For those of you paying more attention to campaigns in Kansas, Missouri, Michigan, and Tennessee in the run-up to next week’s big block of primaries, the Oklahoma primaries may have slipped by unnoticed.

But, the Oklahoma political insiders got a bit of surprise last Tuesday as Jari Askins beat sitting Attorney General Drew Edmondson in the Democratic primary for Governor and James Lankford took a first place finish into a run-off for the Republican nomination in the Fifth Congressional District.

This came as a particular surprise because two highly reported polls taken immediate before the primary showed Edmondson leading Askins by 16 in the case of the Tulsa World’s Oklahoma Poll (conducted by SoonerPoll.com) and 11 in the case of the Sooner Survey and the same Tulsa World poll showed Lankford trailing Kevin Calvey by eight.

Now the Oklahoma blogosphere is atwitter with discussion of how the polls could have gotten it so wrong. We are reminded, more than a little, of the discussion in the wake of another major polling failure—the failure of many outlets to correctly model the New Hampshire Democratic primary of 2008.

AAPOR, the professional organization of the polling community, conducted a major investigation of the New Hampshire polling and released a multi-hundred page report of findings.

We think that many of those findings apply in a substantial way to the failure of the public polling in Oklahoma to correctly analyze the outcome of this week’s primaries. But the biggest one is this, primary elections require very well-crafted likely voter models to find the population of actual primary voters and sample from them. At the very least a good primary voter model will need to:

• Rely heavily on past turnout behavior to ensure an unbiased, baseline, population of primary voters from whom to sample.
• Allow for flexibility to include populations of less frequent primary voters who are highly engaged and interested to capture the fluctuation in sub-group turnout that can cause surprise outcomes.

While we don’t have the data in hand to evaluate the two flawed Oklahoma polls’ baseline likely voter models or how they handled the possibility of surges in sub-groups of more irregular voters, we would recommend that both pollsters spend some time analyzing their use of previous behavior and current engagement data as they model the likely electorate in future primary in hopes of avoiding these issues going forward.

The USC/Annenberg 2010 Digital Future Report reveals that 0% (yes, ZERO) of Twitter users would be willing to pay for Twitter:

Such an extreme finding that produced a zero response underscores the difficulty of getting Internet users to pay for anything that they already receive for free,” said Jeffrey I. Cole, director of the Center for the Digital Future at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism.

A majority (55%) say they would rather see advertising than pay for content/usage; however, 70% say that Internet advertising is “annoying.”

The report also includes data about how Americans use the Internet:

82% use the Internet
65% buy online
50% use instant messengers
79% Blog
80% participate in chat rooms

But, just like how charging for Twitter would keep users out, USC/Annenberg is charging $500 for individuals and $1,500 for corporations to see the full report - thus killing any chance of me actually exploring it any further.

It’s just like Cole says in the summary (pdf) “Internet users can obtain content in three ways: they can steal it, or pay for it, or accept advertising on the web pages they view.”  My advice to Cole - sell ads on your webpage so we can put your report to good use.

from the PRIsm Political Report:

 

Oklahomans went to the polls to choose nominees last night and the Democratic race for Governor proved to be an unexpected nail-biter with a surprise winner.  Despite late polling showing Attorney General Drew Edmondson with double-digit leads over Lt. Gov. Jari Askins, it was she who pulled out about a 1,500 vote victory.  The race was close all night, and Askins withstood an Edmondson onslaught from Tulsa where he racked up 62% of the vote.  Askins was consistently in the low 50s throughout the rest of the state.

 

On the Republican side, Rep. Mary Fallin (R-OK-5), as expected, won her nomination outright, scoring 55% of the vote against three other candidates.  Fallin and Askins will now square off in the general election for the right to succeed term-limited Gov. Brad Henry (D).  The Republican Congresswoman begins the race as the favorite.

 

In the Democratic race for US Senate, retired educator Jim Rogers won the right to face Sen. Tom Coburn this fall.  Coburn is rated a safe bet for re-election.

 

In the House races, all incumbents were re-nominated and cruise through easy re-election campaigns.  In the open 5^th district, college professor James Lankford surprised everyone by placing first in the Republican primary with 34% of the vote against former state Rep. Kevin Calvey, who was always believed to be strong enough to qualify for the second ballot.  Calvey finished a close second with 32%.  The August 24^th GOP run-off will be anybody’s game, but the winner will have the inside track to a November victory, as OK-5 is a solid Republican seat.  On the Democratic side, attorney Billy Coyle was an easy winner and will face the victor of the Lankford-Calvey run-off. 

Raising eyebrows in federal campaign political circles, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has reserved some $28 million worth of television advertising time to support the re-election bids of 40 incumbent Democratic Members of Congress and the Democratic nominee in Kansas’ Third Congressional District. While the reservation of advertising time is not necessarily an indication of what the DCCC will actually spend in advertising in each of these congressional districts, the reservations are a possible indication of DCCC’s level of concern about their prospects of holding these seats in November.

