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Wayne State University

Wayne State University Dissertations

1-1-2011

Approval of George W. Bush: Economic and media impacts

Gino Tozzi Jr.

Wayne State University,

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Part of the Mass Communication Commons, and the Political Science Commons

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Tozzi Jr., Gino, "Approval of George W. Bush: Economic and media impacts" (2011). Wayne State University Dissertations. Paper 260.

is Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@WayneState. It has been accepted for inclusion in Wayne State University Dissertations by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@WayneState.

APPROVAL OF GEORGE W. BUSH: ECONOMIC AND MEDIA IMPACTS

by

GINO J. TOZZI JR. DISSERTATION

Submitted to the Graduate School of Wayne State University,
Detroit, Michigan in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

2011 MAJOR: POLITICAL SCIENCE Approved by:

_________________________________

  • Chair
  • Date

_________________________________ _________________________________ _________________________________
© COPYRIGHT BY GINO J. TOZZI JR.
2011
All Rights Reserved

DEDICATION

To my Father

ii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I want to thank my committee chair Professor Ewa Golebiowska for the encouragement and persistence on only accepting the best from me in this process. I also owe my committee of Professor Ronald Brown, Professor Jodi Nachtwey, and Professor David Martin a debt of gratitude for their help and advisement in this endeavor. All of them were instrumental in keeping my focus narrowed to produce the best research possible.
I also owe appreciation to the commentary, suggestions, and research help from my wonderful wife Courtney Tozzi. This project was definitely more enjoyable with her encouragement and help. Mr. Michael Kleingartner from Oakland University proved invaluable with his help in auditing my content analysis of media coverage and assisting me in my first venture into the R Statistical Computing Environment. His crosschecking of my coding scheme and advisement on how to improve it significantly improved that portion of my study.
I want to thank the Political Science Department and the Wayne State University
Graduate School for the financial and research support they provided along the way which made this scholarly work far easier to achieve. I also appreciate the efforts that Ms. Cindy Krolikowski, our Political Science Department Librarian, made to help me with the campus databases to find my media transcripts. I thank the Administrative staff within the Department of Political Science, Ms. Patricia Robinson, Ms. Delinda Neal, and Ms. She’re Davis, who expedited this process saving me time and worry. I also owe my appreciation to my family for their support, encouragement, and assistance.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Dedication…………..........……………………………………………….………………….…ii Acknowledgements……………………………………………………….…………..........….iii List of Graphs.................................................................................................................viii List of Tables....................................................................................................................ix List of Figures...................................................................................................................x CHAPTER 1 “Introduction”……………………………………………..………….............….1
Variables Influencing Presidential Approval…………………………………………..3 My Model for Approval and Its Relationships…………………………...……………9 Reasons to Study George W. Bush’s Approval Rate………………………………..9 Why This Is Different…………………………………………………………………..11 Looking Ahead………………………………………………………………………….13
CHAPTER 2 “Literature Review: What Effects Opinion Change of the Presidency”......14
Changes in News Media Coverage of Presidencies and Presidential Campaigns.. …………………………………………………………………………………………...14 Technological Changes in the News Media…………………………………………16 Trends in Media Influence on Public Opinion……………………………………….18 Media Effects on Presidential Approval……………………………………………...22 The Media’s Coverage of the Economy……………………………………………..23 The Economy and Presidential Popularity…………………………………………..24 Presidential Power over the Economy………………………………………………25 Theories on the Relationship Between the Economy and Presidential Approval…………………………………………………………………………………26

