Commentary
Oregon Daily Emerald
Thursday, November 11, 2004
NEWS STAFF
(541)346-5511
(EN SUDICK
EDITOR IN CHIEF
STEVEN R. NEUMAN
MANAGING EDITOR
JARED PABEN
AYISHA YAHYA
NEWS EDITORS
PARKER HOWE1.J,
SENIOR NEWS REPORTER
MORJAU BALING1T
MEGHANN CUNIFF
KARA HANSEN
ANTHONY LUCERO
CANELA WOOD
NEWS REPORTERS
CLAYTON JONES
SPORTS EDITOR
JON ROETMAN
SENIOR SPORTS REPORTER
STEPHEN MILLER
BRIAN SMITH
SPORTS REPORTERS
RYAN NYBURC
PULSE EDITOR
NATASHA CHIUNGERIAN
SENIOR PULSE REPORTER
DAHVI FISCHER
AMY LICHTY
RYAN MURPHY
PULSE REPORTERS
DAVID JAGERNAUTH
EDITORIAL EDITOR
JENNIFER MCBRIDE
AILEE SIATER
CHUCK SLOTHOWER
TRAVIS WILLSE
COLUMNISTS
ASHLEY GRIFFIN
SUPPLEMENT
FREELANCE EDITOR
(ABE BRADLEY
NEWS FREELANCE EDITOR/
DIRECTOR OF RECRUITMENT
DANIELLE HICKEY
PHOTO EDITOR
LAUREN WIMER
SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER
TIM BOBOSKY
PHOTOGRAPHER
NICOLE BARKER
PART-TIME PHOTOGRAPHER
ERIK BISHOFF
PART-TIME PHOTOGRAPHER
BRET FURTWANGLER
GRAPHIC ARTIST
KIRA PARK
DESIGN EDITOR
ELLIOTT ASBURY
CHARLIE CALDWELL
DUSTIN REESE
BRIANNE SHOLIAN
DESIGNERS
SHADRABEESLEY
IEANNIE EVERS
COPY CHIEFS
KIMBERLY BLACKFIELD
PAUL THOMPSON
SPORTS COPY EDITORS
AMANDA EVRARD
AMBER L1NDROS
NEWS COPY EDITORS
IJNDSAY BURT
PULSE COPY EDITOR
ADRIENNE NELSON
ONLINE EDITOR
SLADE LEESON
WEBMASTER
BUSINESS
(541)346-5511
IUDY RIEDL
GENERAL MANAGER
KATHY CARBONE
BUSINESS MANAGER
REBECCA CRITCHETT
RECEPTIONIST
NATHAN FOSTER
AIBING GUO
ANDREW LEAHY
JOHN LONG
MALLORY MAHONEY
HOLLY MISTELL
DISTRIBUTION
ADVERTISING
(541)346-3712
MELISSA GUST
ADVERTISING DIRECTOR
TYLER MACK
SALES MANAGER
ALEX AMES
MATT BETZ
HERON CAUSCH-DOLEN
MEGAN HAMLIN
KATE HIRONAKA
MAEGAN KASER-LEE
MIA LEIDELMEYER
EMILY PHILBIN
SHANNON ROGERS
SALES REPRESENTATIVES
KELLEE KAUFTHEIL
AD ASSISTANT
CLASSIFIED
(541)3464343
TRINA SHANAMAN
CLASSIFIED MANAGER
KATY GAGNON
SABRINA GOWETTE
LESUE STRAIGHT
KERI SPANGLER
KATIE STRINGER
CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING
ASSOCIATES
PRODUCTION
(541)3464381
MICHELE ROSS
PRODUCTION MANAGER
TARA ^1 HAM
PRODUCTION COORDINATOR
JEN CRAM LET
KRISTEN DICHARRY
CAMERON GAUT
ANDY HOLLAND
DESIGNERS
The Oregon Daily Emerald is pu6
lished daily Monday through Fri
day during the school year by the
Oregon Daily Emerald Publishing
Co. Inc., at the University of Ore
gon, Eugene, Ore. The Emerald
operates independently of the
University with offices in Suite
300 of the Erb Memohal Union.
