Highlighting flawed poll showing partisan divide on Hurricane Katrina, Wash. Post ignored independents' criticism of Bush response
In a September 7 article by staff writer Dan Balz, The Washington Post reported that Americans are "dividing along sharply partisan lines in their judgment" of President Bush's and the federal government's handling of Hurricane Katrina, which Balz called the "opposite" of the reaction of "national unity" Americans had to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But in concluding that assessments of the administration's performance were largely based on political affiliation, Balz relied on a flawed Post/ABC News poll and ignored other polling data suggesting that independents -- and possibly even Republicans -- are critical of Bush's response to the natural disaster.
Balz wrote that the September 2 Post/ABC News poll "illustrates the point vividly" that reactions to Bush's handling of Katrina divide along partisan lines because "[j]ust 17 percent of Democrats said they approved of the way Bush was handling the Katrina crisis while 74 percent of Republicans said they approved." The poll also found that 48 percent of independents disapprove of Bush's response to Katrina, compared with 44 percent who approve. But as Media Matters for America has noted, the Post/ABC News poll is flawed because its sample size was small, producing an increased margin of error, and its results were also potentially skewed because it was taken on the Friday evening of a national holiday weekend, likely altering the demographics of its respondents.
Further, Balz failed to address other polls indicating that independents -- and perhaps even Republicans -- are critical of Bush's handling of Katrina. While a September 5-6 CNN/USA Today/Gallup survey showed that self-described Republicans are supportive of Bush's response to the hurricane and Democrats are highly critical, the poll also showed that 47 percent of independents give Bush a negative rating for handling Katrina, compared with 29 percent who give him a positive rating. Although the question was not specifically about Bush, a September 2-3 Rasmussen Reports poll found that even among Republicans, 51 percent say the federal government's response to the hurricane has been "fair or poor," compared with 47 percent who say it has been "good or excellent."
From Balz's September 7 Post article, headlined "For Bush, a Deepening Divide; Katrina Crisis Brings No Repeat of 9/11 Bipartisanship":
When terrorists struck on Sept. 11, 2001, Americans came together in grief and resolve, rallying behind President Bush in an extraordinary show of national unity. But when Hurricane Katrina hit last week, the opposite occurred, with Americans dividing along sharply partisan lines in their judgment of the president's and the federal government's response.
The starkly different verdicts on Bush's stewardship of the two biggest crises of his presidency underscore the deepening polarization of the electorate that has occurred on his watch. This gaping divide has left the president with no reservoir of good will among his political opponents at a critical moment of national need and has touched off a fresh debate about whether he could have done anything to prevent it.
To his critics, Bush is now reaping what he has sown. Their case against him goes as follows: Facing a divided nation, the president has eschewed unity in both his governing strategy and his political blueprint. These opponents argue that he has favored confrontation over conciliation with the Democrats while favoring a set of policies aimed at deepening support among his conservative base at the expense of ideas that might produce bipartisan consensus and broader approval among the voters. His allies and advisers, while acknowledging that polarization has worsened during the past five years, say the opposition party bears the brunt of responsibility. Democrats, by this reckoning, have rebuffed Bush's efforts at bipartisanship, put up a wall to ideas that once enjoyed some support on their side, and, even in the current crisis along the Gulf Coast, are seeking to score political points rather than joining hands with the president to speed the recovery and relief to the victims.
Wherever reality lies between these mutual recriminations, the path from post-9/11 unity to the rancor and finger-pointing in the aftermath of Katrina's fury charts a clear deterioration in political consensus in the United States and a growing willingness to interpret events through a partisan prism. It is a problem that now appears destined to follow Bush through the final years of his presidency -- a clear failure of his 2000 campaign promise to be a "uniter, not a divider."
A Washington Post-ABC News poll taken last Friday illustrates the point vividly. Just 17 percent of Democrats said they approved of the way Bush was handling the Katrina crisis while 74 percent of Republicans said they approved. About two in three Republicans rated the federal government's response as good or excellent, while two in three Democrats rated it not so good or poor.
"Who said ANYTHING about the LOCAL GOVERNMENT evacuating 100%?? That's ridiculous, but I'm sure YOU know that."
Actually, we depend on our local governments to aid evacuations in a lot of ways. They tell us which areas need to be evacuated, provide local shelters, provide traffic control, and (if we're lucky) they change all the lanes of the evacuation routes to go OUT only. Also (if we're lucky) they enforce restrictions on price gouging so that we don't have to sell our children into slavery to afford enough gas to leave.
How many smear campaigns have we seen against Democrats which were grounded in nothing but lies?
Forgive me if I remain suspicious of this one.
It occurred to me some time ago that no matter what the opposition to George says, no matter what he does, no matter anything, nobody on the right is going to change their mind. He could stand naked on a table at one of his staged events reciting "Mary had a Little Lamb" and the polls wouldn't change 2 percentage points. What we have going on in this increasingly dysfunctional country of ours is a football mentality. Their team won the Super bowl 5 years ago and even though they refuse to replace flawed players and they haven't come close since then, they still think they're a championship team and can do no wrong in the eyes of their fans. Bush's followers have their heels dug in so deep that can't see what is clearly obvious to anyone with the slightest inkling of an open mind. Maybe somebody should do a poll of the people who live on the Gulf Coast and see what they think.
bush's "response" is typical of his administration from top to bottom. unqualified, clueless hacks. from the chicago tribune by adam zajac: "top officials of fema have strong political connections to president bush,but...they had little or no experience in disaster management before landing in top fema posts." "the credentials of top fema managers stand in contrast to the backgrounds of leaders of the agency during the last years of the clinton administration."
