[Republished from 2008Central.net]

This morning on Meet The Press, Tim Russert reached a new degree in sexism and shoddy analysis with a tortured segment on a recent Pew Survey.

Russert's introduction to the segment:

MR. RUSSERT: [...]

Then Pew said, "Give us a word that you think best describes these candidates." The first one was McCain.  Old was the first word people threw out.  Honest, experienced, patriot, conservative, hero, liberal.

Then they asked, OK, Obama.  Inexperienced, charismatic, intelligent, change, inspirational, young, new.

Clinton.  Experienced, strong, untrustworthy, intelligent, smart, determined, rhymes with rich.  That's what the poll said.  They used a different word. But it's a family poll, and this is a family program.  What does that tell you, James?

I'll spare you the agonizing discussion that followed, but if you must read it you can do so here.  The survey was of a group of 1,508 people.  Here are the full results of this presidential candidate word association:

You may be asking yourself, "I noticed that Russert listed 7 words for each candidate.  Are these the only 7?  The top 7?  Are there more?" Good question.  You see, the word bitch was 7th word on the list for Hillary Clinton, so Tim couldn't just discuss the top 5, because then that wouldn't have given him the opportunity to talk about the "word that rhymes with rich."

My issues with the discussion on MTP about this survey are as follows:

• First, if no one described Sen. Clinton as a "word that rhymes with rich," there's zero chance that it would have gotten discussed on Meet The Press.
• Secondly, if you're going to begin a discussion of this survey about the "bitch" description towards the only woman in the race, then it's also incumbent on the host to mention that 10 people also described her as "female/woman." Notice how people didn't describe the most viable black candidate in history as "black?" But, the woman is well "female/woman." This is certainly a topic worth discussing, but it wasn't.
• Third, there are certainly some interesting pieces from this survey that were worth discussing, but weren't discussed.  See, as I already noted, having a serious discussion about this survey is silly.  That is part of the reason why some of the interesting parts of it were not discussed in detail, such as: that almost half of the people described Obama as inexperienced; or 9 described him as arrogant (which I was definitely not expecting); or the fact that 16 people described Hillary Clinton as untrustworthy; or the fact that people seem confused about McCain with some describing him as conservative, others as liberal and others as moderate.  The fact that none of these points were discussed belies the true purpose of the segment: to talk about what a "word that rhymes with rich" Hillary Clinton is.

I'm not arguing that there's some grand scheme against Hillary Clinton or anything.  Rather, I'm simply saying that this segment was garbage and in the wider context of some of Russert's previous antics, it only stinks more.  Is it not worth asking and discussing the role of gender in this election?  Good analysis would have probed deeper, or at least tried to probe deeper.  At the very least, good analysis would have at least pointed out that while Obama was not characterized by his race, Hillary Clinton was characterized by some by her gender.

Further, since the survey was discussed on Meet The Press, does this mean that other parts of the survey are relevant as well?  For example, based on the survey, Obama has more trouble retaining Democrats in a match up against McCain than Hillary Clinton does (he does better amongst independents though).  With Nader in the race, wouldn't the Democratic loyalty be something worth discussing?  Obama's strength amongst independents is often discussed.  In case you're curious, here are the details in match ups against McCain:

Democratic support vs. McCain...

• Hillary Clinton: 89% (McCain gets 8%)
• Barack Obama: 81% (McCain gets 14%)

Independent Support  vs. McCain...

• Barack Obama: 49% (McCain gets 43%)
• Hillary Clinton: 44% (McCain gets 50%)

Any regular reader of 2008Central.net knows that we caution strongly against giving too much credence to polls.  So, I'm not here arguing that this poll is a reflection of reality.  My point is simply this: If this pew report is worth discussing on Meet The Press, then discuss it.  Don't gloss over or flat out ignore the interesting points solely to remind viewers that some people think Hillary Clinton is a "word that rhymes with rich."

[Photo Credit: Big Russ And Me]

Update [2008-3-2 18:42:6 by 2008 Central]: Thanks to a commenter for pointing out an issue with respect to data, the main point of the post remains unchanged, but a correction has been noted.

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