represented 72 percent of the electorate, down from 74 percent in 2008. The demographic shift continues its inexorable grind.

In several respects, the winning Obama coalition was narrower than it was four years ago. The president’s share of the white vote was down from 43 to 39 percent. He was supported by 56 percent of moderates, down from 60 percent, and by 45 percent of Independents, down from 52 percent. While the party composition of the electorate was virtually unchanged, the liberal share rose from 22 to 25 percent, enabling Obama to overcome a drop in support among conservatives. And while the president’s share of the vote from households making $50 thousand or less held steady at 60 percent, his support among middle income households ($50 to 100 thousand) fell from 49 to 46 percent, and among households making more than $100 thousand, from 49 to 44 percent.

In his victory speech last night, Obama listed a number of important goals for his second term—restoring fiscal stability, reforming the tax code, enacting comprehensive immigration reform, and achieving energy security. It remains to be seen whether a divisive election in a divided America has laid the foundation for progress in these areas. Obama believes that despite these differences, we are still “One America.” However that may be, it will take the skills of a statesman to forge the agreements we will need to move the country forward.

Authors

William A. Galston

Image Source: © Jim Bourg / Reuters

Will Undecided Voters Tip the Election Against Obama?

William A. Galston — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 00:00:00 -0400

As the 2012 election reaches the homestretch, most pundits are focusing on voter mobilization—turning out each side’s committed supporters. Is the Obama campaign’s ground game as good as its reputation? How much of an improvement does the Romney campaign represent over McCain’s?

These questions are well worth asking. Still, observers should remember—as should the campaigns—that uncommitted voters still matter. Nationally, about 5 percent of likely voters—between 6 and 7 million people—report that they remain undecided. Despite the extraordinary amount of advertising and candidate time lavished on the swing states, most of them have large pools of uncommitted voters as well—6 percent in Ohio, 5 percent in Florida and Colorado, 4 percent in Iowa and Virginia. And President Obama remains at or below 48 percent of the vote in each of those states. The undecided vote, in other words, can still be decisive in deciding the election.

To see how much uncommitted voters can matter, let’s compare potential gains from committed and uncommitted voters. A widely accepted rule of thumb is that a superior ground game directed at core supporters can raise turnout for a candidate by between 1 and 2 percent—in the context of today’s electorate, by between 650 thousand and 1.3 million votes. If the 5 percent pool of uncommitted voters splits 55-45, the candidate receiving the larger share nets about 650 thousand votes; if they split 60-40, about 1.3 million. The difference between an even and uneven split of uncommitted voters is in the same range as the difference between a superior and mediocre ground game.

How are undecided voters likely to split this year? While no one knows for sure, the two most recent presidential elections involving incumbents suggest that challenger has an advantage. Here are the exit poll numbers, categorized by the timing of voters’ final decisions:

1996			2004
	Last Week	Before That		Last Week	Before That
Clinton	35	52	Bush	45	52
Dole	41	38	Kerry	52	47

Although Clinton won by 8 percentage points overall, Dole edged him by 6 points among late voters who made up their minds during the final week. In 2004, Bush bested Kerry by 3 points, but Kerry defeated him by 7 points among the late deciders.

There’s evidence that the environment of the incumbent/challenger race makes a difference. 1996 was not an especially polarizing election overall, and fully 17 percent of those who voted waited until the last week to make up their minds. By contrast, the 2004 electorate polarized over the invasion of Iraq and the conduct of the “war on terror,” and only 11 percent remained undecided as the final week of the campaign began. Because partisan and ideological polarization are even sharper in 2012, there’s good reason to conjecture that the percentage of voters who remain undecided with a week to go will be much smaller. That does not imply, however, that the propensity of these voters to favor the challenger will change.

There’s no guarantee that the past is prologue, of course. Every election is different, and this one may break the mold. Political generalizations are empirical, not metaphysical, and they’re true only until a disconfirming event occurs. Still, it’s easier to construct an explanation for why late deciders tend to break for the challenger than the reverse. If undecided voters approved of the incumbent’s job performance, they wouldn’t have much of an incentive to vote against him. So the odds are that they’re lukewarm at best about him and are trying to make up their minds whether the challenger represents an acceptable alternative.

During the past few weeks, the Romney campaign has done everything in its power to render their man acceptable, and they appear to have made some headway. In less than two weeks, we’ll find out whether Obama’s ground game will be enough to neutralize the likely tilt of late-deciders toward Romney. Nobody knows for sure, but one thing is clear: it’s an analytical mistake to focus on the former without taking the latter into account.

Authors

William A. Galston

Publication: The New Republic

Image Source: © Jason Reed / Reuters

Early Voting: A Live Web Chat with Michael McDonald

Wed, 26 Sep 2012 12:30:00 -0400

Event Information

September 26, 2012
12:30 PM - 1:00 PM EDT

Online Only
The Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC

Thousands of Americans are already casting their votes in the 2012 elections through a variety of vote-by-mail and in-person balloting that allows citizens to cast their votes well in advance of November 6. From military personnel posted overseas to absentee voters, these early voting opportunities give voters the opportunity to make their voices heard even when they can’t stand in line on Election Day. However, there are pitfalls in the process.

Expert Michael McDonald says that while a great deal of attention has been focused on voter fraud, the untold story is that during the last presidential election, some 400,000 absentee ballots were discarded as improperly submitted. How can early voters make sure their voices are heard? What effect will absentee and other early voting programs have in this election year? On September 26, McDonald took your questions and comments in a live web chat moderated by Vivyan Tran of POLITICO.

12:30 Vivyan Tran: Welcome everyone, let's get started.

12:30 Michael McDonald: Early voting was 30% of all votes cast in the 2008 election. My expectation is that 35% of all votes in 2012 will be cast prior to Election Day. In some states, the volume will be much higher. In the battleground state of CO, about 85% of the votes will be cast early; 70% in FL; and 45% in Ohio.

What does it all mean? Hopefully I will be able to answer that question in today's chat!

12:30 Comment from JMC: At what point do you think that the in person early voters become less partisan types eager to cast their vote and more "regular folks" who would be more swayed by debate performances, TV ads, and the like?

12:30 Comment from Jason: 400,000 absentee ballots were discarded in 2008? How?

12:30 Michael McDonald: Reasons why election officials reject mail ballots: unsigned, envelope not sealed, multiple ballots in one envelope, etc. 400K rejected in 2008 does not include the higher rate of spoiled ballots that typically occur with paper mail ballots compared to electronic recording devices used in polling places. Moral: make sure you follow closely the proper procedures to cast your mail ballot!

12:31 Michael McDonald: @JMC: If they are going to vote early, most people wait until the week prior to the election. Those voting now have already made up their minds. But, the polls indicate many people have already done so, so maybe we see more early voting in 2012 as a consequence.

12:31 Comment from User: It was my understanding that absentee ballots are never counted unless the race is incredibly close in a particular state? Is that true - or do the rules for that vary by state?

12:32 Michael McDonald: No, all early votes are counted. What may not be counted, depending on state law and if the election is close enough for them to matter, are provisional ballots.

12:33 Comment from Damion: The blurb here says 400,000 early votes were discarded. Shouldn't the board of elections be reprimanded for that? Who was at fault and what consequences were there?

