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Message fail, quantified
Fivethirtyeight.com reviews some polling on whether voters want a public option. Their conclusion? Nobody knows what the hell that term means.
Another key indicator: 23% of Democrats polled think that "public option" means "creating a national healthcare system like they have in Great Britain."
I know the President has had some trouble filling out the ranks of his top staff, but there's got to be someone in the West Wing capable of communicating with the average voter. Why isn't anyone even trying? Go reassign the guy busy writing inane Twitters! Who would have thought that George W. Bush was better at anything policy-related than Obama, but here's one important example -- Bush was able to speak to Americans like they were three-year olds.
Just 37 percent of the poll's respondents correctly identified the public option from a list of three choices provided to them. . . . This should serve as something of a reality check for people on both sides of the public option debate. If the respondents had simply chosen randomly among the three options provide to them, 33 percent would have selected the correct definition for the public option. Instead, only 37 percent did.When you label a complicated policy with an ambiguous name, then neglect to explain it to people, these are the results you can expect.
Another key indicator: 23% of Democrats polled think that "public option" means "creating a national healthcare system like they have in Great Britain."
I know the President has had some trouble filling out the ranks of his top staff, but there's got to be someone in the West Wing capable of communicating with the average voter. Why isn't anyone even trying? Go reassign the guy busy writing inane Twitters! Who would have thought that George W. Bush was better at anything policy-related than Obama, but here's one important example -- Bush was able to speak to Americans like they were three-year olds.
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Awesome blog. Highly recommended. You have precisely identified the reason why the health care reform debate isn't already over, having moved on to education or energy.
August 28, 2009 11:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
Can you read,
Unfortunately, some liberal interest groups may be contributing to the confusion as well, with this poll being a prime example. When Penn, Schoen and Berland ask people to identify the public option, they describe it -- correctly -- as offering health insurance at "market rates". However, when they ask people how they feel about the public option, a different concept is introduced:
"Starting a new federal health insurance plan that individuals could purchase if they can’t afford private plans offered to them."
Seventy-nine percent of the poll's respondents -- including 61 percent of Republicans -- say they'd support this proposal. But it seems to be a very different proposal from the "public option" that Penn, Schoen and Berland took so much care to define, or the one that is actually being debated before Congress. Rather than offering health insurance at "market rates", the public option has been transformed in this question into a sort of fallback policy for people who are priced out of the market. Moreover, the term "government" has been replaced by the softer but more ambiguous term "federal".
Also, if you read the fine print, this is an Internet-based poll, which is not something that an esteemed firm like Penn, Schoen and Berland or an esteemed organization like the AARP should be toying with. Telephone polls have their problems, particularly if they do not include respondents with cellphones, but they are a long ways ahead of Internet-based polling. Zogby Interactive, the most prolific (if the least methodologically sound) Internet-based pollster, has missed the outcome of recent elections by an average of 7.6 points when conducting polls online. (Internet-based polling is cheaper to conduct, but as is the case with fine dining in Manhattan, "value" should not be confused for "cost". Any organization commissioning an Internet-based poll is probably wasting its money, because the poll isn't likely to be any good.)
More generally, there seems to be a sort of arm's-race on both sides of the debate to conduct crappy, manipulative polls on health care reform, and the public option in particular. This poll belongs in the 'crap' pile, as do most of the others. Defenders of the public option, however, should have little to fret about: the most neutrally and accurately-worded polls on the public option -- these are the ones from Quinnipiac and Time/SRBI -- suggest that their position is in the majority, with 56-62 percent of the public supporting the public option and 33-36 percent opposed.
August 28, 2009 11:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Still doesn't excuse the complete lack of message integrity and the fact that this debate has stalled so completely when it should have been a slam-dunk given the numbers going in.
Whatever special interests groups have done to manipulate the environment is beside the point of progressives learning from this experience in order to make the next round of reform efforts more widely supported.
The "public option" is still understood to mean many things, no matter what specific polls might suggest in terms of support for such a plan.
August 28, 2009 12:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
My point is the poll and anything that you infer from it are crap. Nate Silver would gag on the conclusions this blogger derives from this 'crap poll'. My problem is with the blog not the sentiment. Very little of the story from 538 is represented in this blog. 'Cherry picking' does not do justice to the load of crap this blogger has presented. This blog is dishonest.
August 28, 2009 12:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Direct quote from Nate Silver: "This is mostly a debate being had among policy elites and the relatively small fraction of the public that is highly knowledgeable and engaged about health care reform; for most others, the details are lost on them."
THE DETAILS ARE LOST ON MOST PEOPLE
This is my point. I am agreeing with Nate Silver. There is nothing dishonest about my post.
August 28, 2009 12:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cherry-picking again!
August 28, 2009 1:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
Once again we form a circular firing squad and take out our frustration on each other. I don't think it particularly useful to start a comment thread with a question "can't you read" and finish it with a remark like "cherrypicking again". We splutter at each other and the right just giggles in glee.
August 28, 2009 4:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't care which side of an argument anyone chooses to take. I will however call out a charlatan on either side of the same argument. This blogger misrepresents the contents of a Nate Silver (highly respected by me and others) to make a point about what he implies is a failure of President Obama. That's dishonest!
August 29, 2009 9:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not dishonest at all. Hits the nail right on the head. No one has distilled the "Public Option" to a handful of salient facts. Therefore what it means is not clear or consistent.
August 29, 2009 10:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Evidently you can't read either. The blogger uses a poll that Silver pans to support his view. That is dishonest and considering your stated views on the subject of HCR your statement here is disingenuous.
