2%
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Polls, RaceThat’s how many African-Americans approve of Bush’s performance.
Listen, this news sucks. I’m not a fan of Bush, but to have this level of distrust of the President’s agenda is pretty dangerous for the country moving forward. You can’t get things done if this many people don’t trust your policies and leadership.
To further illustrate, let’s see what that 2% means in actually numbers. The entire African-American population in the US is around 35 million. If you consider that 25% are under 18, that leaves around 26,250,000 million blacks. 2% of that number is 525,000. That means Bush has convinced a little over half a million blacks that the country is going in the right direction.
Now of course, this is just one poll, but Bush’s numbers have been trending downward and there are no indications that they’ll do anything but keep going down; especially if the special prosecutor starts handing out indictments in the Plame case.
Simply put, no amount of Kanye Wests can drive numbers this low. This is a faulty message and agenda, and for the sake of the country I hope the White House starts getting their act together and puts together some type of strategy that addresses this lack of trust.
If not for Bush’s sake, then for the country’s.
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October 13th, 2005 at 7:46 pm
Hmmm, Bush has his problems communicating to EVERYONE these days, it seems. But I wonder how you expect he’s going to make his case to black Americans over the wall of the self-appointed — and too often Hollywood-Democrat-approved — spokesmen for black Americans who have responded to the hurricane disaster with a flood of conspiracy mongering?
October 13th, 2005 at 8:48 pm
Again…2%
No amount of Louis Farrakhans, Cornel Wests or Howard Deans can bring about this kind of disapproval. African Americans can make up their minds regardless of what their leaders say, especially given such an incredibly low approval rating.
I mean, do you really believe that a 2% approval rating is caused by these kinds of conspiracy theories? Or would the most logical explanation simply be bad governance, attention to detail and messaging?
I’m going to stick with the latter.
October 13th, 2005 at 9:51 pm
With a sample size of only 89 African Americans, though, the margin of error on this 2% is about 10%, or so says Wonkette. Still, even 12% is not good at all.
October 13th, 2005 at 10:04 pm
I wonder if AFP (the source of the South African story you linked to) got the numbers right. This looks like the poll in question, but I don’t see “2 percent” in there under black approval of the president. I see 12 percent.
The Reuters story makes no reference to that dramatic low number.
The 12 percent actually would be about a point higher than the percent of blacks who voted for Bush in 2004.
October 13th, 2005 at 10:11 pm
Brian, it now looks like Froomkin, the WaPo columnist Wonkette cited, is backing away from the 2%, too. And he’s updated to link to the Pew Poll I found, which, it turns out, was not the same one AFP wrote about, but which was drawn from a wider sampling and thus has a better chance of being accurate.
October 13th, 2005 at 11:13 pm
Sorry folks, a couple things wrong with the logic here.
First, the guy Froomkin talked to who questioned the numbers was a political analyst, not a pollster. So this 10% to 12% thing is just a wild guess. More on HOW wild later. And by the way, the margin of error for this study is 4.6%. To get a 10% margin of error, the sample size would be 166 people. This study had 807.
Also, the poll was done by NBC and the Wall Street Journal. Forgive me if I trust their bi-partisan pollsters more than Froomkin’s analyst friend. And frankly, just because Froomkin is “backing away” from the remarks doesn’t mean he knows what he’s talking about which I will now demonstrate.
So let’s take the 4.6% margin of error as a statisical given, since it’s 4% for a sample size of 1,037 and 5% for a sample of 664. Fair enough?
Now, 89 blacks in a nationwide sample of 807 people is 11% of the total sample. Currently, blacks make up 13% of the population. Not that far off. But let’s just add some more into the sample for a moment to bump it up to the 13%. That would be 104. And let’s just say, for argument’s sake, that 12% of the remaining 15 participants would actually say Bush is doing a good job. That’s still only another 1.8 people. Let’s round up to 2 people. Add those 2 to the original 2 that said they approved (2/89 is .022) and you have 4/104, which equals .038 or 4%.
So remember that WILD guess. Well now I’m going to reveal how wild. First and foremost, it’s obvious that to get to that 10% or 12% number, you would have to have a larger margin of error than the poll actually has. And by the way, that would be a statistical anamoly to rival all other statistical anamolies. Putting that in percentages, the chance this study is incorrect by 8% (giving you 10% of blacks) is about 5%. The chance this study is incorrect by 10% (giving you 12%) is about…2%.
Sorry people, these guesses are just that…guesses. And bad ones at that. I realize that 2% is too low to be believed, but just because the Pew poll got 12% doesn’t mean the NBC/WSJ poll didn’t get 2%. I’m more than willing to accept a number of say 4%. That at least has a 28% chance of being right.