12:33: Michael McDonald: No, these are ballots "discarded" because people did not follow proper procedures and they must be rejected by law.

12:33 Comment from Shirley: Can you Facebook your vote in?

12:34 Michael McDonald: No. However, election officials are transmitting ballots electronically to overseas citizens and military voters. Voters must print the ballot, fill it out, sign it, scan it, and return. There are ways for these voters to verify that their ballot was received.

12:35 Comment from Karen K: What kind of impact could these discards have on the 2012 election?

12:36 Michael McDonald: Difficult to say. More Republicans vote by mail (excluding all mail ballot states). But, we don't know much about those who fail to follow the procedures. They might be less educated or elderly, and thus might counter the overall trend we see in mail balloting. Who knows?

12:37 Comment from User: This is the first I've heard of so many early votes getting discarded. Is this an issue people are addressing in a serious way?

12:38 Michael McDonald: Unfortunately, we are too focused on issues like voter fraud, which are low occurrence events, when there are many more important ways in which votes are lost in the system. Hopefully we can get the message out so fewer people disenfranchise themselves.

12:39 Comment from Anonymous: What do we know so far about absentee votes for 2012? Can we tell who they're leaning toward in specific states and how?

12:40 Michael McDonald: It's a little early :) yet. One of the major changes from 2008 is that the overseas civilian ballots -- a population that leans D -- was sent ballots much earlier this year than in 2008. We'll get a much better sense of the state of play in the two weeks prior to the election.

12:41 Michael McDonald: That said, the number of absentee ballot requests is running about the same as in 2008, if not a little higher, suggesting that the early vote will indeed be higher than in 2008, and perhaps that overall turnout will be on par with 2008, too.

12:41 Comment from Leslie: So, how can I ensure my early ballot is counted? There are so many rules and regulations, I'm never sure I've brought/filled out the paperwork.

12:42 Michael McDonald: Many states and localities allow people to check on-line the status of their ballot. Do a search for your local election official's webpage to see if that is available to you.

12:42 Comment from Daryyl: Can you define provisional ballots then?

12:44 Michael McDonald: Provisional ballots are required under federal law to allow people to vote if there is a problem with their voter registration. Election officials work after the election to resolve the situation.

If you vote in-person early, then you can resolve provisional ballot situations much sooner, which is good.

12:45 Michael McDonald: Some states use provisional ballots for other purposes: e.g., for a person who does not have the required id or to manage a change in voter registration address. One of the untold stories of this cycle is that FL will manage change of reg. address through provisional ballots. OH does so, and 200K provisionals were cast in 2008. Expect 300K in FL, which may mean we will not know the outcome in FL until weeks after the election. Can you say 2000?

12:45 Comment from Mark, Greenbelt: Is early voting a new phenomenon, or is it increasing? It seems we should make it easier for people to vote when they can.

12:46 Michael McDonald: We are seeing more people vote early, particularly in states that offer the option. However, only MD changed its law from 2008 to allow in-person early voting. OH is sending absentee ballot requests to all registered voters, which is not a change in law, but a change in procedure that is expected to significantly increase early voting there.

12:47 Comment from Jennifer S. : Why do we vote on Tuesday? It seems inconvenient. Wouldn't more people vote if we did it on the weekend? Or over a period of days that offered both morning and evening hours?

12:48 Michael McDonald: We used to have early voting in the US! Back at the Founding, elections were held over several days to allow people living in remote areas to get to the courthouse (the polling place back in the day) to vote. In the mid-1840s, the federal gov't set the current single day for voting because -- what else? -- claims of vote fraud. That people could vote more than once.

12:49 Comment from Winston: What percentage of the U.S. population votes? And, if you could make one change that would increase voting in the U.S. what would be?

12:50 Michael McDonald: I also calculate turnout rates for the country for the media and academics. 62.2% of the eligible voters cast a ballot that counted in 2008. If I were to wave a magic wand, I would have election day registration. California just adopted it yesterday (but starting 2015). States with EDR have +5-7 percentage points of turnout.

12:50 Comment from Bernie S.: One of your colleagues at Brookings, Bill Galston, has suggested that we make voting mandatory, as they do in Australia. What do you think of that idea? Is it even possible here?

12:51 Michael McDonald: That will never happen in a county that values individual freedom so deeply as the US. Fun fact: a few years back, AZ voters rejected a ballot initiative to have voters entered into a lottery.

12:51 Comment from James: If early voting becomes more and more common, shouldn't candidates start campaigning earlier?

12:53 Michael McDonald: They do. In fact, you will see the presidential candidates visit battleground states that have in-person early voting at the start of the period. In 2008, you could see how early voting increased in places where Obama held rallies.

12:53 Comment from Devi P. : What are the factors that drive turnout? How do we get people to the polls? And what can you say about the "microtargeting" strategies the political parties are using to get their voters out?

12:54 Michael McDonald: One of the major ways in which elections have changed in the past decade is that campaigns now place more effort into voter contacts. Over 50% of people reported a contact in 2008. These contacts are known to increase turnout rates by upwards of 10 percentage points. Even contacts from Facebook friends seems to matter!

12:54 Comment from Wendy P, Ohio: What's your position on electronic voting? Can't every voting machine be hacked? Isn't plain old paper balloting more secure?

12:56 Michael McDonald: I went to Caltech, so I am sensitive to the potential for hacking. That said, I encourage experimentation so that we can build a better system. There are counties that do hold electronic elections!

12:56 Comment from Leslie: 400,000 seems like a lot - does this actually have impact on the electoral votes, and if so, should we be worried in this coming election that a lengthy recall may occur?

12:57 Michael McDonald: It could affect the outcome. So please spread the word through your networks. This is the #1 way in which votes are lost in the system!

12:57 Comment from JVotes: Perhaps we should microtarget with ballot issues. Many Americans seem disappointed with the two candidates we have to choose from.

12:58 Michael McDonald: Actually, ballot issues are known to increase turnout. But only a small amount in a presidential election, about 1 percentage point. People vote in the main show: the presidential election.

12:58 Michael McDonald: Interesting aside on that: early voting seems to have a small turnout effect in presidential election, but a larger effect in state and local elections.

12:58 Comment from Jaime Ravenet: Is there a reading of the new voter ID requirements (in at least the 9 most contested states) that does not constitute an "abridgment" of citizens' voting rights?

1:00 Michael McDonald: Perhaps under state constitutions. But the US Supreme Court has already ruled in favor of Indiana's id law. Still, that does not mean that lawyers will try to find some way under federal law to overturn them. TX was blocked because their law was determined to be discriminatory, per Sec. 5 of the Voting Rights Act.

1:00 Vivyan Tran: Thanks for the questions everyone, see you next week!

Previewing the 2012 Presidential Election: A Live Web Chat with William Galston

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 12:30:00 -0400

Event Information

June 6, 2012
12:30 PM - 1:00 PM EDT

Online only
The Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC

With a decisive victory in the Texas primary, GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney passed the 1,144 delegate threshold and clinched his party’s nomination. The final sprint to the White House now begins in earnest as President Obama and candidate Romney crisscross the country courting voters and outlining their competing visions for nation.

How are the campaigns adapting themselves in key swing states such as Florida, Ohio and Virginia? Will a slowing economic recovery derail President Obama’s chances for reelection? On June 6, Brookings expert William Galston took your questions and comments in a live web chat moderated by Vivyan Tran of POLITICO.