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Sociotropic Economic Evaluations of the President: Past, Present, and Future..27 Influence on Approval: Inflation, Unemployment, and Personal Income………...29 Control Variables……………………………………………………………………….30 The Rally Effect………………………………………………………………………...30 The Honeymoon Effect…………………………………………..……………………33 Second Terms and Divided Government……………………………………………35 Moving Forward………………………………………………………………………..36
CHAPTER 3 “Initial Observations of Bush's Approval Rate”……...................................38
Bush’s Approval Rate………………………………………………………………….38 War and Bush’s Approval……………………………………………………………..44 The Economy’s Impact on Bush’s Approval………………………………………...46 Hypotheses on Bush’s Approval Rate……………………………………………….51 The Analysis of Bush’s Media Coverage……………………………………………54 Statistical Concerns for Bush’s Media Coverage Rating Variable………………..61 Criteria for the Coding of the Presidency in the Media…………………………….64 Bush’s Media Coverage: The Results from the Content Analysis………………..68 Approval Moving Forward…………………………………………………………….70
CHAPTER 4 “Methodology”…………………..................................................................72
Potential Problems with my Public Opinion Research…………………………….72 The Data………………………………………………………………………………..73 The Tests………………………………………………………………………………..80 Looking Forward……………………………………………………………………….82
CHAPTER 5 “Results”………………………………………..............................................84

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Macroeconomic Indicators During the Occurrence of Control Variables………...84 Bush’s Media Coverage During the Occurrence of Control Variables……………88 Test Results………………………………………………………………………...…..89
Granger Causality Test Results………………………………………………………………94 Success of Predictions………………………………………………………………………..97 Final Model Graph and Implications…………………………………………………………99 CHAPTER 6 “Conclusion”…………………………………..............................................102 Appendix A “Bush's Approval Rate Correlated with Time”............................................119 Appendix B “Media Coding Guidelines for Bush”.........................................................120 Appendix C “Media Coding Chart”................................................................................127 Appendix D “Sample Coding Form”..............................................................................623 Appendix E “Difference of Means Test”........................................................................624 Appendix F “Augmented Dickey-Fuller Test Results”...................................................625 Appendix G “Basic Descriptive Statistics”.....................................................................627 Appendix H “Correlation Table”.....................................................................................628 Appendix I “Variance Inflation Factors”.........................................................................629 Appendix J “Breusch-Godfrey Test”......…....................................................................630 Appendix K “Residuals”................................................................................................631 Appendix L “Multivariate OLS Regression”...................................................................632 Appendix M “Granger Test Results”..............................................................................633 Appendix N “Robust Regression of Quarterly Data”……………………………………..638 Appendix O “Granger Causality Test for Quarterly RDI change and Approval”……….639 Bibliography………………………………………………………………..............………...640

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Abstract………………………………………………………………….............……………675 Autobiographical Statement…………………………………………................................676

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LIST OF GRAPHS

Graph 1: Bush's Approval Rate.......................................................................................40 Graph 2: Real Disposable Income, 2001-2009…………….. ..........................................47 Graph 3: Consumer Price Index, 2001-2009..................................................................48 Graph 4: Unemployment Rate, 2001-2009.....................................................................48 Graph 5: Monthly Percent Change in Real Disposable Income, 2001- 2009.................49 Graph 6: Monthly Percent Change in Consumer Price Index, 2001-2009......................50 Graph 7: Monthly Percent Change in Unemployment Rate, 2001-2009........................50 Graph 8: Bush’s Media Coverage from AP and CNN…..................................................62 Graph 9: Bush’s Media Coverage Rating Moving Average.............................................69 Graph 10: Bush's Approval Rate and His Media Coverage Rating.................................70 Graph 11: Bush's Predicted and Actual Approval with Control Periods........................100

viii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: General Linear Model, Bush’s Approval Regressed on Predictor Variables…..90 Table 2: Robust Model, Bush’s Approval Regressed on Predictor Variables……………92

ix

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Model of Bush's Approval Change..................................................................10 Figure 2: Agenda-Setting Diagram.................................................................................20 Figure 3: Agenda-Setting and Its Consequences………................................................21

x1

CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION

The use of polls and the study of public opinion are relatively new to political science. In the American political system, most Americans have an opinion of the president who is the most powerful figure.1 The most significant measure of public opinion that determines the president’s popularity is the president’s approval rate. Research began forty years ago to find what determines presidential approval. There is still plenty to understand about the approval rate and the variables that change it, but there are also known variables that have predictable influences on presidential approval. My study’s goal is to better understand the approval rate for President George W. Bush, to see what has changed from previous approval research, and to find what is unique to Bush’s approval rate.
The advent of popular sovereignty in America and Western Europe was the impetus for the serious study of public opinion. Initially, electoral returns were the only way to measure public opinion (Erikson et. al. 3). In the 1930s, the Gallup Organization was the first to conduct a survey measuring presidential approval. Today, opinion polls are expected to be accurate, whereas sixty to one hundred years ago they were not accurate. Presidents, since Franklin Roosevelt, have used pollsters and monitored polls.
The president’s approval rate is the most commonly used indicator of public opinion of the president. It is also the most mentioned poll in the media and probably the most well-known poll among the American public. The approval rate indicates

1 I use the male pronoun for the U.S. president because there has not yet been a female U.S. president and also because this study is concerned with the George W. Bush Administration.

