For whom the bell curve tolls

Gary Langer, polling director for ABC News, marks the passing of the Los Angeles Times' polling unit, a victim of Tribune Co. budget cuts. The Times put out its final poll nine days ago; it was an analysis of the growing economic uncertainty felt by many Americans in this economic recession*. The Times poll started 31 years ago and has been overseen by Susan Pinkus since 1995. She and her staff are being laid off.

Langer writes:

Does the loss of a single polling outfit matter? If it’s a good one, sure it does. Even when well done, a single poll often is insufficient to illuminate public opinion fully; like a flashlight on the road, it takes a bunch of them, shining in the same direction, to show the way. Without the L.A. Times Poll, our path forward will be a little less well-lighted.

*A link to the poll results. Americans are very down on Wall Street firms handing out bonuses this year.

Company for the miserable

It's not surprising that a majority of Americans are worried about the economy - 63 percent say it's in a long-term decline, according to an ABC News poll out today. What is surprising is the number of people who say they're feeling the pinch. From the ABC poll (paraphrased):

63 percent say they've been hurt by the recession; three in 10 say they've been hurt "a great deal"

51 percent say they've been hit by the stock market collapse

Two-thirds are worried about maintaining their standard of living (74 percent of women vs. 57 percent of men)

27 percent say someone in their household has had their pay or work hours cut; 18 percent say someone in their household has lost a job

21 percent worry they'll lose their job, and almost half think they'd be unable to find as good a job if they had to look

53 percent are worried about health care (59 percent of women vs. 46 percent of men); 75 percent of lower-income Americans worry about health care

15 percent have fallen behind on the mortgage or the rent; 37 percent are worried they will (the numbers are highest for women, lower income and those under 40)
57 percent say they'll spend less this Christmas

24 percent approve of Bush's handling of the economic crisis; 23 percent approve of the overall response; 55 percent say Obama's off to a good start, but just over half think he can do anything about it

Where we get our news

The number of Americans turning to the Internet as a preferred source for news on the presidential campaigns is up 23 percent from four years ago - 33 percent in 2008 compared to 10 percent in 2004. The same poll, conducted by the Pew Research Center, finds 29 percent of Americans read newspapers for campaigns information, up one percent from 2004 but still below the Internet number.

(Nevertheless, newspaper circulation continues to drop.)

As for the other media, television watching was down - though it continues to dominate as the top source for campaign news - and magazine reading and radio listening were up.

There is one clear weakness in the findings: One of the media sources is not like the others. The Internet is not a form of production but a delivery system. What exactly are people looking at online? A local newspaper? A national magazine? Are they listening to NPR podcasts or dowloading clips from the Daily Show? The footnote has a link that gives us some idea of how news consumers use the Internet, but not enough to disambiguate what proportion of the Internet audience is reading an online newspaper versus some alternative source.

Another interesting finding in the Pew survey is that cable news channels serve a much more partisan audience than other campaign news sources:

Among those who name the Fox News Channel as their main source for campaign news, 52% are Republicans and only 17% are Democrats. By contrast, among those who rely on MSNBC for their campaign news, 50% are Democrats and only 11% are Republicans. Similarly, CNN's campaign news audience is largely Democratic -- 45% are Democrats and 13% are Republicans

A plurality of newspaper readers are self-identified Democrats (41% Dem vs. 22% Rep vs. 34% independent). Fox News is by far the preferred source for Republicans while independents are almost evenly split between all of the news sources.

Not the bump they were looking for

As the McCain campaign tries to turn revelations that Sarah Palin's 17-year-old daughter, Bristol, is pregnant into a "Juno" moment, new polls suggest Barack Obama got a bigger boost from the Democratic convention than McCain from his VP choice.

CBS News has the Obama-Biden up eight points over McCain-Palin, at 48-40. The poll also shows Obama-Biden making big gains with independent voters.

A USA Today/Gallup Poll conducted over the weekend has Obama-Biden up 50-43 in a head-to-head race with McCain-Palin. The poll also found Obama reaching even with McCain on the question of who is the stronger, more decisive leader. The poll suggests a tough road ahead for Palin as well.

CNN/Opinion Research Corp. has the race virtually tied as of Sunday night. Obama-Biden are at 49, McCain-Palin at 48. The poll also found 50 percent of respondents don't think Palin is qualified to take over as president.

Nate Silver has a roundup of the polls on his FiveThirtyEight.com blog. His advice: Ignore the numbers for now and take another look midway through next week.