August 29, 2009 11:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well said.
August 29, 2009 10:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
I still have to disagree that the blog is dishonest. I think he makes a great point about the continuing confusion amongst the silent majority that drive most polling data.
August 29, 2009 10:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Nate pans the poll that the blogger uses to support his theory. As well he further uses a quote from Silver, concerning the complexity of the HCR issue, to support his claims of lack of understanding the public option. This is dishonest. Perhaps the blogger should write an essay that incorporates the theme of the quoted material, rather than taking a paragraph here and a single sentence there and twisting them to his desired outcome.
August 29, 2009 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Again, he was using the quoted material to explain where is opinion was coming from. It didn't sound a bit like using the poll to justify his opinion.
His larger point - that democrats are miserable as message management - is exactly right. All one has to do is look at more than 40 years of having mostly good ideals that the country should get behind but still losing to people many dems refer to as half-wits and morons.
What does that say about ya'all for not beating them consistently?
The nonprofit arena still offers a huge opportunity to solve much of what ails America and face very little resistance from republicans. The faith-based initiatives program was one place the democrats bit off their noses to spite their face because it had something to do with God, however tangentially given how the program is run.
I agree with Eric. It isn't ideas. It is innovation. The democratic party has yet to evolve to the point that it can solve social problems using various means that are mostly non-governmental in design.
August 29, 2009 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
The quoted material is not representative of Silver's thoughts. You're the one who is always so up in arms about disingenuous efforts on both sides. What gives, do you believe it's ok to quote out of context to misrepresent thoughts of the author or not?
August 29, 2009 1:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
I just didn't see it as misrepresenting the source material. It really had less to do with the source material as the conclusion being drawn, whether at odds with your interpretation or not.
All I was saying was that the 538 quote aside, his larger point of the democratic messaging failing to connect with a public largely in support of significant reforms is the real problem.
Differing views aren't necessarily disingenuous.
August 29, 2009 2:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
He is not addressing a broad issue, 4 of his last 5 blogs have spoken specifically of public option.
August 29, 2009 2:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, the public option as understood by the public as a broad issue and how it is seen.
If the "public option" was seen probably by the majority of Americans, the approval ratings on the reform effort in general would be much higher. The continued partisan warfare is indicative of a communications effort that has failed to convinced moderates to support the initiatives on the table.
Not sure why you keep offering strawmen that are tangential at best to the topic at hand.
August 29, 2009 2:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, if the public option was seen "properly" by the majority of Americans the effort as a whole would enjoy broader support.
August 29, 2009 2:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
what strawmen, the only discussion i'm in pertaining to this blog is it's quality.
August 29, 2009 3:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Whether or not the blogger was at odds with Silver's commentary is beside the larger point the the democratic party is losing the message war.
The idea the Nate Silver's opinions have anything to do with the larger point of "public option" being misunderstood by both Americans is a strawman.
Silver is only one of dozens of pundits who think they have it all figured out.
August 29, 2009 7:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey Hey ... Johnnie . . .
I see where Mister Bluster's real concern is coming from. His less than glowing take on Nate is quite evident here:
Now when it comes to polls and polling, Nate's a whole hell of lot more that just some "pundit." I wonder if the blustery one has any in-depth knowledge whatsoever on Nate's background and proven abilities relating to polls and polling?
As I posted early yesterday, below in this thread, I agree with Nate's take on this Penn poll (my higlighting):
I agree: The Penn poll IS crap. It is manipulative in it's question structuring and interactive polls aren't worth the phone bill.
~OGD~
August 30, 2009 11:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good to see someone is paying attention.
August 30, 2009 11:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Jonnie...
I placed my response to you here for better formatting.
~OGD~
August 31, 2009 6:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hey ... Jonnie . . .
Nice to see your response.
As you know, the header of this blog was:
I feel that you can't "quantify" a "message failure" from a poll so poorly worded that it's on the verge of manipulative and also so questionably conducted where the people polled were narrowly categorized in such narrow groupings.
And like I said before, interactive internet conducted polls aren't looked upon by the statistical polling community as standard and reliable and aren't worth the phone bill.
Now bear with me here. It's not because the two polls that Nate Silver alluded to at his post (Quinnipiac and Time/SRBI) fit my personal agenda about the need for the "public option" but due to those polls' attempts to be neutral that I see them as more conducive to good polling practices than the Penn poll by a wide margin. Here's what Silver said (my highlight):
And due to the link block in the Cafe system here are the links to those polls, Just C&P them into your browser.
Thanks for responding Jonnie . . .
~OGD~
August 31, 2009 6:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Here's a Newsweek article that examines the poor messaging from the WH on HCR. Thanks for the link to 538.
August 28, 2009 3:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ah, I hadn't seen this. Thank you.
August 28, 2009 5:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey Hey ... Eric . . .
Thanks for the information. All input is good.
I agree that the messaging has not gotten into the general public's minds. And of course there are a myriad of reasons and wherefores for that. Nothing new there. But I'm not going to get into that side of the discussion at this point in time.
After a complete going over of the Penn Poll, I will agree with Silver's overall take on the poll where Nate wrote:
The Penn poll IS crap.
~OGD~
August 29, 2009 3:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh and ... I almost forgot . . .
In an early blog of yours, you were looking for a good White House explanation in 140 characters or less to explain the public option to the Twitter crowd?
How's this?
Keep up your blogging. I enjoy your take on things.
~OGD~
August 29, 2009 3:22 AM | Reply | Permalink