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whether people approve or disapprove of the job the president is doing. A high approval rate can help the president's legislative agenda, if the legislation concerns salient and complex issues (Canes-Wrone and de Marchi 2002). On the other hand, presidents with low approval rates tend to increase expenditures and deficit spending around an election year (Burstein 1998). Usually greater public support for a president and his goals increases the likelihood that his policies are enacted. In short, public opinion can affect the president’s actions.
Presidents care about their approval rates for a couple of reasons. First, presidents monitor their approval rates to help them get reelected. Presidents are elected to four year terms (U.S. Const. art. II, sect. 1, cl. 2) and can only serve two full terms as president (U.S. Const. am. XXII, sect. 1, cl. 1). The approval rate is a strong indicator of a sitting president's reelection prospects. The president always gets reelected when he has an approval rate of 50 percent or higher in June of the election year (Lewis-Beck and Rice 1992). Second, presidents want to implement their agendas, and high public support for their agendas makes their implementation more likely (Canes-Wrone and de Marchi 2002). American politicians have known for awhile that having public support for their agenda is crucial. As President Abraham Lincoln once said, “With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. Consequently, he who moulds (sic) public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions. He makes statutes and decisions possible or impossible to be executed. (Johannsen 65)” Presidential approval, though relatively new, helps gauge public opinion of the president and his agenda.
Over the past 40 years, presidential approval elicited much interest from political

3

scientists. Researchers of the presidency flocked to this topic because of its prominence among the general public and political system. This prominence is a direct result of the growth and modernization of polling, the growth in news coverage on it, and the growth in presidential power. The first political scientist to study presidential approval in depth was John E. Mueller in his 1973 classic, War, Presidents and Public Opinion. He discovered patterns in the movement of presidential approval from his analysis of U.S. foreign conflicts, economic performance, and public opinion of the presidency. Another influential study is Brody's 1991 book, Assessing the President, where he linked the change in media coverage of the president to the change in presidential approval.
My study is concerned with how George W. Bush's approval rate is affected by the news media and the economy. I also control for the effects of honeymoon periods, rally effect periods, the second term period, and the divided government period. These variables have a strong influence on the approval rate for most presidencies (Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002).

Variables Influencing Presidential Approval

My research shows the relationship between Bush’s approval rate, the economy, the media, rally effect period, honeymoon period, divided government period, second term period, and lagged approval. President Bush’s approval rate is the dependent variable in this study. My aim is to combine the independent variables to predict presidential approval. Several other studies analyze approval as a dependent variable, and my study is no different in this respect.
The state of the U.S. economy affects how people view the president. People

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criticize and praise the president for the condition of the country’s economy because the president is the leader of the executive branch for U.S. government. As a result he has an enormous amount of power and responsibility for the prosperity of the country. The president, with the help of Congress, has tools at his disposal to affect the economy of the United States. People know about the condition of the U.S. economy from the media and usually lay responsibility for the condition of the economy on the U.S. Government.2 However, people do not hold the government responsible for their own personal economic situation (Brody 1991).
It is a common assumption that economic prosperity leads to an increasing approval rate and an economic recession leads to a decreasing approval rate (Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002, 42). Mueller (1973:240) found that as unemployment increases the approval rate decreases, and Kramer (1971) found a relationship between the change in real disposable income and the chances for the president’s party winning Congress. These studies, among others, provide a clear link between the national economy and presidential popularity. Some research does not find a significant relationship between presidential approval and the state of the U.S. economy (Norpoth and Yantek 1983; Yantek 1982; Kenski 1977). However, studies not showing a relationship are fewer than the studies that do. When controlling for different presidencies, the relationship between the economy and approval rate grows and becomes more significant (Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002, 43-48).
Another important variable that affects presidential approval is the media (Brody
1991). The modern news media's pervasive presence in our lives has a major impact on

2 When people do this they are making sociotropic evaluations of the president. I further explain this concept in the next chapter.

