Why Polling on Gun Control Gets It Wrong

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In calling for Republicans to pass gun safety measures like expanded background checks, Democrats point to polls that show most Americans support the idea. They aren’t wrong about the polling. In fact, some polls show that over 90 percent of Americans support expanded checks. Polling, however, does not tell the whole story.

The Daily, New York Times

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Why is trust in government so low? There’s blame to go around.

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Pew Research Center’s latest poll confirms what has been known for a long time: Trust in government is low. Really low. “Just 20% say they trust the government in Washington to do the right thing just about always or most of the time,” the pollsters found, although when asked about specific government functions (e.g., responding to natural disasters, preventing terrorist attacks), approval soars to nearly 70 percent. Democrats’ trust level is low (29 percent), but not as low as Republicans’ (9 percent). …

At the same time, the public still says government has a significant role to play: “There is a widespread belief that [the federal government] does too little on issues affecting many of the groups asked about, including middle-income people (69%), those with lower incomes (66%) and retired people (65%).” Moreover, more than 60 percent say government should have a major role in a long list of policy arenas. …

So the public doesn’t trust the government to do the right thing most of the time, but it still wants the government to do lots of things? This wouldn’t be the first time Americans express contradictory sentiments. How can one make sense of all this? CONTINUED

Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post

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What did Trump know, and when did he know it?

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The chronology is so symbolically perfect that it borders on the eerie. Next week, we will commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Watergate break-in. And this Thursday night marks the start of the House Select Committee public hearings on the Jan. 6 insurrection — a chilling event that displaced Watergate as the gravest threat to American democracy since the Civil War. …

Armchair experts argue that Americans no longer have the attention span to watch any type of protracted congressional hearings. Also, at a time of hyperpartisanship, there are supposedly too few voters in the middle whose voting behavior might be influenced by the hearings. In short, the widespread feeling is that the era when the 1973 Watergate hearings could galvanize the nation has come and gone. Instead, the upcoming hearings will be just another blip in a tumultuous news environment that has hurtled from Ukraine to Roe v. Wade to inflation to Uvalde.

The problem with these glib judgments is that there is literally nothing in modern political history that compares to the Jan. 6 hearings. Never has a congressional committee spent months investigating what was, in effect, an attempted coup to overturn a valid election. CONTINUED

Walter Shapiro, Roll Call

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All the newsroom’s men: How one-third of “The Watergate Three” got written out of journalism history

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… These days, talk about the future of journalism often circles around reporters’ individual brands — the sort of word journalists take a strange pride in hating. Build up a reputation with an audience? Quit your job, lose the constraints (however real or mythical) muzzling your voice, and start a Substack!

There are journalists for whom that model makes a lot of sense. But the story of Barry Sussman reminds us that many of the world’s most important journalists don’t get bylines at all. Their brand is invisibility. And whatever models, whatever systems of support inspire journalism’s next forms, they need to find a way to make sure they can do their work, too. CONTINUED

Joshua Benton, Nieman Lab

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Big Apple Is Sour on the Job Mayor Adams Is Doing

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While 29% of New York City adults think Mayor Eric Adams is doing an excellent or good job as mayor, 64% say he’s doing only a fair or poor job. On three specific issues – fighting crime, addressing homelessness, and safety at Rikers Island – New Yorkers give the mayor even worse grades. But by a 53-37% margin, City residents approve of the mayor’s style, according to a new Spectrum News NY1/Siena College Poll of New York City residents released today.

Seventy percent of New Yorkers say they feel less safe in the City today than before the pandemic, compared to 25% who feel about as safe as before the pandemic and only 3% who feel safer, and 76% said they are very (38%) or somewhat (38%) concerned that they will be a victim of violent crime. CONTINUED

Siena College Research Institute

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McCourtney Institute for Democracy Mood of the Nation Poll

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The McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State’s most recent Mood of the Nation Poll, conducted May 11-19, 2022, finds that well over half the American public disapproves of the job that Joe Biden is doing as president, with 45% disapproving strongly. Perhaps more importantly, the survey provides a window into what Americans feel the president could do to improve his job performance. CONTINUED

Craig Helmstetter & Benjamin Clary, APM Research Lab

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