Three weeks ago, I wrote about Conor Clarke's argument that we need to do away with polls and his subsequent challenge for someone to make an "affirmative case" for media polling: "What good reason do we have (besides morbid curiosity) to consume polls we see in the morning's paper?"
I had not anticipated returning to that subject again so soon, but then along came the debate about town hall meetings on health care. It provides the perfect argument not only for why we need public opinion polls, but why it is a good thing to have many different polls asking many different questions at the same time about the same subject.
Consider some of the arguments from pundits over the last few weeks. In the Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan argued that Democrats "overinterpreted" their mandate, missed how "the great recession changed the national mood and atmosphere" and, until the raucous town-hall meetings, "had no idea how people were feeling."
"You can't get people to leave their homes," she argued, "and go to a meeting with a congressman (of all people) unless they are engaged to the point of passion.... People are not automatons. They show up only if they care. What the town-hall meetings represent is a feeling of rebellion, an uprising against change they do not believe in."
Salon's Joan Walsh, on the other hand, took issue with "Republican leaders -- and even some thoughtful folks in my letters -- [who] try to argue that these town-hall protests are a spontaneous display of populist anger."
"Even if they aren't being paid by the insurance lobby to turn out at these meetings (and some of them may well be)," Walsh wrote, "these angry citizens are being mobilized by lies and shrill rhetoric.... The 'town hells,' in short, don't represent populism, they're a display of hysteria fed by lies peddled by GOP leaders and corporate interests."
What these opposing arguments have in common is a debate about the nature of public opinion. Does the apparent anger represent a "populist" uprising against President Obama and the Democrats on health care reform? What do "the people" want?
In the absence of public opinion polling, we might have only the expressions of those "engaged to the point of passion" to consider. Thanks to modern survey research, however, we need not guess. We can evaluate the opinions of all Americans as measured by representative samples.
That said, with a set of attitudes as rich and multifaceted as those on the health care system, we need to be careful to avoid boiling down all of public opinion on health care reform to one particular question. As my Pollster.com colleague Charles Franklin likes to say, we need "context to understand any numbers -- polling numbers in particular." We are best able to understand a single poll number by putting it in the context of many other polls.
So consider the narrow question of whether Americans generally favor or oppose the reforms being proposed by Obama and the Democrats.
Two weeks ago, the CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll asked a national sample of adults: "From everything you have heard or read so far, do you favor or oppose Barack Obama's plan to reform health care?" Their interviewers pushed hard for an answer, and more expressed support (50 percent) than opposition (45 percent).
Yet on the next question, the CNN poll asked if they favor or opposed the plan "strongly or only moderately," and found more Americans expressing strong opposition (33 percent) than strong support (23 percent). This one survey does confirm the notion that the intensity of opposition to what Obama and the Democrats are proposing is greater than intensity of support.
Now, given that Obama has not yet specifically endorsed any of the multiple bills working their way through the Congress, it may seem odd that so many Americans are able to express an opinion.
So consider what happened when the Gallup/USA Today poll kept Obama and the Democrats out of the question and prompted respondents with the option of saying they didn't have an opinion. When asked whether they would urge their "member of Congress to vote for or against a health care reform bill when they return to Washington in September," Gallup's sample of adults divided almost evenly: 35 percent in favor, 36 percent opposed and 29 percent unable to express an opinion.
The Fox News/Opinion Research survey asked a sample of registered voters and found 34 percent in favor, 49 percent opposed and 16 percent uncertain when asked to evaluate "based on what you know about the health care reform legislation being considered right now." Similarly, the Rasmussen Reports automated survey found a bigger gap between opposition and support (53 percent to 42 percent, with 5 percent unsure) when it asked likely voters about "the health care reform plan proposed by President Obama and the congressional Democrats."
The common theme of these different measurements is that opposition to the health care reform proposals -- or more accurately, to whatever it is that Americans think Obama and the Democrats are proposing -- is more intense than support. This intensity and emotion also appears to bleed into the measures of interest and enthusiasm that pollsters use to identify likely voters.
At the same time, a very large number in the middle are confused and uncertain about the health care reform debate. Their opinions matter too, and are obviously subject to change in the weeks and months ahead. So while the angry opinions expressed at some town hall meetings may tell us something about one aspect of public opinion, it tells us little about those who are still watching and pondering from afar.
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