[Mb-civic] The Anatomy of a Myth - How did one exit poll answer become the story of how Bush won? Good question.

[George R. Milman]

This older article, containing an important and well stated point, needs
occasional reading as a reminder in the run-up to the next set of elections.

 

Geo.



By Dick Meyer

Sunday, December 5, 2004; Page B01 

Social and intellectual conventions are supposed to settle slowly, but
conventional wisdom can congeal instantly and without much wisdom. That's
what has happened over the past several weeks with a prevailing
interpretation of this year's presidential election -- the great moral
values theory.

The Big Political Idea of the '04 election goes something like this: "Moral
values" turned out to be the most important issue to voters, not the economy
or the Iraq war or terrorism. President Bush won because a legion of "values
voters" -- whose growing numbers escaped the attention of an inattentive
media -- preferred him. The Democrats are doomed until they can woo the
voters who belong to this new political force.

It's a neat theory -- but wrong. How it came to be regarded as the real
story of Bush's victory is a fascinating and sobering example of
journalism's quest for freshness and surprise.

Here's the simple fact: The evidence that moral values determined the
election rests on a single dodgy exit poll question. And it's not at all
clear that more voters are preoccupied with moral values now than were
fretting about "family values" on Election Day 1996, when exit pollsters
included that phrase in a question about "priorities for the new
administration." But in the often arid and repetitive arena of American
political ideas, fun new contestants can be hard to disqualify. The myth of
the moral values election is proving hard to snuff out.

The mantra was in full hum on election night. Television commentators were
understandably struck by the results of the question asked of almost 7,000
voters as they left their polling places: "Which one issue mattered most in
deciding how you voted for president?" The most cited issue on the list of
seven options offered to those surveyed was "moral values" at 22 percent; 80
percent of these voters went for President Bush, 18 percent for Democratic
nominee John Kerry. "Economy/jobs" came next on the list at 20 percent,
followed by terrorism (19 percent), Iraq (15 percent) and then health care,
taxes and education in single digits.

Brian Healy was the CBS News producer covering the exit polls, something he
has done in many elections. He recalled that everyone was surprised that
moral values topped the list as the numbers came in, but it wasn't until
about 4 a.m. that someone quite innocently asked, "What exactly are 'moral
values'?" 

Too late. The story line was already set. And the surprise nature of the
moral values result boosted its allure for the commentariat. When the
newspapers could finally write definitive headlines, the notion that moral
values was a synonym for various conservative positions became a given -- as
did its decisive effect on the outcome of the contest. "Faith, Values Fueled
Win," reported the Chicago Tribune. " 'Values voters' key to Bush
re-election," declared the Fort Worth Star Telegram. "Moral Values Decide
Election," the Tri-Valley Herald in northern California told its online
readers.

>From the modest experiment of one exit poll question, a Unified Theory of
Election 2004 was hatched. Pundits began to spread the word. "Ethics and
moral values were ascendant last night -- on voters' minds, in Americans'
hearts," William J. Bennett wrote in a column posted in the National Review
Online at 11:09 a.m. on the morning after the election -- even before
Kerry's concession and Bush's victory speech.

Several days later, American Prospect Executive Editor Michael Tomasky
expressed the apocalyptic Democratic interpretation in his column: "The
reelection of a president such as George W. Bush for the reasons the exit
polls tell us he evidently won is a culminating event in the political
retreat of modernity, a condition of existence whose fundamental tenet was
the triumph of scientific skepticism over what used to be called 'blind'
faith." Wow.

And on CNN's "Crossfire," co-host Tucker Carlson opened the Nov. 5 show with
this categorical assessment: "Three days after the presidential election, it
is clear that it was not the war on terror, but the issue of what we're
calling moral values that drove President Bush and other Republicans to
victory this week." 

Some reporters were even apologetic for missing the big story. "Somewhere
along the line, all of us missed this moral values thing," said CNN's Candy
Crowley in a speech to a Florida audience.

Political reporters may have many things to atone for, but missing "the
moral values thing" is not one of them. Plenty of commentators have tried to
spike this dogma (including me in one of my columns), but it has proved a
stubborn adversary. Let's take another swing at it.

Yes, the issues boiled down into the code phrase "moral values" were a
factor in this election. There are voters passionately concerned with gay
marriage and abortion, and an overwhelming number of them supported
President Bush. It's also clear that gay marriage ballot initiatives
energized these voters, as did Republican efforts to get out that vote.

But the size and impact of that cohort has been exaggerated. And the impact
of other issues (war, terrorism) and leadership qualities was minimized.
That's mostly because of oddities in the exit poll, but also because this
Big Political Idea conforms to what some Republican strategists are peddling
(and their interpretation has the added credibility that winners get in
writing history). It also fits neatly the red/blue, "two Americas" school of
thought, which projects the country as deeply divided and at war over
cultural issues.