12:30 Vivyan Tran: Welcome everyone, let's get started!

12:30 [Comment From Anne: ] How does Gov. Walker's win in Wisconsin yesterday affect the presidential election? Will this give added momentum to the Romney campaign?

12:31 William Galston: In two ways. First, the Romney campaign will make an all-out effort to wrest Wisconsin away from Obama. And second, Romney will come under intense conservative pressure not to move to the center during the general election.

12:31 [Comment From Samantha: ] What is your analysis of the campaigns thus far? Are there any obvious adjustments Romney and Obama should make?

12:33 William Galston: The Romney campaign has done a pretty good job of maintaining focus on the economy. By contrast, the Obama campaign has been all over the map. They're spending their time appealing to specific groups (e.g., women, students) on narrow issues rather than making a broad appeal to the country. I expect them to shift course pretty soon.

12:33 [Comment From Joe, S: ] Do the results of last night's recall show that the influence of organized labor is waning in U.S. politics?

12:35 William Galston: Private sector unions have been in steep decline for decades. Last night indicates that public sector unions aren't invincible, at least in current circumstances. Notably, the Wisconsin unions couldn't persuade Obama to campaign for them.

12:35 [Comment From George, DC: ] The economy now seems to be losing steam. Given that the economy appears to be issue #1 this election, how does (or can) Obama adjust?

12:36 William Galston: He can't evade the issue, and at this point he can't affect the economy very much between now and November. So he has to make the case that he's done the best that anyone could have done in very difficult circumstances.

12:36 [Comment From Violet: ] What is your feeling on Citizens United? Should the Supreme Court revisit this issue now that so much corporate money is finding its way into campaigns?

12:37 William Galston: They should, but they won't.

12:37 [Comment From Anthony, Va: ] Has there been any more discussion on Romney's VP choice? When do you think we might hear about his selection?

12:40 William Galston: There has been a lot of talk about it, and it's continuing. Much of the speculation has centered on Rob Portman, a senator from Ohio. He'd be a safe choice, which matters. If Romney thinks he needs a "game-changer," which is what McCain thought in 2008, then he'll go for someone more exciting but riskier (Rubio, Jindal). Right now he's competitive enough with the president not to need to take risks, but that could change. As for timing, there have been rumors that he might break with tradition and name his choice well in advance of the convention.

12:41 [Comment From Brian, DC: ] At this point in the race, which states do you think will prove most critical in the election?

12:45 William Galston: There are three main baskets of states--one in the Midwest, another in the Southwest, the third in the "Rim South." The first is the largest (Wisconsin, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania). In the SW, Colorado and Nevada are critical. The Obama campaign thinks it has a chance in Arizona; I don't. In the Rim South, Virginia looks pretty promising for Obama; North Carolina, much less so. Florida's 29 electoral votes will be hotly contested, as usual, and so will New Hampshire.

12:45 [Comment From Bill, E: ] I know that you are a part of the No Labels organization. What role do you think independent voters will play in the 2012 presidential election?

12:47 William Galston: Crucial. The Pew Research Center recently released a survey showing that 38 percent of Americans now consider themselves independents--an all-time high. To be sure, many of them lean toward one party or another. But it will be difficult for either candidate to win a popular-vote majority without prevailing among the pure independents who are real swing voters.

12:47 [Comment From Bob: ] Do you think this election will come down to the wire in November, or will we have a clear winner sooner than that?

12:49 William Galston: Based on my analysis of the six most recent presidential campaigns involving incumbents, this election is shaping up to be contested all the way. I'd be surprised if either candidate pulled away from the other before the presidential debates in October.

12:49 [Comment From Caitlyn: ] Is there any way for President Obama to be productive in the last few months leading up to the election? Or will he be completely distracted by the campaign?

12:50 William Galston: He's in full campaign mode. And even if he weren't, Congress is in no mood to cooperate with him on a legislative agenda between now and the election.

12:51 [Comment From Virginia: ] Do you think that after the 2012 election, political polarization will die down a bit? When will Washington get back to the matter of actually governing?

12:52 William Galston: Beats me. I thought it would happen after Obama's first two years, but it didn't. It's possible that the two parties won't get together and compromise until there's another crisis. I hope we can do better than that, but I'm not confident that we will.

12:52 [Comment From Karen K: ] Who will out raise whom, and how will this impact the results?

12:53 William Galston: I expect that both campaigns will have plenty of money--unlike 2008, when the Obama forces outspent McCain by a large margin.

12:53 [Comment From Timothy: ] In your opinion, are there ways that the next government can reform Washington and help it operate a little more smoothly and with more bipartisanship?

12:55 William Galston: Yes, absolutely. And the place to begin is Congress. We need common-sense reforms to the nominations process, the filibuster and the congressional work schedule, among other items. The reform agenda already exists, and it's time to move on it.

12:55 [Comment From Erica: ] Do you expect health reform to be a prominent issue in this election cycle? What are we likely to hear on the topic from the Romney and Obama campaigns?

12:56 William Galston: Yes, especially if the Supreme Court overturns some or all of the Affordable Care Act. We'll know before the end of this month.

12:57 [Comment From Elaine: ] What do you think would be the best campaign strategy for Obama going forward?

12:57 William Galston: He should present his record to the American people in the most persuasive way he can. Attacking Romney won't be enough.

12:58 [Comment From Judy: ] How does Romney get back to the center again? If he's elected president, he can't simply govern to the wishes of the far right.

1:00 William Galston: I agree with you, but he hasn't made it any easier for himself in the campaign so far. We'll know pretty soon whether he intends to shift at all from his hard-line primary stances. The real test case is the Hispanic vote, which recoiled in disgust after the Republican debates. If Romney doesn't add anything to his program that's more attractive to Hispanics, he could pay a big price and maybe lose for that reason. He's aware of this fact and has talked about it openly, but he hasn't done anything about it up to now.

1:01 Vivyan Tran: Thanks for the questions everyone, see you next week.

Participants

Panelists

Vivyan Tran

Telling Americans to Vote, or Else

William A. Galston — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0400

Jury duty is mandatory; why not voting? The idea seems vaguely un-American. Maybe so, but it’s neither unusual nor undemocratic. And it would ease the intense partisan polarization that weakens our capacity for self-government and public trust in our governing institutions.

Thirty-one countries have some form of mandatory voting, according to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. The list includes nine members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and two-thirds of the Latin American nations. More than half back up the legal requirement with an enforcement mechanism, while the rest are content to rely on the moral force of the law.

Despite the prevalence of mandatory voting in so many democracies, it’s easy to dismiss the practice as a form of statism that couldn’t work in America’s individualistic and libertarian political culture. But consider Australia, whose political culture is closer to that of the United States than that of any other English-speaking country. Alarmed by a decline in voter turnout to less than 60 percent in 1922, Australia adopted mandatory voting in 1924, backed by small fines (roughly the size of traffic tickets) for nonvoting, rising with repeated acts of nonparticipation. The law established permissible reasons for not voting, like illness and foreign travel, and allows citizens who faced fines for not voting to defend themselves.

