A few weeks ago, The Democratic Strategist, a blog written by–you guessed it, Democratic strategists–featured a roundtable on swing voters. While all the comments of the veteran campaign operatives deserve a read, the piece by author and consultant Robert Creamer on the differences between “mobilizable” and “persuadable” voters was particularly interesting–especially in light of the new Gallup Poll results. Creamer argues campaigns often mistakenly believe persuadable citizens decide their vote based on issues–where a candidate stands on health care, education, or foreign policy etc. Not true, he writes:
Issues are symbols of broader candidate qualities, Creamer writes. Issues like prescription drugs or Social Security or tax cuts are often symbols that are used to describe the qualities of a candidate or party. But they are not the subject of the message in a political campaign. Creamer believes swing voters base their support on these candidate characteristics. He outlines nine major examples in his piece. And while not exactly the same, many of Creamer’s candidate qualities match up with the questions asked in the most recent Gallup Poll. McCain and Obama each win or statistically tie in five categories (McCain does well on traits like leadership, trust, and effectiveness; Obama scores high on caring about people, values, and understanding daily problems; both do well on bipartisanship and whether people would be proud to have them as president). Senator Clinton only wins one category by a statistically significant margin (has a clear plan for solving the country’s problems). If Creamer’s right, and swing voters sway based on character dimensions, Senator Clinton stumbles in this dance. See the chart from Gallup here.