The Emerald is private property.
Unlawful removal or use of
papers is prosecutable by law.
WCU., 'ST'* HA,W> -TO
*Tff-A\6HT WK6H 'foo’n.c ALt
—-- fcAOrHT- VOlM(rCt>...
Eric Florip | Freelance illustrator
■ In my opinion
Playing Ofl Morality
John Zogby is a man who likes to
be on top of things. Zogby, who has
nurtured his public opinion business
into one of the pre-eminent polling
organizations in the world, has
made a living making sure neither
he nor his wide variety of clients are
caught with their pants down.
Pollsters make a point of being
right — at least within the confi
dence interval — but like all practi
tioners of an imperfect science, they
can be wrong. And this year, many
were, Zogby included. As late as
election day, he predicted a win for
Democratic presidential candidate
John Kerry, The Observer-Dispatch
(Utica, N.Y.) reported. The guess,'
though wrong, wasn’t a bad one. A
shift of a percentage point or two in
Ohio, or any of dozens of other plau
sible electoral scenarios would have
vindicated him. And by the after
noon of Nov. 2, many, this colum
nist included, thought that the office
was more likely Kerry’s than not.
(The problems with the exit polls on
which I and others based our guess
es are interesting, but outside the
scope of this column.)
Wrong guesses are the opinion
pollsters’ eternal burden. The public
and the media alike place faith in
their numbers, but they have only
the raw sampling of a fickle popu
lace to guide their estimations.
But something stranger happened
to the opinions survey around
the election.
“When we did our polling before
the election and asked people the
five most important issues on their
minds, moral values just never came
up,” Zogby explained to the San
Francisco Chronicle. “I’m baffled. It
was obviously extremely important
as a driver.”
Moral values did come up, as
TRAVIS WILLSE
RIVALLESS WIT
pundits have praised or lamented.
According to an Edison Media Re
search/Mitofsky International exit
poll, a plurality (22 percent) of vot
ers listed “moral values” as the most
important criterion for choosing a
president, followed by the economy
(20), terrorism (19) and Iraq (15).
But saying that moral values were
critical to this election, and leaving
it at that, obfuscates a subtler politi
cal landscape than the notion that a
dramatic electoral re-engagement of
conservative, evangelical Christian
voters decisively (and maybe single
handedly) derailed a Kerry victory.
Moral issues, whatever they may be,
are important for voters across a
spectrum of categories.
Gallup Editor in Chief Frank New
port observed in the same Chronicle
article, “It’s not some particular
group or people who are members
of an organization. It seems to be
much broader.”
Muddling analysis of the issue is
the oversimplified and mostly wrong
notion that gay marriage ballot
measures (a moral issue for some)
spurred turnout for President Bush.
In the 11 states where such initia
tives were on the ballot (all of them
passed), Bush did improve his share
of the popular vote by 2.26 percent
age points over his 2000 election fig
ures (from 52.2 percent to 54.4 per
cent). But his national share
notched up 3.22 percentage points
(47.9 percent to 51.1 percent).
Bush’s percentage point gains, it
turns out, were actually 42.4 percent
smaller in states with the amend
ments on the ballots. (Raw numbers
were taken from uncertified CNN
2004 election results and the Federal
Election Commission.) While one
could arguably chalk up a small part
of this gap to greater pre-existing
saturation of Republican support in
the states (nine of which were red in
both election years), the presence
of the measures certainly didn’t
help him.
But the worst and most harmful
oversimplification is that of charac
terizing “moral values” as anything
too specific (say, as code for the reli
gious inclinations of socially conser
vative evangelical Protestants). A
well-considered letter to the editor
that graced this page recently (“
‘Moral values’ differ greatly,” Nov.
9) elucidated this point: “ ‘Moral
values’ is the big post-election buzz
word but it is meaningless ... Ameri
cans simply have no unified
definition of what constitutes the
moral position.”
This sort of sanity, however, will
likely and regrettably sink into a ca
cophony of reductionism perpetuat
ed by parties who stand to lose from
a fuller discussion of the point.