The results were remarkable. In the 1925 election, the first held under the new law, turnout soared to 91 percent. In recent elections, it has hovered around 95 percent. The law also changed civic norms. Australians are more likely than before to see voting as an obligation. The negative side effects many feared did not materialize. For example, the percentage of ballots intentionally spoiled or completed randomly as acts of resistance remained on the order of 2 to 3 percent.

Proponents offer three reasons in favor of mandatory voting. The first is straightforwardly civic. A democracy can’t be strong if its citizenship is weak. And right now American citizenship is attenuated — strong on rights, weak on responsibilities. There is less and less that being a citizen requires of us, especially after the abolition of the draft. Requiring people to vote in national elections once every two years would reinforce the principle of reciprocity at the heart of citizenship.

The second argument for mandatory voting is democratic. Ideally, a democracy will take into account the interests and views of all citizens. But if some regularly vote while others don’t, officials are likely to give greater weight to participants. This might not matter much if nonparticipants were evenly distributed through the population. But political scientists have long known that they aren’t. People with lower levels of income and education are less likely to vote, as are young adults and recent first-generation immigrants.

Changes in our political system have magnified these disparities. During the 1950s and ’60s, when turnout rates were much higher, political parties reached out to citizens year-round. At the local level these parties, which reformers often criticized as “machines,” connected even citizens of modest means and limited education with neighborhood institutions and gave them a sense of participation in national politics as well. (In its heyday, organized labor reinforced these effects.) But in the absence of these more organic forms of political mobilization, the second-best option is a top-down mechanism of universal mobilization.

Mandatory voting would tend to even out disparities stemming from income, education and age, enhancing our system’s inclusiveness. It is true, as some object, that an enforcement mechanism would impose greater burdens on those with fewer resources. But this makes it all the more likely that these citizens would respond by going to the polls, and they would stand to gain far more than the cost of a traffic ticket.

The third argument for mandatory voting goes to the heart of our current ills. Our low turnout rate pushes American politics toward increased polarization. The reason is that hard-core partisans are more likely to dominate lower-turnout elections, while those who are less fervent about specific issues and less attached to political organizations tend not to participate at levels proportional to their share of the electorate.

A distinctive feature of our constitutional system — elections that are quadrennial for president but biennial for the House of Representatives — magnifies these effects. It’s bad enough that only three-fifths of the electorate turns out to determine the next president, but much worse that only two-fifths of our citizens vote in House elections two years later. If events combine to energize one part of the political spectrum and dishearten the other, a relatively small portion of the electorate can shift the system out of all proportion to its numbers.

Some observers are comfortable with this asymmetry. But if you think that today’s intensely polarized politics impedes governance and exacerbates mistrust — and that is what most Americans firmly (and in my view rightly) believe — then you should be willing to consider reforms that would strengthen the forces of conciliation.

Imagine our politics with laws and civic norms that yield near-universal voting. Campaigns could devote far less money to costly, labor-intensive get-out-the-vote efforts. Media gurus wouldn’t have the same incentive to drive down turnout with negative advertising. Candidates would know that they must do more than mobilize their bases with red-meat rhetoric on hot-button issues. Such a system would improve not only electoral politics but also the legislative process. Rather than focusing on symbolic gestures whose major purpose is to agitate partisans, Congress might actually roll up its sleeves and tackle the serious, complex issues it ignores.

THE United States is not Australia, of course, and there’s no guarantee that the similarity of our political cultures would produce equivalent political results. For example, reforms of general elections would leave untouched the distortions generated by party primaries in which small numbers of voters can shape the choices for the entire electorate. And the United States Constitution gives the states enormous power over voting procedures. Mandating voting nationwide would go counter to our traditions (and perhaps our Constitution) and would encounter strong state opposition. Instead, a half-dozen states from parts of the country with different civic traditions should experiment with the practice, and observers — journalists, social scientists, citizens’ groups and elected officials — would monitor the consequences.

We don’t know what the outcome would be. But one thing is clear: If we do nothing and allow a politics of passion to define the bounds of the electorate, as it has for much of the last four decades, the prospect for a less polarized, more effective political system that enjoys the trust and confidence of the people is not bright.

Authors

William A. Galston

Publication: The New York Times

Image Source: © Jessica Rinaldi / Reuters

Fixing the U.S. Election System: Is a Democracy Index the Answer?

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:00:00 -0400

Event Information

April 7, 2009
2:00 PM - 3:30 PM EDT

Falk Auditorium
The Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC

The 2000 presidential debacle focused public attention on our increasingly dysfunctional electoral system. Nearly a decade later, widespread problems remain despite a wealth of proposed solutions, an eager reform community, and significant public support for more smoothly-run elections. Yale Law School’s Heather Gerken offers a solution in The Democracy Index: Why Our Election System Is Failing and How to Fix It (Princeton University Press, 2008) – an index to rank states and localities based on how well they run their election systems on issues like wait times to vote and frequency of voting machine breakdowns.

On April 7, the AEI-Brookings Election Reform Project, in cooperation with Yale Law School, hosted a discussion with Gerken. Thomas Mann, co-director of the AEI-Brookings Election Reform Project and Brookings senior fellow, moderated a panel featuring Harold Koh, dean of the Yale Law School, and Norman Ornstein, co-director of the Election Reform Project and resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

After the program, the panelists took audience questions.

Participants

Moderator

Panelists

Heather Gerken

J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law, Yale Law School

Harold Koh

Dean and Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law, Yale Law School

Norman J. Ornstein

Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute

Early Voters Deluge States

Michael P. McDonald — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 12:00:00 -0400

Early voting has started in earnest in many states, marking a dramatic change in how Americans vote and how campaigns are run. Preliminary indications are that more people will cast their ballot prior to Election Day than in any campaign in the nation’s history.

Already, well over ten million people have cast their ballot for this November’s much-anticipated presidential election. This statistic is from just a few states and localities where these early voting numbers are available. In Georgia, for instance, more people have already voted early than voted early in all of the last presidential election.

These early numbers are startling, far outpacing what would be expected at this stage in the election. In the past, early voting starts as a trickle, with the spigot opening as the traditional Election Day approaches. These numbers could portend a higher level of early voting, higher overall turnout, or – most likely – both.

The apparent increase witnessed so far is part of the upward trend in early voting that has swept the country over the past two decades. In 1992, about 7 percent of all voters voted early; by 2004 that number exceeded 20 percent. The increase arises among states that have enacted early voting policies permitting people to vote absentee for any reason, to automatically receive an absentee ballot by mail or to vote at special early voting polling place in a high-traffic location.

Those who vote early have changed over the past 20 years. People who vote by traditional absentee ballot tend to be younger, single and highly educated; essentially students, military and professionals traveling on business.

Today, many people tend to be early voters, though early voters are on average older. This age disparity is consistent with the type of person who is motivated to vote early: a strong partisan who is certain of their vote.

Early voters obviously do not show up to vote on Election Day, which causes problems for exit pollsters stationed outside polling places. In 2004, the media’s national exit poll organization conducted phone surveys of early voters to supplement their Election Day polling. These surveys found that in all states – except Iowa – the early electorate was more Republican than the election day electorate, which is an expected pattern steeped in campaign folklore that a Democrat will win if they evenly split the early vote.

The deviating case of Iowa makes sense. In 2004, the Iowa Democratic Party conducted an intense early vote drive, a move that may have cost John Kerry the state since their Election Day ground game suffered.

