Scary news, breaking from Politico:
POLITICO poll: Democrats in danger over Ebola
Uh-oh. I guess this means the GOP has scored another big political win by blaming Obama for Ebola, right? Well, sure, except the poll—which was conducted from October 3-11 in House districts and states with "competitive" races (
pdf)—only had one question about Ebola, and that question found that most voters actually had some or a lot of confidence in the government response to Ebola:
How much confidence do you have that the U.S. government is doing everything possible to contain the spread of Ebola?
A lot/some confidence: 61%
Not much/no confidence: 33%
Given those numbers, how on Earth did Politico reach the conclusion that Ebola represents a grave threat to Democratic political fortunes? Because, they say:
Voters who intend to support Republicans in the most consequential Senate and House elections this November had significantly less confidence in the federal government’s response to the occurrence of Ebola, according to a new POLITICO poll.
Specifically, Republicans had 43 percent confidence while Democrats had 81 percent confidence. But that doesn't tell us that Ebola imperils Democrats ... it tells us that people have partisan views of whether government is working. Duh.
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Oh, and one other thing. The poll did ask a generic ballot horse race question, and you know what they found? Democrats leading:
If the election for the [U.S. House of Representatives/U.S. Senate] were held today, would you vote for the [Democratic candidate] or the [Republican candidate] in [your district/your state]?
Democratic candidate (incudes KS-I): 41% (44% w/leaners)
Republican candidate: 36% (41% w/leaners)
Don't know: 23% (14% w/leaners)
To summarize: Politico poll found roughly 2:1 confidence to no confidence ratio on the government's Ebola response, with Republicans more critical than Democrats, and found that Democrats led Republicans in the horserace ... yet somehow they decided that what their poll really showed was that Ebola is a problem Democrats.