What They Told Us: Reviewing Last Week’s Key Polls

What They Told Us: Reviewing Last Week’s Key Polls
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Email a Friend Email to a Friend ShareThis
Advertisement

Is it or isn’t it – in the health care reform bill proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats? The public option, that is.

The week began with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius suggesting a government-run health insurance company to compete with private insurers was not a must in the president’s plan. The White House scrambled to say its position hasn’t changed, as the political left howled in outrage.

Just 34% of voters nationwide support the health care reform plan if the public option is removed, and Democratic support evaporates. The previous week, 42% of voters nationwide supported the plan with the public option included.

This puts Obama who continues to battle negative ratings in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll in a delicate political position. His base strongly supports a government insurance alternative, but most Americans have serious reservations about it.

Democrats, in arguing for the public option, are increasingly critical of private health insurance companies, in part for denying coverage to those with pre-existing medical conditions, and 28% of voters say they or a family member have had that problem.

Whether the public option is include or not, however, just 35% of voters say passage of the bill currently working its way through Congress would be better than not passing any health care reform legislation this year. Most voters (54%) say no health care reform passed by Congress this year would be the better option.

Lost in the uproar over a comment in USA Today by the top two House Democrats that those protesting health care reform are “un-American” were several statements aimed at assuring Americans that their access to quality care will be even greater. But 45% of voters think House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer are wrong when they say the passage of health care reform will mean more affordable coverage for all Americans.

Even with Democrats now talking about going it alone without any Republican support or breaking the reform plan into at least two bills to better ensure their passage, the vote in the Senate is expected to be close. So close, in fact, that terminally ill Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy is trying to get the law changed in his state to make sure his replacement can vote right away. Fifty-two percent (52%) of Massachusetts voters agree with Kennedy that the state’s Democratic governor should be able to name an interim senator to take his place until a special election can be held.

More voters than ever rate health care as a very important issue, but the difference in partisan emphasis helps to explain the big Democratic push for health care reform in Washington. For Democrats, it’s second only to the economy in terms of importance; for Republicans, it comes in fifth.

Deficit reduction continues to rank first for voters among the four major budget priorities set down by the president in February. Forty percent (40%) say cutting the federal deficit in half by the end of his first term should be Obama’s top priority, compared to 21% who put health care reform first. But voters also think deficit reduction is the goal the president is least like to achieve.

One bright piece of economic news for the administration this week is the finding that confidence in the $787-billion stimulus plan passed in February has rebounded a bit. Now 33% of voters say it has helped the economy, up eight points from a month ago. But 30% still think the plan has hurt the economy, while another 30% say it has had no impact.

At the same time, 54% worry more that the federal government will try to do too much to fix the economy rather than not enough. That’s the highest level of concern found on this question since Obama was elected president.

Just six percent (6%) of voters now expect their own taxes to go down during the Obama years. This is the first time since last November’s election that the number expecting a tax cut has fallen to single digits. During Election 2008, then-candidate Obama promised to cut taxes for 95% of Americans.

The Country Financial Security Index has fallen to its lowest level since February 2007. Just 35% of Americans now rate their overall level of financial security as good or excellent; 20% say it is poor.

Still, the Rasmussen Consumer Index, which measures daily confidence, ended the week up 18 points from the beginning of 2009. Similarly, the Rasmussen Investor Index, which measures the economic confidence of investors on a daily basis, is 24 points higher than its first reading of the year.

Most voters continue to blame the country’s economic problems on the recession that began under President George W. Bush. For the third month in a row, only 39% say the bad economy is caused more by Obama’s policies.

Eighty percent (80%) of Americans worry, though, that current economic conditions in the countryare at least somewhat likely to lead to increased crime.

Given the mixed messages from the economy and the political turmoil in Washington, it’s perhaps no surprise that Republican candidates have now matched their biggest lead over Democrats of the past several years on the Generic Congressional Ballot. This is the eighth straight week Republicans have been ahead.

Adding to the nation’s uncertainty is the situation in Afghanistan, where violence-plagued elections were held this past week and U.S. military commanders express concern about the rising strength of the radical Islamic Taliban. The president on Monday declared Afghanistan a “war of necessity,” and now just 33% of voters believeit is even somewhat likely that U.S. combat troops will be removed from that country by the end of his first term.

Forty-one percent (41%) say Obama is doing a good or excellent job in his handling of the war in Afghanistan, while 24% rate his performance as poor.

In other polls last week:

-- Just one-third (34%) of voters believe the United States is heading in the right direction. Still, that compares with 10% in late September and early October of last year, and the new finding is up seven points from the week Obama took office in January.

-- Forty-nine percent (49%) of voters say working Americans should be allowed to opt out of Social Security and provide for their own retirement planning. A majority of voters under 50 say workers should be allowed to opt out.

-- Eighty-two percent (82%) of Americans believe their bank account information is at least somewhat secure online, which helps to explain why an increasing number of people are sending personal financial information over the Internet for banking and shopping transactions. But 49% also still believe it’s riskier to use their debit cards online than to use them in a store.

-- Forty-four percent (44%) of Americans think admission to U.S. national parks should always be free, but 47% think the cost of admission should cover the costs of maintaining those parks.

-- The plurality of American adults (46%) believes colleges and universities do not do enough to monitor students’ behavior.

-- Conservative Republicans in Florida may be rumbling about Charlie Crist’s run for the U.S. Senate, but so far the governor is well ahead of his chief 2010 GOP Primary challenger. Crist leads former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio by 22 points among likely Republican Primary voters – 53% to 31%. Crist continues to maintain a sizable lead – 48% to 29% - over his chief Democratic opponent, Rep. Kendrick Meek, in the overall Senate race, too.

-- Republican hopeful Mark Kirk finds himself starting out even in his 2010 Illinois Senate race against his likeliest Democratic competitor, State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias.

-- John Oxendine, Georgia’s fire and insurance commissioner, continues to hold a commanding lead over all other Republican gubernatorial hopefuls in an early look at his state’s GOP Primary next year. The Democrat whose already held the job is still the distant front-runner in the race for Georgia’s 2010 Democratic gubernatorial nomination. Former Governor Roy Barnes is 33 points ahead of his nearest competitor, State Attorney General Thurbert Baker.

-- Forty percent (40%) of Georgia voters favor the health care plan proposed by the president and congressional Democrats, but 54% oppose it. Like other voters around the country, those who oppose the plan feel more strongly about it.

-- Labor Day's almost here, so in a new Rasmussen Reports survey, we asked Americans what they did this summer. Among the most popular activities were barbecuing (70%), reading (67%), playing board games (57%) and watching fireworks (57%). Least popular were outdoor concerts and theater events.

-- Speaking of outdoor concerts, 400,000 people descended on a small town northwest of New York City 40 years ago and staged a music festival that would become the symbol of a generation. There were no incidents of violence. But on the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, just 39% of Americans believe that 400,000 people could gather peacefully for a similar festival today.

Remember, if it’s in the news, it’s in our polls. Check out the latest numbers on our home page and keep up with our daily Presidential Tracking Poll. Premium Members get access to more data, a morning briefing from Scott Rasmussen and an advance look at key findings.

If you’d like us to keep you informed, sign up for our free daily e-mail update. Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
ShareThis

Rasmussen Reports is an electronic publishing firm specializing in the collection, publication, and distribution of public opinion polling information.

The Rasmussen Reports Election Edge™ Premium Service offers the most comprehensive public opinion coverage available anywhere.

Scott Rasmussen, president of Rasmussen Reports, has been an independent pollster for more than a decade.