If the national exit poll had been worded differently, moral values would
not have been the top issue and this argument wouldn't be happening.

If, for example, one of the choices on the exit poll list combined
"terrorism" and "Iraq," it probably would have been the top concern and
nobody would be talking about moral values.

If economy/jobs and taxes were one item instead of two, it might have been
the winner. Who knows what the exit poll would have found if "truth in
government" were an option. Or "character."

And, most importantly, the definition of moral values is in the eye of the
evaluator. Most voters probably did think moral values meant being against
gay marriage, stem cell research and late-term abortion; but others
undoubtedly thought it meant helping poor people or not invading Iraq. For
some, moral values may have referred to character attributes of the
candidates. It is a bit of a Rorschach test. Moral values are not a
discrete, clear political issue to be set next to taxes or terrorism; it's
public-opinion apples and oranges.

Gary Langer, the polling director for ABC News who helped design the exit
poll but objected to including the moral values option on the issues list,
pointed out some of these flaws in a Nov. 6 op-ed for the New York Times. He
argued that "this hot-button catch phrase had no place alongside defined
political issues on the list of most important concerns in the 2004 vote.
Its presence there created a deep distortion -- one that threatens to
misinform the political discourse for years to come."

Now, to the hard question: Are there more values voters than there used to
be?

In 2000, the consortium that ran the national exit poll did not list "moral
values" as an option on their issues menu. At that time, it would have been
seen as a question about Bill and Monica, and so pretty useless. So it's
hard to know whether the slice of the electorate concerned with such matters
has grown during President Bush's term. 

We do know that in the 1996 question about the next administration's
priorities, "family values" was tops for 17 percent (behind the winner,
"health of the economy," at 21 percent), and that group largely went for Bob
Dole. So you could argue that the 17 percent whose top worry was family
values and went heavily Republican turned into 22 percent worried about
moral values in 2004. That's a slight shift, but hardly a cultural tsunami
-- and remember, no one asked these voters for their definition of family
values then, or moral values now.

Nonetheless, analysts have been surfing on tidal-wave conclusions. It has
become a breast-beating crisis for Democrats that the values voters who were
22 percent of the electorate went for the Republican by a crushing margin,
80 percent to 18 percent. By that logic, it must follow that it's a crisis
for Republicans that the 20 percent who care most about the economy and jobs
went 80-18 for the Democrat. 

Or perhaps it's a crisis for the Republicans that the 45 percent slice of
the electorate that describes itself as moderate went for Kerry 54-45? Or
that first-time voters went 53-46 for Kerry? So many crises, so few facts to
support them.

Voting behavior does divvy up Americans into certain patterns. Rural
residents and heavy churchgoers vote Republican. City people and
church-avoiders vote Democratic. But these cleavages have persisted in
several elections. Moral values didn't just seep into the drinking water.

Yet the myth persists. Sometimes it's perpetuated by partisans claiming that
Democrats are hostile to values voters. "There simply aren't enough voters
in Berkeley, Santa Monica, Santa Fe, Manhattan and Cambridge to offset the
many concerned evangelicals, Catholics and Jews in the rest of the nation
for whom moral values are a determining issue," wrote Richard A. Viguerie
and David Franke in a Nov. 15 Los Angeles Times op-ed.

Sometimes it's perpetuated by those looking at the red and blue divide. Even
after many debunking pieces came out, a story in the Rochester Democrat and
Chronicle about strained relations in the Christian community noted that "it
has gotten stickier than ever in the aftermath of a presidential election in
which moral values played a key role in keeping George W. Bush in the White
House."

A Nov. 22 op-ed in Newsday by political scientist Laura R. Olson also took
off from the fatal assumption. "The much-touted exit poll finding that moral
values were the most important Election Day concern of 22 percent of voters
highlights the fact that a sizable number of Americans expect political
leaders to offer a prophetic vision," she wrote. I'm not picking on her;
that's just one example of many I could have cited.

Other scholars have tried to put the exit poll question in perspective.
Lawrence R. Jacobs, a political science professor and director of the 2004
Election Project at the University of Minnesota, wrote: "The initial
conclusion of media commentators that 'moral values' determined the outcome
of the 2004 presidential election was off the mark, neglecting the impacts
of partisanship and the economy."

Despite the best efforts of myth-busters, the moral values doctrine has
morphed from a simple poll finding to a grand explanatory theory to gospel
truth. This contaminated strain of punditry needs to be eradicated before it
spreads further.

Author's e-mail: 

grain at cbsnews.com 

Dick Meyer is the editorial director of CBSNews.com, where he writes an
online column, "Against the Grain." 

C 2004 The Washington Post Company

 

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