This sort of irks me (emphasis mine):
On his 100th day in office, Barack Obama enjoys high job approval ratings, no matter what poll you consult. But if a new survey by the New York Times is accurate, the president and some of his policies are significantly less popular with white Americans than with black Americans, and his sky-high ratings among African-Americans make some of his positions appear a bit more popular overall than they actually are.
What?!
This is really unfortunate wording. It implies that in order to determine whether Obama is popular, we have to throw out African American opinions to find out what real public opinion is.
In fact, I’m having a hard time finding a way to interpret this that isn’t troubling.
Sure, I’m willing to accept that a large percentage of African Americans support the President (and people can debate the reasons for this on their own time; I don’t care to address this). But how does that make him “seem” more popular than he “actually” is? This boggles me.
Posted under Obama, news, politics, racism
Sadly, this doesn’t even surprise me. We’ve been seeing poll numbers devalued since the early, early primary season by the fact that *gasp!!!* black people actually want to engage in the democratic process!!!
Isn’t it the goal, in the first place, to have everyone engaged?
Reply to MichelleI looked at the article and its comments and if that isn’t proof that post-racial America is a myth, I don’t what is.
Reply to Veritie ParlantObviously, we should multiply Black opinion polling numbers by three-fifths before including them in the aggregate.
Reply to dcroweahahaha dcrowe I *almost* wrote that in the post but decided it was too edgy. Thank you for commenting!
Reply to stuperb