Rishon Rishon

What won it

Jeff Jarvis has a very interesting post on what won it. I have a somewhat different take on the results. Here’s his comments, and mine:

The top issue (21%) was "moral values"; 78% of those who cared about that went for Bush, 19% for Kerry. That's a huge difference. Read this one as you will (MSNBC commentators see it as code for Vietnam and the Swifties).

“Moral values” is a codeword for either family-values conservatives, or people who were repulsed by Kerry’s Vietnam record. This is Bush’s core constituency. Kerry had no chance of winning these people’s votes. The challenge was Bush’s to get them to vote at all.

Next: economy/jobs at 20%; 81% preferring Kerry, 17% Bush. So Kerry got much better marks on the economy.

This is the “none of the above” answer. Under normal circumstances, the economy is always top priority; people who put this first are the ones that can’t say moral values or terror, because then they would have to vote for Bush. In other words, people who wanted business as usual (i.e. agreed that “terror is a nuisance”) put this first.

Terror comes in third at 18%; 85% preferring Bush, 15% Kerry. That's the one that amazes me -- not in the Kerry/Bush split but in the importance voters gave it. Bush ran on terrorism; it wasn't No. 1 in the minds of voters; yet he still won.

This came in third because a lot of the “moral values” people are in this camp too. Note, it’s a pretty close third.

Iraq comes in next at 15%; 75% preferring Kerry, 24% Bush. No surprise.

This is competing against “terror” – Bush people who thought Iraq was important did so because terror was important.

Health next at 8%; 79% preferring Kerry, 21% Bush.

These are people looking for handouts: naturally they went for Kerry.

Taxes next at only 5%; evenly split at 52% preferring Bush, 47% preferring Kerry.

I admit: I don’t get this one.

Finally, education at 4%; 76% preferring Kerry, 23% preferring Bush. So much for the education president as a defining issue.

The people who are most concerned about education are the religious right, but they put “moral values” as their lead issue. This is the teacher’s union vote: they are afraid of educational choice and competition. Naturally they voted for Kerry.

Posted by David Boxenhorn at November 4, 2004 12:56 PM