We are seeing indications that Barack Obama’s campaign is successfully turning out their supporters in Florida, Georgia and North Carolina, three states that provide demographic breakdowns of early voters. In Florida and North Carolina, registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by two to one among early voters. In Georgia and North Carolina, African-Americans are a much greater share of the early electorate than of the overall 2004 electorate. What makes these numbers all the more impressive is not just their disparity towards Democrats, but that we would normally anticipate Democrats to lag behind Republicans at this stage in the game. Do not expect the well-financed Obama campaign to skimp on their Election Day mobilization efforts, either.

It is too soon to tell definitively if these early vote numbers represent a coming flood of early voting and Election Day turnout or if these represent pent up demand by enthusiastic Democrats finally able to cast their ballot. But that this question can even be asked is not encouraging for John McCain.

For McCain to win, he needs to turn the election around – now. The presidency is starting to slip from his grasp. Pre-election polling currently indicates Obama will hold all the states won by Kerry in 2004, plus Iowa and New Mexico. Obama wins the Electoral College if he wins Colorado, a state that he has had a small consistent lead in the polls throughout the year. More than 60 percent of Coloradans will cast their ballot early.

If McCain can not change the campaign dynamic, it will soon be too late for him to shift enough votes into his column to win. He may be able to take one of the states currently favoring Obama, but that will be an increasingly difficult task as ballots pile up in high-early vote battleground states like Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon and Washington.

It’s mid-October. Now is the time for an October surprise, before too many people can no longer be surprised.

View 2008 Early Voting Statistics »

Michael P. McDonald is an associate professor at George Mason University and a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He calculates national turnout rates for academics and the media and he is co-editor of The Marketplace of Democracy: Electoral Competition in American Politics.

Authors

Michael P. McDonald

The Waning Days of the 2008 Presidential Election

Thomas E. Mann — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 12:27:29 -0400

Thomas Mann says that, with the presidential debates and months of campaigning behind us, the electorate has largely made their decision. In the waning days before the election, Mann suggests that the candidates should focus on mobilizing voters and underscoring the messages.

Video

Most Voters Have Made Their Decision in Presidential Contest

The Election of the Century

Michael P. McDonald — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 12:00:00 -0400

The impending presidential election may be the election of a century. Record primary voting, floods of new registrations, more small campaign donors and highly rated political conventions show that people are intensely interested.

These indicators augur a high turnout. Undoubtedly, more people will vote than the 60 percent who turned out four years ago, which was the highest rate since 1968. The question is, how many more? If participation tops the 1960 level of 64 percent, then we must go all the way back to 1908 — literally a century of American politics — to find the next highest rate: 66 percent.

Lessons from the 1960 and 1908 elections explain why 2008 may see a historical election. Many people recall the 1960 election that pitted two familiar names, Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. Kennedy won one of the closest presidential elections in American history. As in sports, people are interested when two contestants are evenly matched. Just like those in 1960, pre-election polls today show a tight race between Barack Obama and John McCain. People perceive that their vote will help determine big issues of peace and prosperity. Further, an African-American or a woman will be elected, for the first time, to one of the country’s highest offices. Contrast this to 1996: People tuned out when pre-election polls showed President Bill Clinton cruising to reelection over Bob Dole.

The 1908 election was not particularly close and did not involve big issues. Republican William Howard Taft won by a landslide over third-time Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan, whose “free silver” platform had lost its luster. What is notable is that the 1908 election occurred in the twilight of the political machines that dominated American politics throughout the latter half of the 19th century. These machines were built from the bottom up. Local ward bosses, who knew their neighbors intimately, dispensed jobs and favors for votes. (Ward bosses conjure images of big city politics, but rural political machines existed, too.) Political machines even paid supporters’ taxes in states that disenfranchised tax delinquents.

During the machine era, turnout rates routinely exceeded 80 percent. Paying people to vote, however, discomfited many. Progressive Era reforms near the turn of the 20th century rooted out the obvious corruption by creating a civil service to replace patronage jobs and adopting the secret ballot so that political machines could not monitor voting. The 1908 election was among the last where machines could still turn out voters.

There is mounting evidence that political machines had something right: Face-to-face contact is among the most effective means to activate voters. Today’s high-tech campaigns recreate the mobilization capacity of political machines. In place of ward bosses are local volunteers, and in place of bosses’ neighborly knowledge are sophisticated microtargeted voter profiles that reveal which voters are persuadable and which are loyal party supporters. The glue is the Internet, which provides an information infrastructure for campaigns to recruit and communicate with their volunteers.

It is tempting to give Democrats a mobilization edge. Obama’s efforts are highly visible, whereas McCain must rely on the tightlipped Republican National Committee. Obama does not employ the Democratic National Committee for this expensive campaign operation because he opted out of public financing. Indeed, recent presidential candidates — McCain included — usually raise money for voter mobilization through their national parties.

Before Obama is given an edge, we must caution that Republicans are better able to register themselves than are lower-income Democrats. Massive Democratic registration drives create a false impression that they are out-hustling Republicans. In 2004, Democratic-aligned organizations’ highly publicized efforts exceeded their voter turnout victory targets. These groups underestimated President Bush’s 72-hour voter mobilization efforts the weekend before the election, which effectively matched them voter for voter.

Still, Obama’s organization should not be discounted. Just four years ago, Democrats were still playing catch-up to Republicans. Now they are just as sophisticated and have recruited a large cadre of volunteers, including typically apathetic youth.

American campaigns have undergone a paradigm shift. They no longer consist primarily of mass appeals through television advertising; grass-roots organizing is now a critical component. If elections stay close and interesting, we will likely observe higher turnouts. No longer will we wonder why turnout is declining; rather, we will wonder why it is climbing. A revitalized ground game will likely emerge as one explanation in the decade to come.

Authors

Michael P. McDonald

Publication: Politico

Can Obama Carry the Evangelical Vote?

E.J. Dionne, Jr., Michael J. Gerson, Jan Crawford Greenburg and George F. Will — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 12:00:00 -0400

E.J. Dionne joins George Will, Michael Gerson, and Jan Crawford Greenburg on This Week with George Stephanopoulos for a roundtable discussion on the impact of evangelical voters in election 2008.

George Stephanopoulos, host: Barack Obama and John McCain last night at Rick Warren's Saddleback Church out in California. It was actually riveting television for everyone who wasn't watching the Olympics last night. We're gonna talk about it now on the roundtable with George Will, Michael Gerson of the Council on Foreign Relations, also President Bush's former speech writer, EJ Dionne of the Brookings Institution and "The Washington Post, and our own Jan Crawford Greenburg. And George, in some ways that forum last night wasn't a natural fit for either Obama on the issues or McCain by his nature, but they did both quite well.

George Will: They both did well. And Obama knows that what he has to do is limit his defeat among that constituency of the evangelicals. In 2006, which is the most recent data we have on the electorate, Republican candidates got more votes from evangelical Christians than Democrat candidates got from organized labor members and African Americans combined, which means if Obama gets up to say 35%, 36% of the white evangelical vote he probably wins.

Stephanopoulos: Oh, if he gets 35% or 36%, as Bill Clinton got close to that in '92 and '96, he does win

E.J. Dionne: Right, and I don't even think he has to get that close. First, thanks for not asking us about our greatest moral failures. But, you know, first, Rick Warren...