 

 

Of interest is the fact that the list of reservations only includes one open seat, so far (KS-3), and no seats currently held by House Republicans. Of the 41 seats in which reservations of advertising time have been placed, President Obama gained a majority of the vote in the 2008 election in 19 of those seats. In 26 of those seats, the Democratic nominee posted double-digit wins during the last election. In nine of those seats, the Democratic incumbent won with a margin or 20 percent or more.

 

 

(* Special election margins)

PRINCETON, NJ — More states are politically competitive this year than was the case in 2009, as fewer Americans nationwide identify with the Democratic Party. Vermont — along with the District of Columbia — is the most Democratic state in the U.S. in 2010 so far, while Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho are the most Republican.

These results are based on interviews with more than 175,000 U.S. adults, conducted between January and June 2010 as part of Gallup Daily tracking.

The accompanying map shows each state’s relative party strength in the first half of 2010. States in which one of the parties enjoys at least a 10 percentage-point advantage in leaned identification are considered solid supporters of that party. States in which a party has between a five- and a nine-point advantage are considered leaning toward that party, and states with less than a five-point advantage for one of the parties are considered competitive.

The complete data for each state appear on page 2.

Solidly Democratic states tend to cluster in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, with a few exceptions in the far West (California, Hawaii, and Oregon), one in the Midwest (Illinois), and one in the Southwest (New Mexico). Solidly Republican states are all West of the Mississippi, including Alaska and states in the Mountain West (Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana) and the Midwest (Nebraska and Kansas).

The most politically competitive states in the Union, all of which have Democratic-Republican gaps of less than one point, are Colorado, Mississippi, Missouri, and Virginia.

There are 10 fewer states in the solid Democratic category thus far in 2010 than there were in 2009, and one fewer state in the leaning Democratic category. At the same time, there are three more solid Republican states, and four more in the leaning Republican category. Sixteen states can be classified as competitive, four more than last year.

It is important to note that the classification of states reported here is based on the political affiliations of all residents, and does not necessarily match the party preferences of registered voters or indicate how a state might vote in a given election. Also, the partisanship figures include independents who have a partisan leaning along with each party’s core identifiers. This makes the states more comparable because the percentage of independents varies widely by state, and can understate a party’s true strength in a state.

National Democratic Advantage in Party Identification Narrows

Nationwide, Democrats have a 4-point party identification advantage over Republicans in 2010 (44% to 40%), down from an 8-point advantage in 2009 and a 12-point advantage in 2008.

While Democrats’ party strength fell in each of the last two years, Republicans have not gained concomitantly. Instead, the percentage of Americans who do not identify with or lean toward either political party has increased.

Bottom Line

Democrats’ advantage in party identification continues to dwindle this year. Fewer Americans identify as Democrats, and more say they don’t identify with or lean toward either party. On a state-by-state level, this means more states are now classified as competitive or leaning/solidly Republican than has been the case over the past two years, and fewer as leaning/solidly Democratic.

Some shift toward independent party identification is to be expected in the years between presidential elections; in presidential election years, party allegiance tends to be at its height. The key finding at this juncture is that Democrats, not Republicans, have been the net losers as Americans shift away from the major parties.

The overall result is a more competitive partisan environment this year than has been the case in the last two years, underscoring the potential for Republicans to do well and pick up seats in this year’s midterm elections.

A new survey released this morning shows that voters in battleground states are very opposed to the scheduled tax increase that takes effect on Jan 1, 2011.  But, nearly half (45%) have no idea that taxes are nearing an impending hike:

54%  Heard of Scheduled Tax Increase
45%  Not Heard of Scheduled Tax Increase

Regardless of whether or not voters have heard of the scheduled increase, they are strongly opposed across party lines.

More analysis here (http://www.resurgentrepublic.com/polling_analyses/14).

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A recent survey by Quinnipiac presents us with more evidence that Americans are beginning to sour on President Obama.  Despite winning a number of key legislative victories, Americans clearly don’t want what Obama is selling.  Now, they are losing confidence in his ability to deal with the most important issue - the economy:

Handling Economy
39% Approve (was 44% in May 2010)
56% Disapprove (was 50% in May 2010)

Policies Hurt Economy  36% (was 32% in May 2010)
Policies Help Economy  41% (was 45% in May 2010)
Made no Difference  19%  (was 18% in May 2010)

Who do you trust to do a better job handling the economy?
Obama   41%
Republicans in Congress  42%
Unsure  17%

As a growing number of voters believe that Obama’s policies have actually hurt the economy, we are seeing a plurality choosing to trust a group (Republicans in Congress) that the public actually thinks less of than Obama to handle the fragile economy:

Republicans in Congress 36% favorable
Barack Obama 49% favorable

This is a disaster for Demcrats who were hoping that Obama could help them save their candidates in the upcoming fall elections.  With each passing day, Obama appears to be more and more of a liability for Democrats across the nation.  We are already hearing reports that Dem candidates in several swing districts are refusing to appear with the President at events.