However, wherever Bush’s number is, it’s near the very bottom when it comes to blacks trusting his leadership. That point should concern us all. I think that’s perhaps a more important point to focus on instead of editorializing about liberals and black leaders race bating, agreed?
One last point. While I do geniunely appreciate that you’re fond of quotes Cal, they’re just quotes. The numbers in this poll represent real people with real feelings. Personally, I’ll go with the those feelings instead of what a wise man felt 90 years ago.
October 13th, 2005 at 11:40 pm
Any chance of getting my #3 quote approved? It’s just sitting there saying “Awaiting Moderation.”
If, when the president had a strategy and a message for black Americans and put some effort into getting their support, he got a mere 12 percent of their votes, what sort of “messaging” do you propose he should do now (other than rolling back the hands of time and doing something different about that Gulf hurricane).
Furthermore do you think the numbers deserve to be so low? As an objective observer (neither black nor Republican) do you think the low number — 2 or 12 percent, take your pick — is a reflection of reality or perception?
Do you really think Plame indictments are going to make a difference to most black Americans?
October 14th, 2005 at 2:43 am
There ya go. #3 quote approved. I hadn’t received any emails saying I had to moderate. Wordpress is funny that way sometimes.
Now, to your points. It’s extremely debatable whether Bush has really ever had any cohesive message that spoke directly to black Americans. Sure, once campaign time rolls around he has a few talking points, but they aren’t his base and I would say that he’s pretty much ignored them.
Some may argue the prescription drug plan was aimed at low-income elderly seniors, and a number of them are black, but what else have we seen? Increased funding for faith based intiatives? Tax cuts? No Child Left Behind? Perhaps what these numbers are showing is the same type of apathy that Bush has shown towards black America.
And seriously, rolling back the hands of time. Come on…
Do the numbers deserve to be so low? Well, forgive me if I don’t answer that since I’m not black. I can tell you that from my point of view I’m personally displeased with the guy’s performance. I think the Meirs nomination, coupled with the fiscal irresponsibility of not rolling back some of the tax cuts to pay for the Hurrican relief, has really got me hot. Now, I’m always heartened to hear that he’s willing to stay the course in Iraq, because I think that’s needed. But I wish he wouldn’t pull troops out in Jan 2006. That I think is a mistake. Monday morning quaterbacking? Of course, but that’s blogging.
Yes, I do. Corruption is corruption. Why do you think it won’t?
October 14th, 2005 at 3:21 am
They’re both true. And related. Which is my point.
Most American blacks like Democratic candidates more than they like Bush. They always have. One of the points he tried to make during the campaign was that by reflexively voting for one party, always, the black population leaves itself vulnerable to being taken for granted by that party, like the Republicans once took black votes for granted. Evidently, the message didn’t stick.
Most are extremely unhappy with the federal government right now, and he’s the symbol of it. He takes those lumps along with everything else.
I don’t see this as a crying need for the White House to scrap every policy and scramble to craft new ones so Bush can bring his approval rate among African-Americans from 2 percent back up to 11 percent.
What’s Rove corruption going to do? Cost him the other 2 percent. Come on. The cynical fact is, the point of a political party is not to bend and twist itself so as to include every possible voter, only enough voters to win an election.
Do you really think Bush is “apathetic” toward black Americans? I think he has a lot of “pathy” toward them. I think he sincerely wants to do good by them. You can damn his results or his tactics, but do you really want to put forth the proposition that he doesn’t care?
October 14th, 2005 at 7:38 am
The overall error rate in a survey is based on the overall numbers. The overall error rate on a subsection (like the approval rate of blacks) depends on the numbers in that subsection. I’m Romanian by birth. If there’s an opinion survey with a sample of 400, there might be 2 romanian americans in that sample. In that, more extreme, case, it becomes perfectly clear that a community of over a million is going to have more nuanced opinions than 100%, 50% or 0%, the only options possible for a sample of two. The error rate of 10% in comments earlier is correct.
The problem of black support for Republicans is bad. It’s been bad for decades. The black social conservatives were the only ones supporting Bush and now, with conservative support falling for him across the board, black support for him has cratered. I don’t know whether 2% is a real result or a misprint. I do know that for Bush to get his numbers up in the black community, he’d have to go hard social conservative. Is that what this article is really advocating?
October 14th, 2005 at 9:28 am
Okay, some me this “pathy”, because I certainly haven’t seen it.
And by the way, I do think he does care, but I think after the election was over his involvement with them dwindled. And to your point about winning enough voters…exactly. Bush’s talk of gay marriage did much more to win black voters than any programs he proposed. I don’t think that’s cynical…that’s just how it is. But let’s not pretend that Bush has some robust agenda for the black population in this country. He doesn’t.