Stephanopoulos: That’s coming up.

Dionne: Rick Warren wins. That was an extraordinary debate. If you only had two hours of information, that wouldn't be a bad thing to go on if that's all you could cast your vote on. And he really dispelled some people's stereotypes about evangelicals. Secondly, George is absolutely right. I think if Barack Obama cuts 5 to 10 points off the Republican lead among white evangelicals, that helps him a lot in Ohio and Indiana, Virginia, Colorado. So that's a huge deal. And I agree, both were good. I thought McCain was very sharp. He learned something running for president for so long. Obama had more of a conversational tone which I think may have helped him with the audience he was looking for but he's got to sharpen up for the debates.

Stephanopoulos: But he was having trouble with the audience. There was a little resistance because of his positions on the issues, particularly abortion.

Jan Crawford Greenburg: Oh, the issues are so stark. And that came out so clearly last night. Whether it's abortion, gay rights, the definition of evil and most importantly the Supreme Court. I think the best that Obama can hope for with this group, because he's polling in the mid 20s is which is about what John Kerry got is that these evangelicals stay home. That they think Obama is not quite that bad so they don't need to go out and vote for John McCain. But I think John McCain last night really went a long way in making his case with this group, energizing the group. And at the end of the day, it's all about the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court is in this election. The McCain campaign believes that's going to turn these voters out.

Stephanopoulos: It's interesting. I was talking to someone in the McCain campaign this morning. They thought - I'm not sure this is right, but they thought that Obama made a big mistake by scoring Clarence Thomas on issue of experience last night.

Michael Gerson: Yeah. I mean I think the forum last night illustrated a larger problem in this outreach. I think that Obama's outreach to evangelicals is evidently sincere. He just doesn't agree with evangelicals very much.

Stephanopoulos: But he speaks the language very naturally.

Gerson: Well, he speaks language on personal faith, but when it came to policy, on issues like faith-based regulations, on issues like the Supreme Court, on issues like stem cell, and his abortion answer, which he must have practiced, was pretty close to a gaffe. You know, talking about, you know, how it's above his pay grade to determine, you know, the status of unborn life. I mean, it's a good thing to do this outreach. I think it's good for the country. It's hard to do outreach even by talented politicians, with people you disagree with.

Stephanopoulos: But wouldn't it have been a problem had he gone in there and told that group exactly what they wanted to hear?

Gerson: Well he couldn't do it. It's a natural limitation.

Dionne: I think the issue here is not, is Barack Obama going to carry the white evangelical vote? No, he's not. No way. It's not even going to be close. The question is, at the margins, younger evangelicals in particular care about this larger agenda. That most of that debate did not focus on abortion or stem cell research.

Stephanopoulos: Poverty.

Dionne: It focused on poverty, on human trafficking, on all the other issues that evangelicals now care about. And Rick Warren is a symbol of this broadening agenda that evangelicals have. So, I agree, if somebody is a hard core right-to-lifer for whom that is the most important issue, then Barack Obama is not going to get their votes. But those weren't the votes he was looking for last night.

Watch the full interview »

Authors

E.J. Dionne, Jr.
Michael J. Gerson
Jan Crawford Greenburg
George F. Will

Publication: This Week with George Stephanopoulos

The Myth of a Toss-up Election

Alan Abramowitz, Thomas E. Mann and Larry Sabato — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 12:00:00 -0400

"Too close to call." "Within the margin of error." "A statistical dead heat." If you've been following news coverage of the 2008 presidential election, you're probably familiar with these phrases. Media commentary on the presidential horserace, reflecting the results of a series of new national polls, has strained to make a case for a hotly contested election that is essentially up for grabs.

Signs of Barack Obama's weaknesses allegedly abound. The huge generic Democratic Party advantage is not reflected in the McCain-Obama pairings in national polls. Why, according to the constant refrain, hasn't Obama put this election away? A large number of Clinton supporters in the primaries refuse to commit to Obama. White working class and senior voters tilt decidedly to McCain. Racial resentment limits Obama's support among these two critical voting blocs. Enthusiasm among young voters and African-Americans, two groups strongly attracted to Obama, is waning. McCain is widely seen as better prepared to step up to the responsibilities of commander-in-chief. Blah, blah, blah.

While no election outcome is guaranteed and McCain's prospects could improve over the next three and a half months, virtually all of the evidence that we have reviewed - historical patterns, structural features of this election cycle, and national and state polls conducted over the last several months - points to a comfortable Obama/Democratic party victory in November. Trumpeting this race as a toss-up, almost certain to produce another nail-biter finish, distorts the evidence and does a disservice to readers and viewers who rely upon such punditry.

Consider the following.

Except for a few days when the Gallup and Rasmussen tracking polls showed a tie, Barack Obama has led John McCain in every national poll in the past two months. Obama's average margin has consistently been in the 4-6 point range during this time. By contrast, the polls in 2000 and 2004 showed much more variation over time.

State polling data have also consistently given Obama the advantage. According to realclearpolitics.com, Obama is currently leading in 26 states and the District of Columbia with a total of 322 electoral votes; McCain is currently leading in 24 states with a total of 216 electoral votes. Obama is leading in every state carried by John Kerry in 2004 along with seven states carried by George Bush: Iowa, New Mexico, Ohio, Indiana, Virginia, Nevada and Colorado.

Obama is leading in 11 of the 12 swing states that were decided by a margin of five points or less in 2004 including five of the six that were carried by George Bush. And while Obama has a comfortable lead in every state that John Kerry won by a margin of more than five points in 2004, McCain is in a difficult battle in a number of states that Bush carried by a margin of more than five points including such solidly red states as Indiana, Montana, North Dakota, Virginia, and North Carolina.

And remember these June and July polls may well understate Obama's eventual margin. Ronald Reagan did not capitalize on the huge structural advantage Republicans enjoyed in 1980 until after the party conventions and presidential debate. It took a while and a sufficient level of comfort with the challenger for anti-Carter votes to translate into support for Reagan. If Obama's performance over the last eighteen months is any guide, a similar pattern is likely to unfold in 2008.

Aside from the horserace results, there is evidence of a growing Democratic Party advantage in the electorate. A recent analysis by Rhodes Cook of voter registration data in 29 states and the District of Columbia that permit registration by party shows that since November of 2004, Democratic registration has increased by almost 700 thousand while Republican registration has declined by almost one million.

Democrats now enjoy a substantial lead over Republicans in voter identification. According to the Gallup Poll, the two parties have gone from near parity four years ago to a 12 point Democratic advantage in the first half of 2008. And polling data continue to show that Democrats are more satisfied with their party's nominee than Republicans voters and more highly motivated to vote. While Republicans normally benefit from higher turnout among their supporters, that may not be the case this year.

In order to defeat Barack Obama, John McCain will have to convince a lot of disgruntled Republicans to turn out and vote for him. But mobilizing the Republican base, a strategy employed successfully by Karl Rove in 2002 and 2004, won't be enough for McCain to win in 2008. He'll also have to convince a majority of independents and a substantial number of Democrats to vote for him. That's a task that proved too difficult even for Rove in the 2006 midterm election and it may be even more difficult in 2008. That's because since 2006 the political environment has gone from bad to worse for Republicans.

