The 2016 Confidence Game A new visual survey reveals how Trump and Clinton blow away their competition when it comes to voter confidence.
"on 19 of 20 issues, Trump is deemed the Republican candidate in whom self-described likely GOP voters are "most confident to deal with" the issues. Ted Cruz topped Trump on just one issue – "Helping to improve public education in America." Sanders beat Clinton only on "Properly regulating Wall Street."On the five issues ranked most important among the 20 by the respondents, both Trump and Clinton far outpaced their party rivals. Those five are protecting the country from terrorism, getting things done with Congress, protecting civil liberties, creating more jobs and improving health care."
The sound of loyalty.
By James Warren April 13, 2016, at 2:35 p.m. + More
CNN's town hall with Donald Trump and family Tuesday night fell only somewhat short of a gauzy political version of the von Trapp family singers at the Salzburg Festival in "The Sound of Music."
They didn't sing "Edelweiss," but their adoration of their dad (portrayed on CNN by Trump himself, not Christopher Plummer as a bombastic, tweeting Capt. Von Trapp) was evident. In him, they trust.
It turns out that a lot of voters also trust him more than Ted Cruz or John Kasich on more issues than one might assume. Ditto their confidence in Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders, at least according to an interesting online research survey of 1,000 likely voters.
In fact, there is overwhelmingly larger confidence in Trump and Clinton among Republicans and Democrats, respectively, than one might imagine.
The research by Washington-based Mercury Analytics, which does work for candidates of both parties and corporate clients, went beyond simply asking, "Which person do you trust more on (fill in the blank for the subject)?" Instead, it used what it tags "situational perception," a gambit it sees as eliciting more vivid and realistic responses to queries.
Thus likely voters were first asked to identify the issues most important to them among 20 seemingly important topics. Issues included "protecting the country from terrorism," "getting things done with a divided Congress," "safeguarding constitutional rights," "improving public education," "managing complex issues in the Middle East," "dealing with civil disobedience and unrest," "managing relations with China," "managing relations with Russia," "dealing with immigration," "improving our roads and bridges" and "improving health care," among other matters.
Respondents were then shown one or more images related to the issue topic. For example, on the Middle East, you got photos of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and Saudi King Salman. With the issue of civil disobedience and the justice system, they were shown a street scene of cops facing off against protesters.
Fancy nomenclature like "situational perception" aside, it's basically the notion of a picture being worth a thousand words. And in asking which candidate was best to deal with an issue, the respondent was asked to drag a photo of the particular candidate to the right spot for the answer.
Ron Howard, who runs Mercury Analytics, contends that in typical surveys, "It's too easy to just keep choosing the candidate I support – rather than stopping and really considering that situation." This forces a bit more consideration, in his mind.
Howard did some seemingly surprising research in early January, even before any primaries, that suggested a Trump vs. Clinton general election faceoff would be more threatening to Clinton than generally assumed. Trump would be more intriguing to a varied group of Democrats than Howard, for one, initally figured. (He's a Democrat.)
[READ: New Poll Shows Donald Trump Is a Real Threat to Hillary Clinton]
Now, he finds that on 19 of 20 issues, Trump is deemed the Republican candidate in whom self-described likely GOP voters are "most confident to deal with" the issues.
Similarly, likely Democratic voters chose Clinton over Bernie Sanders on 19 of 20 issues.
Ted Cruz topped Trump on just one issue – "Helping to improve public education in America." Sanders beat Clinton only on "Properly regulating Wall Street."
On the five issues ranked most important among the 20 by the respondents, both Trump and Clinton far outpaced their party rivals. Those five are protecting the country from terrorism, getting things done with Congress, protecting civil liberties, creating more jobs and improving health care.
Amid dueling accusations in both party races over qualifications and trustworthiness, respondents rated all the candidates on those traits.
Among Republicans, Trump, Cruz and John Kasich were rated about the same. When Republicans were asked about the two Democrats, they rated Sanders higher on trustworthiness but they gave similar grades to Clinton and Sanders on qualifications.
Among Democrats, Clinton and Sanders were roughly similar on both matters. Sanders was rated trustworthier by a negligible amount, while Clinton was deemed more qualified by a small margin. When self-described independents were questioned, they rated Sanders better on both metrics.
Commitment to Clinton and Sanders by their backers was roughly the same. Trump, however, generated far greater loyalty from his supporters compared to what Cruz or Kasich engender.
And, as we generally know by now, Kasich was the favored Republican among Democrats.
That, as the von Trapp family would know – if not the Trumps – is as simple as Do-Re-Mi. |
