By Many Gauges, GOP Only Holds A Slim Edge

January 18, 2003

Conventional wisdom tends to cast the 6-point advantage the Republicans had in last year's total popular vote for the U.S. House as the truest measure of the relative strength of the two major parties. A good case can be made, however, that the GOP's two-seat edge in the Senate, two-seat edge in governorships, and 0.4 percent advantage in state legislative seats are truer gauges of how closely divided the nation really is: The GOP holds only the slightest lead.

The Gallup Organization noted last week, "A person's party identification is generally the most powerful predictor of his or her political behavior." With that in mind, Gallup last week released a study that looked at the 44,889 interviews it conducted in nationwide surveys in 2002. It found that 33 percent of people identified themselves as Republicans, 32 percent as Democrats, and 34 percent as independents. Even when independents were "pushed"--asked which party they tend to lean toward-and their responses were added to the totals above, the two parties were only a hair's breadth apart: 45.1 percent of all the people interviewed said they were Republicans, and 44.7 percent said they were Democrats. (Studies have repeatedly shown that independent "leaners" vote with their preferred party almost as often as those who initially identify as party members.) In surveying just over 26,000 registered voters last year, the Ipsos-Reid/Cook Political Report poll found the two parties dead even, at 44 percent.

A president who leads a closely divided country isn't necessarily in political trouble-at least not if the public thinks he walks on water. Thus, two new polls showing President Bush's approval rating dropping below 60 percent should worry the White House. The latest Gallup Poll of 1,002 adults nationwide, conducted January 10-12, indicated that 58 percent approved of Bush's overall performance, his lowest rating since 9/11; 37 percent disapproved. That approval rating represented a 5-point drop in just one week. Meanwhile, the most recent Ipsos-Reid/Cook poll, taken January 7-9 among 784 registered voters, found that 58 percent approved of Bush's performance and 38 percent disapproved. In the two December Ipsos-Reid/Cook polls, Bush's approval rating had been 4 points higher.

According to Gallup's analysis, "This most recent drop may well be related to the controversy over North Korea's nuclear weapons capability. In a poll conducted just a week ago, ... Americans gave Bush a foreign affairs approval rating of 60 percent. That rating is now down to 53 percent, with 42 percent of Americans disapproving of the way he is handling foreign affairs, the highest disapproval he has received on this issue. Just prior to September 11, Bush's foreign affairs approval rating was 54 percent approval to 33 percent disapproval, a 21-point favorable margin that is only 11 points in the current poll."

Gallup continued, "The 7-point drop in foreign affairs approval is nearly equal in size to the 5-point drop in Bush's overall approval rating in the last week. In contrast, Bush's economic approval rating did not change ... (49 percent approved in the January 3-5 poll and 48 percent approved in the poll conducted over the weekend), further implicating foreign affairs as a reason for Bush's declining rating."

Looking deeper, Gallup discovered that "while there were no specific questions about North Korea in the current poll, respondents were asked about Iraq. Support for invading that country is the same as it was a week ago, suggesting that the public's lower rating of Bush on foreign affairs was not related to Bush's actions toward Iraq. The other major foreign policy news this past week has been the development of a nuclear weapons program in North Korea. The Bush administration has been criticized for having a double standard about the nuclear programs in Iraq and North Korea, treating the latter country as less of a concern than the former. In the poll last week, Americans were about evenly divided over whether North Korea was as much of a threat to the United States as Iraq; 51 percent thought Iraq was more of a threat, while 46 percent said North Korea was either the greater threat (18 percent) or at least as much of a threat (28 percent). Last week, among people who had been following the news about North Korea very closely, a clear majority, 59 percent, thought that North Korea represented at least as much of a threat as Iraq."

The theory that the president's foreign policy may be largely responsible for his declining popularity receives some corroboration from the Ipsos-Reid/Cook data. While the two December polls showed Bush at 51 percent approval on his handling of the economy and 44 percent disapproval, the January survey found 52 percent approval and 46 percent disapproval. On handling "domestic issues like health care, education, the environment, and energy," in December, 50 percent approved of Bush and 44 percent disapproved, a net approval of 6 points. This month those ratings were 52 percent approval and 44 percent disapproval, a net approval of 8 points. But on handling "foreign policy issues and the war on terrorism," the two December polls had a Bush approval rating of 65 percent and a disapproval rating of 31 percent, a net approval rating of 34 points. Yet the January survey showed 62 percent approval and 36 percent disapproval, a net approval rating of 26 points.

Thus, if there really has been a drop in the president's approval rating since December, the decline does appear to be driven by foreign policy, which since 9/11 has been his strong suit. The post-9/11 halo effect that helped protect the GOP from a troubled economy during a midterm election may be wearing out.

Gallup's state-by-state breakdown of its nearly 45,000 interviews contains good news for both parties. (Like most national polls, Gallup's included only the 48 contiguous states and the District of Columbia; Gallup does not survey Alaska, which reliably votes Republican, or Hawaii, which almost as often goes Democratic.) As might be expected, Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho were the most Republican states while the District of Columbia, Massachusetts, and Maryland were the most Democratic. Even though 28 states had a higher Republican Party identification and only 20, plus D.C., were higher for the Democratic Party, the Republican states tend to be smaller, amounting to only 252 electoral votes while the Democratic states total 279 electoral votes. Just 270 electoral votes are needed to win the presidency. On the other hand, since 1993, Republicans have gained ground in 41 states, indicating that the parties are probably closer to parity than to any real Democratic advantage.