… During the 2009 battle over health-care reform, we measured the preferences of the same 800 individuals in two contexts: in a period (August 2009) characterized by relatively little media coverage of Senate procedures, and later (January 2010) in the immediate aftermath of a major obstructionist episode in the Senate. Then, we examined changes in filibuster attitudes with an important intervening event in order to better understand the causes and consequences of filibuster opinions. [cont.]
Steven S. Smith (Washington U.) & Hong Min Park (U. of Alabama), Washington Post