Well, I never said anything of the sort. But should he address the problem? Yes, he should. I don’t know what form this should come in, but it should come soon. That’s up to him and his advisers to figure out. Perhaps a good will tour through the south where he actually talks with these people every single day for a week or two weeks. But man, let’s see SOMETHING.
And TM, for everybody’s sake, I’m going to do more research on this one. I am extremely positive that you can’t take a subset of a poll and give it its own margin of error. Why? Because that group is calculated as a percentage of the overall population and therefore is a cross section that accurately represents our nation. It’s not as if the pollsters ONLY interviewed 87 black people. That would certainly create a larger margin of error. But because those 87 were part of an overall 807, it can be said that those opinions are accurate, at least within the 4.6% MOE. I’m almost certain about this, but I’ll do some digging and get back to everybody.
I mean, in short, this is what every single pollster does. And also, by that reasoning, the Pew poll Cal cites has a 10% margin or error, so their finding of 12% could actually be…2%. Does that make sense to anybody? Because that means that nearly every single poll that takes a subset of an overall poll and draws conclusions about blacks will have a 10% MOE.
But hey, you could be right so I’ll check.
October 16th, 2005 at 3:43 pm
Mystery Pollster comes down hard on the 2 percent figure. I see Maureen Dowd now has picked it up and run with it, too, like some sort of partisan holy grail, which further convinces me it’s a bad number.
October 16th, 2005 at 4:27 pm
HA! What if Michael Yon talked about it?
Listen, everybody has the flavors of media they like and they despise. But just because liberal commentators are crowing about it doesn’t mean the pollsters didn’t get those numbers and that they don’t express a certain opinion. I also find it a little disappointing that many are still questioning the accuracy of these numbers instead of what they mean in the broader context.
Also, good points made by the Mystery Pollster and thanks for pointing it out. Personally, I haven’t been able to contact my statistics prof at MU, but it looks like more and more are saying that the MOE for the black portion is 10%. I’m willing to accept that for now, but remember how very unlikely that the approval would still be 12% among blacks.
Because with a 10% MOE, here’s the likelihood that the numbers would be THAT off.
12% – 16.2% (10% off, etc.)
11% – 18.8%
10% – 21.6%
9% – 24.6%
8% – 27.8%
7% – 31.1%
6% – 34.7%
5% – 38.4%
4% – 42.2%
3% – 46.1%
2% – 50%
Again, what is the most likely number that’s correct? 2%. It’s got a 50/50 chance of being right.
Also, note the update at Mystery Pollster, where Fox News is cited with a drop from 22% approval to 7%.
Again, I hope that pretty soon we’re going to talk about what all of these numbers actually mean instead of whether they’re statistically accurate or not.
October 16th, 2005 at 10:07 pm
It’s not that Maureen Dowd is liberal. It’s that she has an inconvenient habit of manipulating information to make it appear damning to the Bush people. So much so that there’s even a word for it now, based on her name.
And I don’t know whether Michael Yon is conservative or not. I have no idea who he voted for or what he thinks about stem cell research or taxes or Bush’s popularity among blacks. He happens to be in the exact place he’s writing about, closely observing his subjects, which is why I credit his observations more than those who are not where he is. It’s not comparable to what a columnist like Dowd does.
October 16th, 2005 at 10:09 pm
The numbers mean black Americans are seriously pissed off by their impressions of what happened during the recent hurricanes, as far as I can tell.
October 18th, 2005 at 11:16 am
The black Americans I know have been seriously pissed off at the Bush administration for the last several years. The straw that broke the camel’s back was what happened during recent hurricanes.
Look, republicans, especially when they claim to be “compassionate conservatives” and then don’t deliver, do not care too much for investing time or money into policies that help the poor or minority groups. Not all black americans are poor, but I would assume that those who are not are mad because they see others being swept under the rug.
So, it’s no surprise that many poor people and members of minority groups are 1) going to vote democrat and 2) are going to highly disapprove of the current administration. Then, when you see thousands of black people (mostly) on the news with no food or water for days, surrounded by the sick and dying and having to deal with riots, looting, murder, rape, etc. while the Pres is on vacation . . . it’s not hard to finish that equation. Whether it was his fault or not – them’s the breaks.
October 18th, 2005 at 1:39 pm
if anyone questions these numbers, they should ask some black friends what they think of the president. None of my black friends think Bush is doing anything for blacks except appointing them to high level positions in his cabinet. And if you look around and find you have no black friends… You really shouldn’t question the poll numbers at all.