Is this what they mean by "Tea Party"?
From the Department of Inescapable Conclusions comes this: the Tea Party movement is basically racist. That little gem is pointedly NOT included in the New York Times’ analysis of their own poll on the TPers — the paper’s focus is instead on the more “surprising” (to Upper East Side liberals anyway) finding that the people who identify themselves with the movement are educated. Can’t wait to see Fox have a field day with that one….
The new poll comes hot on the heels of a Gallup Poll released last week that also looked at Tea Party supporters (different from people active in the movement as defined by the Times) and how it’s supporters stack up ideologically and demographically with the rest of America. Both polls give a similar demographic snapshot but the Times poll went far deeper into what TPers actually think and believe. The result is strong support for the argument that while the TP movement is ostensibly driven by anger and fear over the economy and government, the elephant in the room is race. The President is a black guy. That’s the problem.
The Times poll has lots of interesting data sprinkled throughout its 110 questions (who actually agrees to sit through all those questions?) including much that is predictable: TPers are better educated, whiter, older, richer, more Republican and vastly more politically conservative than the average American. There are also some telling surprises like the fact that the economic downturn seems to have effected the TPers less than the average American even though Tea Party members are far angrier about t
Let’s start with question 52.
In general, do you think the policies of the Obama administration favor whites over blacks, favor blacks over whites, or do they treat both groups the same?
Favor whites Favor blacks Treat equally Don’t know
U.S. 2 11 83 5
Tea Party 1 25 65 9
Tea Partiers are more than twice as likely as the average American to think Obama’s policies favor blacks. Still it’s only a quarter of the TPers and two-thirds think the administration has treated both groups about the same. That hardly seems to support a charge of racism. Let’s look at question 72.
In recent years, do you think too much has been made of the problems facing black people, too little has been made, or is it about right?
Too much Too little Just right DK/NA
U.S. 28 16 44 11
TP 52 6 36 6
While question 52 could be perceived as a pretty direct way of defining someone as being prejudiced, question 72 is far subtler. It doesn’t ask the respondent about his/her impressions of Obama vis a vis race but instead the way the race has talked about. Over half the TPers think too much attention has been focused on blacks compared with roughly a quarter of the general population.
What makes the
Times numbers so significant is that they are consistent with the results of another poll released late last week that got far less attention. Although Nate over at 538
posted on it, the University of Washington poll on race and politics has some really eye-opening results.
The pollsters there polled on peoples’ attitudes in a handful of 2008 battleground states about race by asking questions designed to get past the obvious. The poll split whites between those who “strongly approve” and those who “strongly disapprove” of the Tea Party movement. Unfortunately the results did not include the views of those whites who do neither (likely a majority) although those numbers are on the way. Nonetheless the raw numbers on TP supporters are pretty telling.
Asked if blacks are “hard working”, “intelligent”, and “trustworthy” fewer than half of the strong TP supporters agreed with any of those three statements (35%, 45%, 41% respectively). Really? More than half of the strong TP supporters don’t think black people are intelligent? Pretty incredible since this isn’t even just the people who say they are involved in the Tea Party movement.
The fact is it’s no real surprise that race is still the biggest unspoken issue on the table. Lots of people have chronicled examples of apparent racism in the Tea Party movement and in opposition to Obama in general. And let’s be straight here: polls show black Americans overwhelmingly support Obama and most of his policies to even greater degrees than Democrats as a whole. That may not be “racism” in the traditional sense but it’s certainly evidence of our racial polarization.
Obama has talked about a post-racial America. Seems like it’s still just talk.
Thanks for this, Jay. More people need to be saying it. Two things amaze me 1. the tea-partiers claim they’re *not* racist, and 2. their arguments historically echo those from the 1920s (esp. the anti-immigration rhetoric), which were all about keeping the “other” (i.e. eastern Europeans, Asians, Mexican/Latin American etc.) from living in the U.S.
As noted on another blog, since when has the Anti-War movement, arguably much larger than the Tea Party, enjoyed such detailed polling of its constituents?
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