It is no exaggeration to say that the political environment this year is one of the worst for a party in the White House in the past sixty years. You have to go all the way back to 1952 to find an election involving the combination of an unpopular president, an unpopular war, and an economy teetering on the brink of recession. 1952 was also the last time the party in power wasn't represented by either the incumbent president or the incumbent vice-president. But the fact that Democrat Harry Truman wasn't on the ballot didn't stop Republican Dwight Eisenhower from inflicting a crushing defeat on Truman's would-be successor, Adlai Stevenson.

Barack Obama is not a national hero like Dwight Eisenhower, and George Bush is certainly no Harry Truman. But if history is any guide, and absent a dramatic change in election fundamentals or an utter collapse of the Obama candidacy, John McCain is likely to suffer the same fate as Adlai Stevenson.

Authors

Alan Abramowitz
Thomas E. Mann
Larry Sabato

Publication: The Huffington Post

Vote Like Thy Neighbor

William A. Galston and Pietro S. Nivola — Sun, 11 May 2008 12:00:00 -0400

The buzz these days is that American politics may be entering a “postpartisan” era, as a new generation finds the old ideological quarrels among baby boomers to be increasingly irrelevant. In reality, matters are not so simple. Far from being postpartisan, today’s young adults are significantly more likely to identify as Democrats than were their predecessors. Along with colleagues at the Brookings and Hoover institutions, we recently completed a comprehensive study of the nation’s polarization. Our research concludes not only that the ideological differences between the political parties are growing but also that they have become embedded in American society itself.

Large events made some increase in polarization inevitable. In the wake of the Vietnam War, the post-World War II foreign-policy consensus collapsed. Less than a decade after President Nixon declared that “we are all Keynesians now,” stagflation and soaring interest rates spawned the controversial tenets of supply-side economics. Social movements and the Supreme Court put long-suppressed, highly divisive cultural issues back on the public agenda.

But polarization has proceeded even further than these shifts made necessary. The great majority of voters now fuse their party identification, ideology and decisions in the voting booth. The share of Democrats who could be called conservative has shrunk, and so has the share of liberal Republicans. The American National Election Studies asks voters a series of issues-based questions and then arrays respondents along a 15-point scale from -7 (the most liberal) to +7 (the most conservative). These data indicate that 41 percent of the voters in 1984 were located at or near the midpoint of the ideological spectrum, compared with only 28 percent in 2004. Meanwhile, the percentage of voters clustering toward the left and right tails of the spectrum rose from 10 to 23 percent.

Most strikingly, political polarization has become akin to political segregation. You are less likely to live near someone whose politics differ from your own. It’s well known that fewer states are competitive in presidential races than in decades past. We find similar results at the county level. In 1976, only 27 percent of voters lived in landslide counties where one candidate prevailed by 20 points or more. By 2004, 48 percent of voters lived in such counties.

What accounts for the decline of ideologically mixed localities? Bill Bishop, a journalist, and Robert Cushing, a sociologist, who have studied this issue, stress that the age of “white flight” to the suburbs is over. Instead, during the past two decades, many whites have moved to one group of cities and many blacks to another. Meanwhile, young people have deserted rural and older manufacturing areas for cities like Austin and Portland. Places with higher densities of college graduates attract even more, so that the gap between such communities and less-educated areas widens further. Zones of high education, in turn, produce more innovation and enjoy higher incomes, generating communities dominated by upper-middle-class tastes. Lower-educated regions, by contrast, tend to be more family-oriented and more faithful to traditional authority.

Not surprisingly, this demographic sorting correlates with a widening difference in political preferences. What’s more, according to Bishop and Cushing, once a tipping point is reached, majorities tend to become supermajorities. This is consistent with the findings of recent political science and social psychology: individuals in the minority of their group tend to shift their views toward the majority, while members of the majority become more extreme in their views. In such circumstances, discussions within groups often intensify, rather than moderate, the underlying polarization.

Our study shows that this geographical sorting worsens polarization in several ways. When counties become more homogeneous, it becomes harder to use redistricting to create more competitive Congressional districts. (Recent research indicates that gerrymandering accounts for, at the very most, one-third of noncompetitive districts in the House of Representatives.) When states become more homogeneous, presidential campaigns begin by conceding a large number of contests to the opposition, disheartening their supporters in those states and increasing the majority’s electoral advantage. Polarization feeds on itself.

Because politics is a contact sport, hard-hitting partisan competition is unavoidably part of the game. A party system that differentiates sharply between alternatives has virtues, not the least being that it engages more voters, offers clearer choices and enhances accountability. But hyperpartisan politics also do damage, not least to public trust and confidence in government — and many Americans understandably yearn for less polarization. Because the underlying structure of our politics remains so deeply divided, the 2008 election may not requite their wish.

Authors

Publication: The New York Times Magazine

Democratic Nod in Barack Obama’s Reach

William A. Galston — Wed, 07 May 2008 12:00:00 -0400

In the wake of the Jeremiah Wright affair, “bittergate,” and Hillary Clinton’s solid win in the Pennsylvania primary, many Democrats had begun to wonder whether Barack Obama was a wounded and diminished candidate. By achieving a 14-point victory in North Carolina and holding Clinton to a 2-point victory in Indiana, Obama allayed those doubts. He took concrete steps toward the nomination as well, increasing his edge in pledged delegates and padding his popular vote margin by more than 200,000. With only 217 pledged delegates left to be awarded through the remaining primaries and caucuses, all in smaller states, it is virtually impossible for Clinton to catch Obama in either of those categories, and her chances of persuading a super-majority of superdelegates to come her way are diminished as well. And it is hard to see how the Clinton forces can use the Democratic party’s Rules Committee to force a resolution of the Michigan and Florida dilemmas over the objections of the Obama campaign.

In the weeks leading up to Indiana and North Carolina, Clinton focused heavily on the economy and emphasized populist policies such as a summer gas tax holiday. Her focus was not misplaced: 60 percent of Indiana voters and 67 percent of North Carolina regarded the condition of the economy as the single most important issue. But she failed to make her case convincingly, winning only 51 percent of the “economy first” voters in Indiana and actually losing them by an 8-point margin in North Carolina. And she may have incurred some self-inflicted damage in the process. In Indiana, only 53 percent of the electorate regarded her as honest and trustworthy, versus 68 percent for Obama; in North Carolina, Obama bested her in that category 71-27. And by huge margins in both states, voters were more likely to say that she had attacked her opponent unfairly.

There are some continuing warning signs for Obama, however. He does better among secular than religious voters and among those who regard themselves as liberal or very liberal rather than moderate or conservative. He lost to Clinton among white independents by 51 to 49 in Indiana and 58 to 38 in North Carolina. Only 34 percent of white voters without college degrees supported him in Indiana; only 26 percent did so in North Carolina. And looking ahead to the general election, only 48 percent of Clinton voters in Indiana said they would support Obama against John McCain; the figure in North Carolina was even worse--45 percent.

To some extent, no doubt, these numbers reflect the passions of the moment. American political history is replete with examples of bitterly divided parties coming together during the general election. Because the issues this year are so important and because the gap between the parties is so large, this process of party reunification is especially likely to take place. Still, Obama cannot afford to take it for granted. He must look honestly at the weak spots in his electoral appeal and do his best, within the limits of honesty and integrity, to address them. He must organize the 2008 Democratic Convention with an eye toward party unity. He should carefully consider the ultimate step—a unifying ticket—as John F. Kennedy did in 1960 with Lyndon Johnson and Ronald Reagan did in 1980 with George H. W. Bush.

