Perception Gap

Endorsements aside, of course the real strength of the Clinton primary campaign is this data pointed to by Todd Beeton:

For example, according to The National Journal's composite senate rankings for 2006, Hillary Clinton is the least liberal of the Democratic senators running, getting a liberal score of 70.2 vs. Biden's 77.5, Dodd's 84 and Obama's 86 (the 10th most liberal score.) But in a new Rasmussen Poll out today, more Democrats see Clinton as "liberal" (33%) than either Obama (31%) or Edwards (21%.) And while a solid 58% of Democrats identifies Clinton as moderate or conservative, a whopping 66% think John Edwards, the candidate running the most progressive campaign, is either moderate or conservative.

In part, you see here that identity trumps ideology even in people's assessments of ideology. John Edwards has the accent of a moderate-to-conservative Democrat, so he must be one. But this is also the fruit of the fact that for a number of years our popular culture essentially defined Hillary Clinton as identical to liberalism, especially in the non-political media where most Americans get their political information.

But of course what's an asset in a primary campaign in this regard is big trouble in a general election, and this has always been a wellspring of skepticism about her merits as a nominee to me. Why would you want your party's standard-bearer to be seen as much more liberal than she really is?

Comments

There's also the fact that for a number of years (until 2004, I believe) John Edwards defined *himself* as a moderate Democrat. It's not all identity.

Posted by Gabriel | September 15, 2007 3:53 PM

john edwards might be running a more progessive campaign, but as a senator he was nearly identical, but slightly to the right of hillary

Posted by ignu | September 15, 2007 4:18 PM

Shouldn't "conservative Democrat" mean something like 'the old labour', union guy, labor organizer, FDR democrat? And then 'liberal' would have to be to the right of 'conservative Democrat', no?

Posted by abb1 | September 15, 2007 4:37 PM

Yeah, the real surpising thing here is Obama, who's got a very liberal voting record, a very liberal campaign platform, and is seen as a moderate or Conservative by over half the party. And has never billed himself as a moderate/conservative (ala Edwards).

People must really struggle with the notion of someone being both liberal and in favor of bipartisanship when possible.

Posted by mopper | September 15, 2007 4:52 PM

I think the confusion is that many Americans just don't think about politics in terms of policy. The terms "liberal" and "conservative" are personality and background identifiers, nothing more.

Posted by Ed | September 15, 2007 5:20 PM

Is she, like Bill, a member of the DLC?
Anyone know?

Posted by Vertalio | September 15, 2007 7:53 PM

More proof Americans are getting dumber.

Posted by Okinawa | September 15, 2007 7:53 PM

More proof Americans are getting dumber.

Posted by Okinawa | September 15, 2007 7:54 PM

Ed nails it....libs and cons for most semi-apolitical types are terms like preps and punkers....

Posted by metalpetic | September 15, 2007 8:32 PM

The above commenters make good points about Edwards' Senate career and previous reputation as a moderate.

I think mopper's comment about Obama never having labeled himself as moderate/conservative is only half-right, though, as Obama has never really labeled himself as liberal, either. Late last fall and early winter, right before he announced his intention to run for president, Obama did a lot of TV appearances where he did a watered down version of Lieberman's "pox on both your houses" schtick. I month after the historic Democratic gains in the 2006 election, and at a time when the Democratic brand hadn't been stronger in decades, Obama cast himself as an outsider who could see beyond partisanship, and implicitly shrunk away from his self-identification as a Democrat. Just when I was looking to drink the Obama kool-aid, I saw a candidate who seemed to find the Democratic label distasteful. While such an "above the fray" approach might play dividends in the general election, I can't say I'm surprised at the polling data that misjudges how liberal he actually is.

His temperament is another thing that might affect perceptions of him. He calmness in the debates sometimes comes across as passionless, just as Howard Dean's energy in 2004 cast him (along with his antiwar stance) as more liberal than he actually was.

It is a shame that primary voters might overlook and misjudge Obama on the exact issues that should be his strengths, but he played a part in guiding those perceptions.

Posted by Jim E. | September 15, 2007 8:38 PM

Good points Jim E., I think you're probably right

I guess for me, as someone who's always been much more philosophically liberal and politically a moderate Democrat, I don't understand how he could be seen as a mod/conservative.

But if "liberal" is just being used as a stand-in for "partisan Democrat" for the majority of people polled, then those results make perfect sense for him.

Posted by mopper | September 15, 2007 9:54 PM

In response to mopper's point, perhaps one should distinguish between policy liberals and politics liberals. I'm in both groups, so HRC and Obama have mixed appeals to me.

