The document discusses several key points about the relationship between presidents and public opinion: 1) Presidents try to use going public strategies to promote their policies directly to Americans, but are often unsuccessful as public opinion moves away from presidential policies over time. 2) Presidents have more influence over public opinion in the short term after elections, when approval ratings are very high, and when their party controls Congress. 3) Events like casualties in war can influence public opinion, but elites and news coverage shape how the public interprets events, so presidents have significant control over these interpretations and therefore public opinion.

1. Peffley
PS 475 Politics & Media

2.  Review questions posted
 Slides posted
 Papers returned: average = 80+
 Conference Friday
 Final: Tuesday

5.  Defined: a strategy whereby a
president promotes himself
and his policies in Washington
by appealing directly to the
American public for support
 Examples:
 Reagan’s media campaign to
promote his budget proposals of
shrinking social spending and
increasing defense spending
▪ Reagan vowed to campaign against
Democrats voting against his
budget

6.  Woodrow Wilson’s failed
public campaign to get the
U.S. Senate to ratify the
Versailles Treaty
 President Clinton's failed
strategy of going public to
rally support for his health
care reform proposal during
1993-1994

7.  Obama on
Healthcare
(Iyengar)
 Obama going
public to pressure
Congress to Leading House GOP figure's compromise plan gets shot down
increase taxes on
the wealthy
Sen. Rand Paul: Cut military spending

8. "Overall, do you support or oppose raising taxes on incomes over 250 thousand dollars a
year?"
Support Oppose Unsure
% % %
ALL 60 37 3
Democrats 73 26 1
Republicans 39 59 2
Independents 63 33 4
"Overall, do you support or oppose reducing deductions people can claim on their federal
income taxes?"
Support Oppose Unsure
% % %
11/21-25/12 44 49 8

10.  Most Republicans won far
more than 51 percent of the
vote
 Eric Cantor 17-percentage-
point advantage.
 Ways and Means Committee
Chairman Dave Camp just won
with a 32-point margin
 Appropriations Committee
Chairman Hal Rogers won by a
whopping 56 points.
Norquist's no-tax pledge has
survived challenges before

12.  Dan Wood: The Myth of Presidential
Representation
 Presidents are partisans, not centrists, who
try to move the public toward their party’s
policies
 Most of the time they are not successful! In
fact, the public moves away from, not
toward, the president’s policies over time.
 Why? Because the public realizes they are
passing policies on the left or the right.
 But presidents only need to be marginally
successful to gain majority support (their
party +)

13.  Short time after election
 When the president has very high approval
levels (which requires a permanent campaign)
 When his party controls other institutions,
especially Congress

14.  Presidential press conference?
 News coverage?
 Speechmaking, primetime addresses?

15. Message Machine
Behind Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand , 2005
A PENTAGON CAMPAIGN Retired officers have been used to shape terrorism
coverage from inside the TV and radio networks.
Most of the “analysts” have ties to military contractors vested in the
very war policies they are asked to assess on air.

16. NYT: “On Opinion Page, a Lobby's Hand Is Often Unseen”
 The Bush administration acknowledged
that it used public funds to pay
conservative media commentators to write
columns in favor of its policies.
 Armstrong Williams, the conservative
columnist and television commentator was
paid $240,000 to promote the Education
Department policy known as No Child Left
Behind.
 Williams' column was cancelled by
the Tribune Company, which had previously
syndicated his work.
 Bottom line: Columnists often fail to reveal
their true identities that pose a clear
conflict of interest

19.  So what influences presidential support?
 Merchandising or History?
 News coverage or Events?

20.  Events
 Inevitable decline?
 Economy
 Battle deaths
 Rally events
 News coverage of domestic vs. foreign affairs

21. American troops have been sent into harm's way many times since
1945, but in only three cases -- Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq -- have they
been drawn into sustained ground combat and suffered more than
300 deaths in action. American public opinion became a key factor in
all three wars, and in each one there has been a simple association:
as casualties mount, support decreases. Broad enthusiasm at the
outset invariably erodes.
The only thing remarkable about the current war in Iraq is how
precipitously American public support has dropped off. Casualty for
casualty, support has declined far more quickly than it did during
either the Korean War or the Vietnam War. And if history is any
indication, there is little the Bush administration can do to reverse this
decline.
More important, the impact of deteriorating support will not end
when the war does. In the wake of the wars in Korea and Vietnam,
the American public developed a strong aversion to embarking on
such ventures again. A similar sentiment -- an "Iraq syndrome" --
seems to be developing now, and it will have important
consequences for U.S. foreign policy for years after the last
American battalion leaves Iraqi soil.

22.  “Event Response theory” of public support for
war
 opinions about foreign policy adjust directly to
dynamic world events in sensible ways
 Mueller (1973, War, Presidents and Public Opinion):
people will shirk from international involvement in the
face of battle deaths
 Larson (1996): the collective public decides whether
to support a conflict based on a rational cost/benefit
calculation. The greater the perceived stakes, the
clearer the objectives, and the higher the probability
of success, the greater the level of public support for
war.

23.  Contradicted by evidence at the individual-level
 Lack of political information about many things, including events
 Perceptions of the economy and war casualties are heavily colored by
political biases (e.g., partisanship)
 Events are not self-interpreting
 Iyengar: Elites (politicians and media) respond to events and the
public appears to be responding to events, but only because they are
taking their cues from elites.
 Presidents have more control over foreign policy events and their
news coverage and their interpretation by other elites.
▪ News coverage of war and crises: President has the upper hand and can silence
the opposition party, which influences news coverage and public response.
Much more control than with, say, unemployment.
▪ PresidentOpposition partyNews coveragePublic OpinionPresidential Support