As he attends to intra-party divisions, Obama should also give more substance to his core argument that he can bring Americans together across party lines. He must demonstrate—not just assert—that his is a more inclusive brand of progressive politics. There is an obvious place to start. In 1992, in a gesture still remembered and resented among Catholics, the Clinton campaign denied the late Pennsylvania governor Bob Casey Sr., a well-known pro-life Democrat, a prime-time speaking role at the Democratic convention. Sixteen years later, another pro-life Democrat, Sen. Bob Casey Jr., became Obama’s most important supporter in Pennsylvania. Giving him a prominent role at the 2008 convention would be a gesture of reconciliation with genuine historical resonance.

Authors

William A. Galston

Pennsylvania Speaks: The Democratic Contest Will Continue

William A. Galston — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 12:00:00 -0400

In last night’s Pennsylvania primary, Hillary Clinton won a sweeping if not quite overwhelming victory, receiving 55 percent of the vote and reducing Barack Obama’s overall popular vote edge by more than 200,000. Because of the Democratic party’s system of proportional representation, she netted fewer than 15 pledged delegates. These results have quieted calls for her to leave the race and will probably slow the steady flow of superdelegates to Obama. Nonetheless, her path to the nomination remains steep.

The demographics of the Pennsylvania vote followed a now-familiar pattern. Obama won among voters younger than 40, while Clinton prevailed among older voters. Obama won in big cities and some inner suburbs; Clinton carried suburbs overall while winning more than 60 percent of the small town and rural vote. Clinton did 9 points worse among men than among women, who constituted 59 percent of last night’s voters. She received 62 percent of the vote from gun-owning households and almost three-fifths of the vote from union households. Obama carried voters from families making less than $15,000 and more than $150,000; Clinton carried everyone in between. She received 64 percent of the vote from high school graduates but only 48 percent from college graduates. Obama won 55 percent of the vote among those who consider themselves “very liberal,” while Clinton got 60 percent of the vote among self-described moderates. Clinton took 56 percent among long-time Democrats, while Obama took 62 percent of new Democratic primary voters—principally Republicans and Independents who registered as Democrats to participate, but also the 4 percent of the primary electorate that previously been unregistered.

There is evidence that religion, gender and race all figured in the results. Clinton received 58 percent of the white Protestant vote and a stunning 71 percent of white Catholics. Obama got 64 percent of those who profess no religion and 56 percent of those who never attend church. Clinton did 22 points better among those who said gender was important than among those who did not. (Intriguingly, men who said it mattered were also more likely to support Clinton.) By contrast, race appears to have been a negative for Obama: whites who said it mattered gave 75 percent of their votes to Clinton, versus only 58 percent for those who said it did not. While nearly half the whites for whom race mattered refused to say that they would be willing to support Obama in the general election, their sentiments may well soften in coming months as differences between the parties come to the fore.

The long campaign mattered, and it left some bruises. 68 percent of the voters said that Clinton had attacked unfairly; 50 percent thought Obama had. Nearly a quarter of the electorate thought that Clinton was solely responsible for unfair attacks, versus only 6 percent who thought Obama was. Only 57 percent of the electorate thought that Clinton was honest and trustworthy, versus 67 percent for Obama. Only 40 percent said they would be satisfied if either candidate won; 32 percent wanted only Clinton, and 23 percent only Obama. But however negative the contest may have turned, it appears to have worked to Clinton’s advantage: she received 57 percent among voters who decided during the last week before the primary, 5 points better than she did among those who decided earlier.

The results also confirmed the surge in concern about the economy. Fifty-five percent of the voters regarded the economy as the top issue, versus only 27 percent for the war in Iraq and a modest 14 percent for health care. Obama prevailed only among voters who gave top priority to Iraq, while Clinton received 54 percent of the health care voters and 58 percent of the economy voters.

Attention now shifts to the May 6 primaries in North Carolina and Indiana. Obama is expected to prevail in North Carolina, but Indiana offers a level playing field. A split decision would be likely to prolong the race, while an Obama sweep might well induce many undecided superdelegates to declare for him and bring this protracted contest to an end. In addition, Obama’s fundraising edge is becoming increasingly important. Not long into her victory speech, Clinton made an urgent pitch for new contributions. Facing a mounting debt and dwindling cash on hand, her ability to continue on until the end of the primary and caucus season in early June may well depend on the size and speed of her supporters’ response.

Authors

William A. Galston

Obama Criticized for 'Bitter' Blue-Collar Remarks

Sherry Linkon, Reihan Salam and Ruy Teixeira — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:00:00 -0400

Ruy Teixeira joins NPR's Talk of the Nation host Neal Conan to discuss the Pennsylvania primary and the working-class vote.

NEAL CONAN: With us here in Studio 3A is Ruy Teixeira, a visiting fellow at Brookings Institution, co-author of the report "The Decline of the White Working Class and the Rise of a Mass Upper Middle Class." He's kind enough to be with us here. Thanks very much for coming in, nice to see you again.

RUY TEIXEIRA: Great to be here.

NEAL CONAN: And, what are some of the common themes that we see around these working class voters that Sherry Linkon was talking to us about?

RUY TEIXEIRA: Well, I think Sherry touched on a number of them. I think one critical theme, obviously, for this election is their level of economic discontent and their sense that the economic ground has shifted underneath their feet, and they are sort of wondering where they are going to go in the future, where their kids are going to go, sort of, where their way of life is going to go.

This is a matter of great concern to these voters because the last, you know, actually the last several years, have not been kind to them. But more broadly, you can look back, you know, 35 years and say the last 35 years has not been very kind to them. This has been a period when America, by and large, has grown not as fast as it did and incomes have not risen as fast as they used to, but it's been particularly bad for these voters.

Anyone with less than a four-year college degree has really done rather poorly since about the middle 1970s. So, there's a real question in their minds of what America has in store for them in the future. And they are very interested to hear what politicians have to say about it. So far, it hasn't seemed to work out quite so well.

And the other side of it is really touched on by the controversy that you're referring to which is their sense of cultural traditionalism, their sense that, especially the Democrats, perhaps, seem out of touch with that at times. It seems like they don't respect their way of life. It seems like their social liberalism gets in the way of connecting to these voters and really hearing what they have to say and what their commitments and priorities really are and a sense of elitism on their part.

And that's really what, I think, Obama's getting slammed on this, you know, in general, and of course, obviously the McCain and Clinton campaigns have some interest in pushing this, but it did give them an opening to raise this issue and argue that, in fact, he is elitist. And Democrats, if they wish to get away from this, they have to adopt - I think it's a little bit unfair to the remark once you look at it in context.

But nevertheless, the perception was there particularly, I think the stuff about guns and about religion. I mean, can't you, like, own a gun and go to church and not be clinging to it? Because you know, your economic way of life is deteriorating. Again, I don't think that's what he meant. But that's how it's being interpreted. And that's where the discussion is.

Listen to the entire interview »

Authors

Sherry Linkon
Reihan Salam
Ruy Teixeira

Publication: NPR Talk of the Nation

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