miller@uiucdcsb.UUCP (09/29/84)
#N:uiucdcsb:11000100:000:2648
uiucdcsb!miller Sep 28 17:08:00 1984
clipped this out of the paper two weeks ago. Interesting...
POLL SHOWS MONDALE HAS REVERSE `GENDER GAP'
By Pat Ordovensky
USA TODAY
The real "gender gap" in this year's election is not Ronald Reagan's
problem with women voters but Walter Mondale's inability to attract men, a new
USA TODAY poll shows.
President Reagan enjoys dramatically more support among men than women -
leading critics to charge he has lost support among females.
The USA TODAY poll shows, however, Reagan is favored by 50 percent of the
women (compared with 41 percent for Mondale) - almost the exact level of female
support polls showed he had in his 1980 win over Jimmy Carter.
Reagan is favored by 64 percent of the men compared with 30 percent for
Mondale.
"The important question is not why Reagan runs less well among women, but
why he does so extraordinarily well among men," USA TODAY pollster Gordon S.
Black said.
"If the election were held now and were limited to women, Reagan would
have an easy victory similar to his defeat of Carter, Black said. But if only
men voted, Reagan "would roll up the largest electorial victory in the history
of presidential politics."
The poll also shows Reagan is strong among young voters; weakest in the
over-65 age group. That's a switch from historic patterns in which Republicans
ran strongest among older Americans.
The "age gap" could mean long-term trouble for Democrats, said Black:
"The party that captures the young is likely to rule American politics for a
generation - just like the Democrats did in the 1930s."
Reagan leads Mondale by only 4 percentage points among over-65 voters but
has margins ranging from 21 to 30 points in other age groups.
He has 60 percent to Mondale's 33 percent of the under 25 voters, many of
whom will be casting their first presidential ballot.
"Men tend to be attracted to Reagan by the strength of his leadership in a
number of critical areas including the economy and foreign policy," Black said.
"Mondale is doing what Carter did - telling the people what they want to
hear," said Antonio Crespo, 27, a Milwaukee sales clerk. "Reagan is hitting
the nail on the head."
The USA TODAY survey is based on interviews with 1,032 registered voters
selected at random from across the USA by the Gordon S. Black Corp. of
Rochester, N.Y., Sept. 4-8. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3
percent. The margin of error is largest for subpopulations, such as when
people of just one region or one race are studied separately.
It also had it broken down by regions in a rough diagram which I can't
reproduce here.alan@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Alan Algustyniak) (10/01/84)
< I think she ought to be called: Messes Ferraro. > To give you an idea of the bias in the press, About 6 months ago, a reporter asked Regan: (1) The polls show that you don't have the support of women. What do you intend to do about it? This is a very hostile question. In order to be fair, the reporter should have gone to Mondale and asked him: (2) The polls show that you don't have the support of men. What do you intend to do about it? We'll see if he's unbiased enuf to now go to Mondale and ask him question (1). I'm not holding my breath! sdcrdcf!alan