RogBlog

David Brooks has just written approvingly of Obama’s capitulation to Republicans on tax cuts for the wealthy.  He cites the most recent Gallup poll’s estimate that 67% of independents and 52% of Democrats support extending all the tax cuts.  (In this poll, the average support over all political persuasions was 66%.)

But you would think that someone who devotes extensive and laudatory coverage to social science would account for the basic fact that how questions in a poll are worded can have a huge impact on what answers are given.  In this most recent Gallup poll, those surveyed were given only the option to vote yes or no on a law to “extend the federal income tax cuts passed in 2001 and 2003 for all Americans for two years”.

Less than three weeks ago, another Gallup poll gave participants three options: to keep tax cuts for all Americans (chosen by 40%), to keep tax cuts but set new limits for the wealthy (44%), or to let tax cuts expire for all (13%).  So according to this poll, a 57% majority of the public wants to let tax cuts for the wealthy expire.  And I’ll give you ten-to-one odds that the results of a three-option poll today would look more like November’s three-option poll than like December’s two-option poll.

And while he’s busy oversimplifying public opinion polls, why doesn’t Brooks mention that over two-thirds of the population supports repeal of “Don’t ask, don’t tell”?