In July 2007, as candidates on both sides of the political aisle jockeyed for position in the forthcoming open-seat presidential election, the Republican Party was facing an election environment headlined by a president from their party with a 29% job approval rating. Today, 16 months before the 2016 open-seat presidential […] Read more »
Only one poll number right now tells us anything meaningful about the 2016 election
Although the 2016 election is nearly 500 days away, the nation — or at least the nation’s political junkies — remain hungry for news about the presidential campaign. … So what’s a political junkie to do? Watch this number: President Obama’s approval rating. As political scientists Robert Erikson and Christopher […] Read more »
Democrats increasingly think the Confederate flag is racist. Republicans don’t.
… Mass politics has become more polarized by racial attitudes because of Barack Obama’s rise. As I show, the election of President Obama helped usher not a post-racial but a “most-racial” political era. Racially liberal and racially conservative Americans are now more divided over a host of political positions — […] Read more »
2016’s Electoral Terrain Looks a Lot Like 2012
There’s a long list of factors that ultimately decide elections, from candidates to issues, but the electoral terrain ranks near the top. Looking at the 2016 presidential race, three types of counties and three big questions about them will be crucial. CONT. Dante Chinni, Wall Street Journal Read more »
Why Bernie Sanders’s Momentum Is Not Built to Last
Bernie Sanders is surging. He trailed Hillary Rodham Clinton by as much as 50 points in the polls a few months ago, but he has pulled within 10 points in New Hampshire, according to some surveys. He has doubled his support in Iowa over the last month. … But the […] Read more »
Whose Party Is It Anyway?
… The conflict between a pro-free-trade presidential wing of the Democratic Party and an anti-free-trade congressional wing has the potential to become a permanent fixture of the center-left. The conflict gives expression to both the downscale forces in the party that lean against trade and the pro-trade upscale forces. At […] Read more »