I Could Be Prouder

During the first three weeks of this month, the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville conducted "The Arkansas Poll" -- the tenth edition of an annual survey sponsored by the Blair Center of Southern Politics and Society -- seeking to measure a variety of things including presidential candidate preference, extent of political interest and knowledge, party and ideological identification, etc.

The nation as a whole tends to think of Arkansas as a backward, unsophisticated place in spite of the achievements of some Arkansans such as Bill Clinton and Mike Huckabee. This year's The Arkansas Poll (TAP) did not provide a lot of ammunition with which to battle that perception.

In some measurements, we are very much in step with the rest of the country. To a question about the number one problem today, the number one answer was "the economy/jobs/wages" at 56 percent. "Healthcare (including insurance)" was second at 15 percent. Also, George Bush is not much more popular here than he is nationally, with an approval rating of 27 percent.

In Presidential elections, Arkansas is traditionally a red state and it looks like we'll stay firmly in that column this cycle. The Ark. Poll gave McCain a respectable 51 to 36 advantage over Obama among registered voters. Still, a healthy 14 percent chose to pick neither and were reported lumped together as "don't know/refused."

I have to take issue with TAP methodology a bit here. There are a total of seven candidates for president on the ballot. It seems to me sadly incurious for the Center for Southern Politics to only ask about the two majors in their survey instrument. Also, to lump legitimately undecided voters in with those who simply did not want to answer questions of pollsters seems to be throwing data away for no good reason.

This is not the way they taught us to do things when I took Research Methods in Political Science. Of course that was back during the Bronze Age.

Back to the subject of presidential candidates, there was one particularly interesting question included in TAP: "would you have voted for Hillary Clinton if she had been a nominee for president?" In theory, Hillary would have carried Arkansas since 54 percent of the respondents answered "yes."

One is left to speculate as to whether Arkansas voters are hypothetically willing to support a Democrat in the 2008 General Election because (a) the Democrat would be a woman, (b) the Democrat would be a former state "First Lady" or (c) the Democrat would be white. For the record, 81.6 percent of the survey's respondents were white, which is in line with the state's population as a whole (80% white).

What else am I less than thrilled by? [improper grammar, I know... I'm a product of the Arkansas public education system] How about this interrogatory: "as far as you know, what is Barack Obama’s religion? Is he a Christian, a Muslim, or something else?" Results:

Christian 44%
Muslim 20%
Other 10%
Don't know/refused 26%

TAP also had some items seeking to gauge racial attitudes. To the statement "Irish, Italians, Jewish, and many other minorities overcame prejudice and worked their way up. Blacks should do the same without any special favors," 70 percent either agreed or strongly agreed. And to the statement "It’s really a matter of some people not trying hard enough; if blacks would only try harder they could be just as well off as whites," 47 percent either agreed or strongly agreed.

TAP's respondents really didn't do too badly in the "political interest and knowledge" section, but there were a couple of somewhat embarrassing [to me] items.

"Who is the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives?"

Harry Reid 3%
Condoleezza Rice 7%
Nancy Pelosi 64%
Newt Gingrich 4%
don't know/refused 22%

O.K., that one could have been a lot worse. Then there's "what is the term of office of a U.S. senator?"

2 years 17%
4 years 30%
6 years 30%
8 years 8%
don't know/refused 15%

In replying to the party identification question, only 24 percent of this red state's respondents said they think of themselves as Republicans. 35 percent said Democrat and 33 percent identified as independent.

Ideologically we are 43 percent conservative and 35 percent moderate. Only 14 percent could bear the shame of admitting to being a liberal, while 8 percent either didn't know what they were or refused to answer. No, I'm not going to go there.

The survey finished with some quality-of-life questions, which revealed us as a fairly optimistic bunch. 71 percent said they thought Arkansas was headed in the right direction. 58 percent said that, compared to a year ago, they are financially either better off or about the same.

74 percent felt that a year from now they'll either be better off or at least about the same.

Alright, so maybe I shouldn't be so hard on my fellow hillbillies.