Republicans seem to be ready to win big in November, but it certainly won’t be because our brand is good.  It seems like we may win in spite of ourselves this fall, especially with more and more bad news coming out about the RNC.

Gallup has released institution confidence results that show that Americans have very little confidence in Congress.  In fact, it is the lowest point on record:

Despite being at the bottom of the list, Congress did not have the largest drop from last year.  That honor belongs to “the presidency” who dropped 15 points from 51% confidence to 36% confidence in a single year.  That is more than double the movement of any other institution on the list.

The drop in confidence partners with one of the lowest approval rates in the past thirty years means that most Americans maintain strongly negative feelings for Congress.

What can LeBron James tell us about younger voters?

Caught up in the all of the discussion about LeBron James’ decision to go to Miami is an interesting sociological and psychological point.  When mentioned at all, this point has been phrased as  ”Jordan or Kobe would never have done this.”  This is true, but instead of a critique of James it really points to differences between a generation that contains both Jordan and Kobe and one that includes the younger stars of today–including James, Kevin Durant, and others.

Generational sociologists don’t universally agree on where the set the “breaks” between generations.  For current purposes though, the general boundaries that most researchers in this field use will suffice.

Michael Jordan was born in February of 1963.  Kobe Bryan was born in August of 1978. Despite the 15 year gap, those birth years define the leading and trailing edges of what is generally referred to as Generation X.

LeBron James, despite being closer in age to Kobe than to Jordan, is a member of the next generation to come of age in America–the generation typically referred to as Generation Y or the Millennial generation.

LeBron’s decision to join Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosch in Miami can tell us some interesting things about the social psychology of this Millennial generation which can, in turn, inform our efforts to win their votes.

The narrative that has emerged about LeBron (and Bosch) is that they gave up money and reputation to pursue “happiness.”  This is incomplete in the sense that what they really gave up was individual-achievement based “happiness” to pursue a group-achievement based “happiness.”

They placed a higher value on relationships and their place in a group of individuals with similar interests than on individual reward or achievement.

This is one characteristic of the emerging behavior of the Millennial generation–the substantial decrease in the transaction costs of communication has created an almost infinite flowering of small, highly cohesive groups with similar interests and experiences. While Generation X was defined by the collapse of community and growing cynicism about politics and public life, the Millennial generation may be defined by a renewed involvement in public life–but in the context of community public life (even if those communities are online) rather than in the sense of the mass-movement politics of the Baby Boom and the 1960s.

Today our political dialogue is dominated by messages that miss the basic need of the Millennial generation:

• The liberal language of mass-movement politics, born of the Baby Boom, misses the Millennial generation because it fails to value their strong interpersonal bonds with others in their communities–the movement that liberals evoke, with its continued emphasis on tearing down rather than building up, is anethma to this new generation of voters.
• The conservative/libertarian language of atomist individualism similarly rings hollow for most Millennials.  The individual standing alone is too cut off from his community and friends for the comfort of the average Millennial; this language seems to promise loneliness and isolation rather than freedom to younger voters.

So what language works for Millennial voters?  What does appeal to the LeBron generation?  It is the language of building something together. It is the language of a movement to solve major problems as a group, rather than as individuals, by building something new, rather than tearing something down.

For LeBron and his friends, it’s the language of winning championships together–as part of a community, a team, rather than as individuals.

We saw the first real evidence of this language at work in the Obama campaign with its imagery and reality of community groups scattered throughout the country working together to build a government beyond the conflicts of the previous decade.

But, the reality of an Administration that speaks acts in the tradition of mass-movement Baby Boom “revolutionary” liberalism has lost Obama these Millennial voters just as fast as he gained them during the campaign.  They are now available as part of a long-term, vibrant, Republican movement if we can speak to them in the language they understand.

Based on our research, there are three keys to reaching these voters and preventing them from becoming a Democratic constituency:

1. Return to  the language of shared goals, values, and achievement–the language of patriotism. Over the last 30 years, conservatives have become increasingly uncomfortable with the language of patriotism.  Whether it is a final act of yielding to the mocking of the establishment left or an increasing difficulty distinguishing the language of “nation” from the reality of “state,” we have abandoned the imagery and language of patriotism and the setting of big goals. Millennials will only respond to us if we can find a way to position our agenda with the same power as Reagan’s “Shining City on the Hill” or Kennedy’s “Ask not what your country can do for you.”
2. Talk about solving big challenges.  Millennial voters came of political age in a country that has faced two major challenges in rapid succession–the threat of terrorist attack here at home and catastrophic economic impact of an assumption that debt didn’t matter.  They are ready and willing to be a part of something big to solve either or both of these–they just need a leader to inspire them and show them the way.
3. Create a movement of small groups.  Millennials don’t want to be part of a mass movement, they want to be a part of something that that they are doing with small number of like-minded individuals.  The message for these voters must be how their small group can link with other small groups to build something bigger–rather than breaking down these bonds, we must acknowledge and leverage them as part of our movement toward shared achievement.