You have heard the body count yet. People will start to wake up when they realize that the count is high enough that they could be or know someone among the dead -- if not now in a future emergency. The FEMA report out of the 90's everyone keeps saying predicted this and pointed to a terror attack, still has an earthquake to go.
Plus, have you read some of the questions on those surveys. One asks if Bush is responsible for the hurricane. I don't even believe that. Doing nothing afterwards, yes. Creating a tropical storm, no -- unless the crazies are right about that HAARP thing in AK.
Yes, there is much failure. And the minnows -- the mayor of NO and the governor of LA have ended their careers -- that's why no one is pointing at them they are done with. Bush and the fed.s are the only ones with the media might to cover themselves. And don't kid yourself, the moment he signed the papers sent to him to declare this an emergency 8/27 or /28 I forget which, he too is responsible. Quite frankly, I could not sleep at night knowing I lost an American city, was responsible for over 10K (that is a kind estimate from what I hear), and then tried to duck my share of the blame. Quite frankly, I could not sleep at night knowing I knowing I defended such a man. So, if you can then shills keep yakking.
[link to mediamatters.org]
Remember the "Louisiana disaster plan, pg. 13, paragraph 5" BS Winger posts?
I’m sure most of you have seen the following quote being pasted all over the Net. The first hint that something was amiss was the “pg 13”; why not Page 13? It shows that someone was desperate to rush any ‘Talking Point’ out there. Then next hint was the lack of a URL to the Document; why don’t the people posting this want us to see the whole Document?
This from the Louisiana disaster plan, pg. 13, paragraph 5, dated 01/00: “The primary means of hurricane evacuation will be personal vehicles. School and municipal buses, government-owned vehicles and vehicles provided by volunteer agencies may be used to provide transportation for individuals who lack transportation and require assistance in evacuating'...”
What the posters left out was that this Paragraph fell under the “PART II: SITUATIONS AND ASSUMPTIONS” Section that starts on Page 12.
[link to www.ohsep.louisiana.gov] 5. It will take a long time to evacuate large numbers of people from the Region. Page 12, Paragraph 5.
6. The road systems used for evacuations are limited, and many of the roadways are near bodies of water and susceptible to flooding. Page 12, Paragraph 6
8. Many of the Region's emergency shelter facilities may be inundated by floodwaters when threatened by a slow moving Category 3 or above hurricane. Sheltering of evacuees outside of the Region becomes necessary. Page 12, Paragraph 8
9. In most emergencies the number of persons needing public shelter will be limited. In the event of a catastrophic hurricane, however, the evacuation of over a million people from the Southeast Region could overwhelm normally available shelter resources. Page 12, Paragraph 9
As you can see, the Plan recognizes the difficult task on the ‘Situations” page.
The next part of this Section is the “Assumptions” page; which starts on the famous ‘pg 13’ and runs to page 15. A good read of it does not indicate that the Governor is responsible for what the “Assumptions” are; a good read of the entire page looks like what would happen in a perfect world.
Read them, and ask yourself; is this a description of what the Governor was “Supposed” to do; or is it what was “Hoped” could be accomplished with the resources at hand. Paragraph 8 and Paragraph 11 sure don’t look like things the Governor has much control over how people will act. And many of these Paragraphs seem to reflect wishes not orders.
The “Actual” Evacuation part starts on page 16. It is broken down into Precautionary / Voluntary Evacuation, Recommended Evacuation and Mandatory Evacuation sections. And each one of those sections is broken down to what the Risk Area Parishes, Host Area Parishes and the State of Louisiana is responsible for.
PART III: EVACUATION
A. PROCEDURES The procedures outlined here are the minimum actions that will be required from State, parish and municipal authorities in a hurricane emergency, to move as many people as possible from the areas threatened by the hurricane storm surge as identified by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers' SLOSH estimates.
The Mayor of New Orleans and the Governor of Louisiana will be judged on how they followed the steps outlined for each of them. We know the Mayor utilized Municipal Buses to move people to the Superdome; and that act alone probably saved many. Had he sent people far out of town on city buses; not as many people would have been evacuated from the area’s that were actually flooded. The Superdome may have been uncomfortable because the Fed’s dropped the ball on getting aid to them early; but the Mayor ensured that most survived.
And nowhere in the Evacuation Procedures do I see the words “School Buses”, or even School for that matter. What do people who make ‘ass-umptions’ do?
by kuni - Wednesday September 7, 2005 10:56:46 PM EST
I think that if people were informed about what really happened, instead of the nonsense that the Bush-o-philes are trying to deceive people with, their opinions about who is to blame would change too.
Too many people allow their partisan political beliefs to color their opinions. I am an independent, and have never registered as a member of either political party. I have even voted for the Libertarian Party candidate at times when I thought the major party candidates were so bad. I think it is really sad that so many people do not look at the facts and instead let their political leanings color their opinions in cases like this. It hurts our country that so many people would ignore the bad things that Bush and FEMA and Bush's appointees and think that his response was fair to excellent.
President Bush's job approval has dipped below 40 percent for the first time in the AP-Ipsos poll
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Although the press have given Bush a pass the electorate seems to be waking up.