A media that is obsessed with horse race politics is trying desperately to come up with ways to predict what's going to happen in the 2022 midterm elections. Since polling is still pretty unreliable when it comes to individual races, they have to look for something else. Typically that means taking into account the fact that, historically, the party that controls the White House does poorly in midterm elections. That, combined with Biden's approval numbers, is part of the package that is predicting doom and gloom for Democrats.
But as we see with NBC's First Read, there's another poll number pundits are using to predict a "shellacking" for Democrats: the extent to which voters think the country is on the "wrong track." According to most polls, 70-75% think we're heading in the wrong direction. With numbers that high, the feeling is obviously bipartisan.
It is understandable why Republicans think the country is on the wrong track. Right wing media is constantly feeding them apocalyptic messages about things like stolen elections, hordes of immigrants invading our country, crime levels on the rise, public schools that teach propaganda to their children, and Democrats implementing a socialist agenda. And that doesn't even take into account the radical conspiracy theories about how a cabal of pedophiles is in control of the world.
So what explains the fact that so many Democrats also think the country is headed in the wrong direction - especially when their party controls the White House and has (albeit small) majorities in both houses of congress?
A seemingly intractable pandemic is certainly a major contributor. But given four years of a Trump presidency, followed by a multitude of Republican attacks on our democracy, it is understandable that even those on the left are feeling pessimistic about the direction we're heading. All of that is combined with the fact that mainstream media seems focused on highlighting the challenges we face as "Biden failures."
It is obvious that Republicans and right wing media are depending on hyping their apocalyptic messages to get their voters to the polls in November. They're doing everything they can to inflame the chaos, while avoiding any talk about their actual agenda.
The question is: how will this pessimism affect Democrats? To the extent that the "wrong track" analysis stems from the way Republicans are attacking our democracy, it is possible that more people will turn out to vote in the midterms. There's just too much at stake. But if that feeling is a reaction to the media's obsession with Biden failures, it could depress turnout.
In the end, Hayes Brown nailed it when talking about this particular data point.
I understand the theoretical utility of trying to take the country’s temperature. But declaring that “America is on the wrong track” based on such polling is absurd. As it stands, analysts and pundits are pretending that they’re using objective data to explain the political fortunes of our elected leaders and the policies they’re advocating. But nothing substantive is being measured — it’s all just vibes.
"A media that is obsessed with horse race politics is trying desperately ..." to call an election in November based on a poll in January. By that standard, the Chiefs and 49ers would be headed for the Super Bowl and Rafael Nadal would have lost his bid for his 21st major over the weekend.
ReplyDeleteThe news media does not report the news based on what is happening. The news media delivers a narrative and highlights news stories that fit that narrative, while ignoring or discounting stories that contradict the narrative. Therefore, the Virginia governor's race is hyped as a foreshadowing of the midterms (a GOP win in a relatively close election; never mind the brand new governor is now polling underwater in record time), but the California governor recall, in which tight polls a few weeks before the election were off by a huge margin in a Democratic blowout, is said to predict nothing.
Predicting what will happen in the midterms is impossible to do without knowing what happens between now and November (and knowing how it is reported). Will the pandemic be behind us, or will we be in the middle of the next wave? Will the economy be booming, or headed toward a recession, or muddling through? What will we learn from the congressional and DOJ investigations into Jan. 6? What about indictments? Will Congress pass more of Biden's agenda, or not? What will be the reaction to the hearings on (and confirmation of) the nomination of a Black woman to the Supreme Court? What happens if Roe v. Wade is overturned, or not? What happens in Ukraine? What if the biggest story of the year is something nobody can anticipate?
Aside from that, no one yet knows how redistricting will affect the November elections, or which candidates survive the primaries, or whether Punxsatawney Phil sees his shadow tomorrow morning.
Predictions are cheap and no one is ever held accountable for being wrong, even wildly wrong. But if history is any guide, here's one thing we can probably expect to see: some surprises.
There's real truth in that and in Nancy's fine post. Still, it takes dismissing some real obstacles as, in her case, vibes or created narratives, in yours. My fear is that these things shape voters and their perceptions and, in effect, minimize surprises. After all, they know just what to expect now, and the media can fit anything into it.
ReplyDeleteCan't help noticing how distinct her previous fine post about Biden's accomplishment is from what's reported. And not even just in the Times. Yesterday for Kevin Drum, for all his fine reporting on how the economy isn't dire after all and (this morning) the supply chain isn't in crisis, Biden was ignoring the median voters who, as a comment on Kevin's post put it, cares about the economy and not radical fringes in the culture wars. Today the headline at Nancy's previous gig, the Monthly, is how American stopped caring about the poor. Nonsense. Conservatives and Republicans stopped caring or, more accurately, took a more militant line in blocking those who care even a little about anyone, poor or middle class, unlike them and their base.