Whatever the case, Democratic
strategists could stand to pay atten
tion to at least one point: The 22 per
cent of voters who cited moral val
ues as their top electoral concern
turned out for Bush over Kerry by a
margin of 80-18. While this says lit
tle about the Democratic Party’s po
sition on moral issues, it’s clear it
can make up some ground by clari
fying and refocusing its message.
traviswillse@ dailyemerald. com
OREGON DAILY EMERALD LETTERS POLICY
Letters to the editor and guest commentaries are encouraged, and should be sent to letters@dailyemerald.com or submitted at the Oregon Daily Emerald office, EMU Suite 300. Electronic
submissions are preferred. Letters are limited to 250 words, and guest commentaries to 550 words. Authors are limited to one submission per calendar month. Submissions should
include phone number and address for verification. The Emerald reserves the right to edit for space, grammar and style. Guest submissions are published at the discretion of the Emerald
■ Editorial
Get in line,
it is time
for cjuacks
and smacks
Quacks to Seoul, South Korea’s, Hanyang Uni
versity for their generous gift of $500,000 and
Quacks to alumnus Dave Petrone for his gener
ous gift of $2.5 million to the University. We now
feel sorta guilty about planning to skip out on our
student loans. Sorta.
Smacks to the Career Fair organizers for serv
ing up another long buffet of tacky corporate
lacky positions. We know the job market isn’t
great but this is ridiculous. Fifth-year senior is
sounding pretty good.
Smacks to anyone who won’t let the election
die already. Analysis in the name of political sci
ence is one thing, but come on! The campaign is
over, stop the spinning.
Quacks to the delightfully amusing ramblings
of conspiracy theorists who warrant an exception
to the above Smack. In their honor...
Smacks to the Illuminati for wiring Bush dur
ing the debates and Smacks to Nick Cage for
making us afraid to park our cars at the Mason’s
lodge during football games at Autzen.
Quacks to the resignation of Attorney Gen
eral John Ashcroft — not that we didn’t love
his big-brotheresque policies, heavy-handed
destruction of states’ rights and civil liberties,
crazy fundamentalist beliefs (dancing is a
sin?) and nail-bitting terror warnings, but
we’re happy to see him go.
Quacks to California voters for green-light
ing embryonic stem cell research to the tune
of $3 billion.
Smacks to California voters for rejecting a bal
lot measure that would have reformed their
state’s uniquely harsh Three Strikes law. In gener
al, basing criminal law on a random sports rule
seems like a bad idea, even when it is America’s
pasttime. But when shoplifting a candy bar can
land people in prison for the rest of their lives,
something needs to change.
Smacks to the Smart Thick, a new consumer
tank currently under development that would be
more massive than the Hummer. You heard us:
three inches higher, four feet longer, 3,000
pounds heavier and even less fuel efficient. It’s
the perfect small penis mobile for guys who like
haulin’ shit and showing wilderness areas who’s
the boss — just remember to stay within one mile
of a gas station at all times.
Smacks to the man to brought a handgun into
a San Francisco school and threatened students
and teachers in order to rob two employees.
Schools are intended to be safe havens for our
children, and let’s keep them that way.
Quacks to the pilot sex education program ap
proved in Maryland that discusses homosexuality
and uses a video that shows 10th graders how to
put on a condom. Let’s teach children at an early
age how to be safe.
Quacks to “Law & Order” for taking on
“tough guy” actor Dennis Farina as a new char
acter. With his steel-gray hair and craggy face,
how could you not love this ex-cop? What is
that you say? Who is this guy? We agree.
Smacks to holiday decorations hitting shelves
two months before Christmas and New Years.
Heck, why not start hauling out the tree in July?
Quacks to President Bush for nominating
White House counsel Alberto Gonzales to fill
John Ashcroft’s attorney general post. Gonza
les is a moderate, and he would be the first His
panic attorney general.
Quacks to veterans. ‘Nuff said.
EDITORIAL BOARD
Jennifer Sudick
Editor in Chief
David Jagernauth
Editorial Editor
Steven R. Neuman
Managing Editor
Gabe Bradley
Freelance Editor