Live from Music Row, Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael to the studio for another edition of Crom’s Crommentary.
CROM CARMICHAEL:
Michael, on July 22nd, there was a very interesting column in the – actually they called it a commentary, (laughter) and the title of it is “Ill Democratic Omens in Education Poll.” Now, I did not know this, that in 2017, the Gallup poll showed that the Democrats on the subject of education had a 19-point advantage over Republicans in 2017.
I had no idea. Gallup, sometimes they get it wrong, but they are a legitimate polling organization. Now, what they’re finding is, in battleground states, they found that 39 percent of respondents have more confidence in Republicans to deal with education than Democrats.
Democrats are 38. So essentially it’s a toss-up. But here’s what’s interesting. Here’s what’s very interesting, and that is that voters are also substantially likelier to have a great deal or a fair amount of confidence in parent organizations at 56 percent, school teachers at 62 percent, and teachers’ unions at only 44 percent.
Now, it found that Republicans are ahead in battleground states. In battleground states they found that Republicans are ahead by three points, 47 to 44, but they’re ahead by nine points with parents, and they’re ahead by 10 points with minority voters. Interesting.
And let me talk a little bit about polling and about subjects and about how people care. If you were a candidate, Michael, and you’re running for office, and you didn’t care at all about the question of gun control; you didn’t care about it, but you wanted to choose the right position to take politically, and the polls showed that 55 percent – and this is the only information you were given – 55 percent were for gun control, 45 percent against it.
Which one would you take as the politician running without a dog in the fight? If you didn’t think much about it, you would pick the 55 percent and you would be wrong, because what you have to measure, in addition to just the polling, is the intensity.
And so for most of the 45 percent, gun control, freedom to bear arms is so important that if you are against that, then on that single issue, you will lose that vote. It doesn’t matter about all the others.
My sense of it is in education, especially in these battleground states where it’s being made such a big issue. That even though the polls are 47-44, the 47 percent of Republicans who want school choice and vouchers and the candidates who are running on school choice and vouchers and opposing the government, run schools like Terry McAuliffe did in Virginia.
What you’re going to find is that the politicians’ commission’s who are on the 47 percent side, it’s much more than just three points. It’s probably in the 10-to-15-point range, and I think it will mean a lot in November.
Listen to the Crommentary:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
