Abramowitz, Teixeira Say GOP's 'Whites Only' Strategy Will Fail

Tea Bagger rally in Madison, Wisconsin
Photo by Jesse Russell

A Republican strategist said last August that the Republican Party's 2012 naked appeals to racism "is the last time anyone will try to do this."

It's Summer 2013 and the GOP is singing a different tune now, exemplified by Sean Trende's minorities-don't-matter analyses.

Alleged GOP efforts to reach out to Latinos and African-Americans have given way to renewed conventional wisdom the Party can win elections by increasing white turnout and doubling down on racist appeals.

Read The Democratic Strategist (TDS) Memo by Ruy Teixeira and Alan Abramowitz: Why The 'GOP Can Win With White Votes Alone' Strategy is Doomed to Failure."

Reading Teixeira and Abramowitz is like reading Nate Silver in October 2012.

Share it with friends.

Abramowitz on Rasmussen polling: Shilling for the GOP

More GOP propaganda floods the U.S.

The following post is by Alan I. Abramowitz, author of The Polarized Public:

From the Democratic Strategist—For the past 8 months, Rasmussen has consistently found more Republicans than Democrats in its national party id polling and that's among adults, not likely voters or registered voters. They're virtually alone in this regard and well off of the overall polling average which has a D lead of about 7 points with Rasmussen removed.

Do we need any more proof of Rasmussen's Republican slant? This isn't just a "house effect." Rasmussen is a shill for the Republican Party as is clear from the wording of many of the questions he asks as well as his results. For more evidence, see Nate Silver's 2010 polling post-mortem in which Rasmussen received the worst rating of any major polling organization for accuracy and bias:

As in 2010, Rasmussen is 'flooding the zone' by releasing numerous state and national polls, thereby strongly influencing polling averages because of the frequency of his polls and their outlier results.

No GOP Cong Takeover, Says Political Sage

Update: NYT/CBS Poll: 30 percent favorable view of GOP in Congress; 47 percent favorable view of Dems. By margin of 52 percent to 27 percent, Americans say Obama better on health care reform than GOP. Hope everyone gets past the misleading headline, "In Poll, Public Wary of Obama on War and Health."

Those fretting that a rightwing takeover of Congress in 2010 is on the horizon ought not to worry.

So says Alan I. Abramowitz in his Why a Repeat of 1994 Is Highly Unlikely.

Abramowitz has been spot-on is his bold political predictions the last several election cycles, most notably predicting the 2008 Democratic rout of Republicans. He notes that today's electorate is very different than it was in 1994.

Writes Abramowitz:

But while there are some important similarities between the current political situation and the circumstances that preceded the 1994 Republican victory, there are important differences between the makeup of the American electorate now and the makeup of the American electorate then, differences that make a repeat of the 1994 outcome highly unlikely.

Novak Wrong in Calling Steady Five-Point Obama Lead a 'Bad Sign'

via mal contends - Robert Novak opines that "Republican losses in Congress will range from bad to catastrophic ... ," and yet Novak still contends that McCain has an even 50 shot at winning the election because of the static some-five-point-lead Obama has enjoyed at the polls for weeks.

"The complete lack of movement in the national polls is good news for Sen. John McCain and bad news for Sen. Barack Obama, even as the Democrat continues to hold a modest lead," writes Novak, whom we hope stays with us for decades to come.

But since when does a newcomer, non-incumbent presidential nominee blow away his challenger in the polls before the conventions and Labor Day—the first Monday in September. Can anyone name one example?

As Alan Abramowitz, Thomas E. Mann, and Larry J. Sabato write:
... 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--point 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.

The Toss-up Lie

Great piece in the CrystalBall exposing the lie that the American public remains virtually tied in their preferences in the 2008 presidential horse race.

Alan Abramowitz, Thomas E. Mann, and Larry J. Sabato write:

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--point 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. Again, maybe conditions will change in McCain's favor, and if they do, they should also be accurately described by the media. But current data do not justify calling this election a toss-up.

But these facts and data tell a story that on broadcast TV just cannot be widely told. It just would not be fair to John McCain.

That this results in presenting a fiction, a lie beneficial to the Republican Party, well, that's what we expect from corporate media.