Comments on: After The Speech

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 19:48:05 +0000

Thanks for the link. I had seen some things excerpted from that, but I hadn’t taken the time to read all of it. The more one learns about how she governed, the more one realizes how perfectly she will fit in with the national GOP, and that is obviously not a compliment.

By: Joel Parshall

Joel Parshall — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 19:38:06 +0000

For some excellent background on Gov. Sarah Palin, here is an email letter written by a female resident of Wasilla, AK, who has known her rather well for a long time and seen her up close as the town’s mayor. It is clear and well written. The writer seems fair and is up front about where she is coming from in writing this. She has nothing to gain in writing it and probably something to lose, although not that much.

http://www.crosscut.com/politics-government/17341

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:22:02 +0000

Correction: the link is to a Missouri paper, but the survey was a national one.

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:19:07 +0000

I still think my first reaction was right. What I think we will see is the lack of a Republican post-convention bounce rather than any significant collapse in McCain’s support. It won’t be so much that McCain has driven away that many people with this choice as it will be that he failed to expand his coalition, despite the transparent goal of doing just that by choosing a woman. We should all hope that the Enquirer story is simply nonsense, because if it isn’t the Palin enthusiasm will end up looking much more foolish than it does right now.

I should have specified where the first survey came from. It was done for a Missouri paper, which may be an indication that McCain will continue to do well in Missouri and this may be an indication of national strength on the grounds that Missouri is a “bellwether” state. On the other hand, without seeing the complete crosstabs I am wary of attributing too much significance to that survey. If the McCain campaign believes the Midwest is where the election will be fought and won, and if they think Michigan is one of the states they can flip, I think the Free Press focus group should be very sobering for them. I stand by my earlier view that the campaign has probably forfeited really competing in the Midwest, and sending Palin to campaign in Midwestern exurbs and suburbs is not going to do the trick all by itself.

By: Josiwe

Josiwe — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:18:53 +0000

Weird. If Barack were Becky Obama, but otherwise unchanged, I’d vote for her without a qualm.

Maybe David Palmer broke more ground with my demographic than Glen Close.

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:09:05 +0000

Possibly, but I should note that opposition to a female candidate has gone down significantly since February. Back then, it was 17% overall. 18-29 year olds were not the most opposed at the time–20% said they were not willing–but their opposition has endured longer than any other age group’s opposition. It may be that Clinton’s campaign made the idea of a woman President seem more plausible and familiar to most people, but for some reason young voters are still somewhat more likely to find it unacceptable.

By: LMaggitti

LMaggitti — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:06:49 +0000

I am increasingly confident that your initial take was correct. I’d put it this way:

(1) As you updates confirm, the reaction to her speech was at best mixed. Given the dynamics of these sorts of things, that’s a really bad sign. The usual pattern would be for an unambiguously initial positive reaction (virtually ANY politician looks good when giving prepared remarks in a sympathetic setting), perhaps eroding over time.

(2) With the usual caveats, initial, pre-speech polling suggested that the initial voter reaction to her selection was negative. At best, the speech reduced this negative reaction (temporarily in my view), but didn’t erase it.

(3) I think there are a huge number of reasons going forward why last night was her high point. Some of the issues raised by the media in the last few days will have legs, even if most of them don’t, but, more to the point, her unpreparedness will lead to many, many gaffes in unscripted situations over the next two months. The McCain campaign will try to limit those situations, but they can’t eliminate them.

(4) Finally, I think that, in the long run, the attack dog persona revealed in the speech will undercut her main positives, her personal story and hockey mom image.

And I’m assuming that the Enquirer story is 100% BS; if now … Katey bar the door, as they say. It will get really ugly for the McCain campaign.

By: Josiwe

Josiwe — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:59:14 +0000

“In another odd result that pairs up with the surprisingly greater resistance to a black candidate for President among 18-29 year olds that I noted before, 15% of 18-29 year olds are unwilling to vote for a woman for President, which is a higher percentage than any other age group, including 65+.”

I find this striking. Is this a trend, or a recent development? It seems to me that this could be more of a conflation of Hillary Clinton with “Woman President”, since she’s the only model we’ve had under scrutiny.