It may be more useful to describe Edwards as a populist. I'm still somewhat leery of his views on gay and reproductive rights, for example - on these issues I think HRC is probably farthest to the left.

But all three are fine candidates in my view.

Posted by rilkefan | September 16, 2007 12:21 AM

In response to Matt's question (why would you want a general election candidate who is seen as liberal and actually is conservative?), consider the following:

(1) The Dems may win the 2008 election regardless of the candidate.

(2) The people who run the party favor corporatist domestic policy and imperialist domestic policy.

-and-

(3) Imperialism is very unpopular right now due to the Iraq War, so a lot of people may want to vote for a candidate perceived as liberal.

Given that, if you are a Democratic Party establishment type who wants to pay off corporate and military-industrial complex campaign contributors and maintain an indefinite occupation of Iraq, the perception of Hillary as ultraliberal when she is in fact ultraconservative would be just about ideal, wouldn't it?

Posted by Dilan Esper | September 16, 2007 1:13 AM

Oops, I mean imperialist foreign policy.

Posted by Dilan Esper | September 16, 2007 1:15 AM

the perception of Hillary as ultraliberal when she is in fact ultraconservative would be just about ideal, wouldn't it?

In what universe is Hillary Clinton "in fact ultraconservative"? A 70.2 score by National Journal does not a Jesse Helms make.

Posted by Jasper | September 16, 2007 8:00 AM

I've never thought Hillary was particularly liberal. Power hungry, sure. Ethically challenged, absolutely. But not liberal. Not even in the mildly Orwellian current sense the term is used.

Posted by Brett Bellmore | September 16, 2007 8:35 AM

Great. So now in the general what it means to be "liberal" will move even further right. When she loses liberals will be even more p-oed and the gulf between left and right will get wider. so much for healing the nation.

Posted by JC | September 16, 2007 9:19 AM

These polling data could mean two things: First, they could mean that the vast majority of voters have not yet tuned into what the candidates' records and positions really are, and that therefore the Dem race may be more in flux than it has appeared to the naked eye. I'm hoping that a polling firm will ask self-identified Democrats and Democrat-leaners, "Which of these candidates supported the Congressional resolution in 2002 to authorize President Bush to use force in Iraq?" My strong hunch is that a substantial number of responders would say that Hillary Clinton was such a candidate. If that's true, there's still room for Obama to highlight Hillary's support of the war, though I sure wish he would actually name her name instead of obliquely referring to "those in our own party who supported the war" expecting everyone in the world to be as informed as Yglesias readers.

Second, the numbers could mean that voters are letting very fuzzy stereotypes and identity politics inform their labeling of the candidates as liberal or moderate, which in my view would be more depressing than if most voters simply were not yet tuning in.

Overall, however, I agree with Matt that the worst thing for a party is to have your candidate be perceived by the other side as the most liberal, when she in fact isn't.

A recent question in an NBC poll did not get much attention, but it supports Matt's Hypothesis. Republicans were asked something to the effect of "if you had to choose a Democrat to be the next President, which Democrat would you choose"? The answer was 26% chose Obama, 8% Hillary, and I believe at 20% Edwards. That can't be good for Hillary, though of course those numbers could, again, reflect that the public is not really tuned in yet to where the candidates stand and that the race is more fluid than it seems to be to those closely watching.

Posted by RaymondA | September 16, 2007 9:38 AM

In what universe is Hillary Clinton "in fact ultraconservative"? A 70.2 score by National Journal does not a Jesse Helms make.

She wants to win the nomination, so she has to keep her score respectable. But in terms of what she actually believes:

1. She has supported killing brave American servicemembers in every single war since Vietnam;

2. She supports indefinite American occupation in Iraq;

3. She will not admit that she was wrong to vote to murder 3,500 brave American servicemembers in Iraq;

4. She opposes single payer health care;

5. From 1994 to 2006, she opposed every attempt at universal health care;

6. She supported the Defense of Marriage Act and Don't Ask Don't Tell, enshrining homophobia and discrimination against gays in federal law;

7. She supported the most regressive kinds of welfare reform;

8. She believes that pro-lifers have a point about abortion and has criticized unrestricted abortion rights;

9. She supports our current Cuba policy in full, including indefinite continuation of the embargo against Cuba and our policy of giving sanctuary to anti-Castro terrorists; and

10. She supports the Likud position that Israel should not make any concessions to the Palestinians.

She is a hard right ultraconservative reactionary.

Posted by Dilan Esper | September 16, 2007 5:12 PM