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how we think and act, which is no less true for its effect on our orientation to politics. In the last forty years, the relationship between presidential candidates, the political system, and the news media has strengthened as the media report incessantly about the presidency. News is now instant and easily accessible, especially through the internet, and can be very influential on our thoughts and opinions (West 2001). These are some reasons why the news media make us believe what is the most important news event.
The news media influence people through agenda-setting. First-level agendasetting indicates the salience of an issue or event. Second-level agenda-setting indicates the salience of certain characteristics of that issue or event (Miller and Peake 2010). My study is concerned with first-level agenda-setting. The media indicate the salience of an issue or event by how much they cover that issue or event. The events covered more usually become well-known by the average person. In essence, the media form their own agenda from their coverage of news, and this agenda passes on to the public because they prime it into their thought processes. The end result is for the public agenda to mirror the media agenda (McCombs 2004). For example, when the media covers twenty major news events, they focus more on only a few of them. Some of this coverage is on the presidency. This means the event the presidency is involved in will shift from the media agenda to the public agenda, where the public is then concerned with that event. My study assumes that the media sets the public agenda on the presidency and that the media influences the public to agree with what the media considers important about the presidency.
Priming occurs simultaneously as the media set the agenda. Priming occurs

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when people are conditioned by media coverage to think differently about further stimuli (McCombs 2004). In the context of my study, this means that when the news media set the agenda by covering a major event, such as the 2008 economic collapse, the public is primed by that media coverage to incorporate it more prominently into their evaluations of the president. As a result of the media's focus on the economic malaise, people are primed to think that the president is doing a poor job handling the economy even though there might be little the president can do to help the economy. When the economy continues its downward spiral and the media constantly cover it, people are primed to change their opinion of the president and disapprove of the president's job handling. Thus, media coverage changes public opinion due to people’s priming mechanism that conditions people to change their opinions. Research over the past few decades confirms this and shows that media significantly impact people’s opinions.
In order to measure media effects on presidential approval, I analyze the content of news coverage. My analysis will reveal the changes in media coverage of the Bush Administration. Then I can analyze the relationship between my measure of media content and the changes in Bush's approval rate. Brody’s (1991) research shows, through his content analysis of news media, that there is a significant relationship between media coverage of the president and presidential approval for the Kennedy Administration to the George H.W. Bush Administration. From prior research on media effects, it is safe to assume that positive news for President Bush will equate to increasing approval rates and negative news will equate to decreasing approval rates.
The rest of the variables, such as the rally effect, honeymoon period, lagged approval, second term period, and divided government period, are used as control

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variables. This is done to control for their effects when analyzing the relationship between the media, economy, and presidential approval. The rally effect, first discovered by Mueller (1973), occurs when a foreign policy crisis and the president’s response to it produces a short-term, significant increase in the president's approval rate (Mueller's 1973; Bardes 158-159; Edwards and Gallup 143).3 For the rally effect to occur, there must be little to no elite criticism in the media of the president’s handling of the crisis (Brody 1991) and the approval rate cannot be too high to start (Brody 1991). The rally effect lasts for less time than normal when it occurs during a war or crisis that has little sustained public support. During most of a rally period, presidential approval trends downward and this signals the end of the rally period (Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002, 49).
The honeymoon period automatically occurs during the first six to eight months of all new presidencies. Presidential approval during this period tends to be greater than the rest of the term for multiple reasons. First, people give the new president a chance to govern before forming opinions about the new president (Brody 28). Second, elite criticism (i.e., media, other politicians, etc...) tends to be muted during the honeymoon; thus, media initially play a minor role in influencing people (29). However, since 1975, honeymoon periods became less pronounced. Currently, honeymoon periods are not as long lasting and do not increase approval rates as much as they did before 1975 (Brody 40-42). The honeymoon period is a control variable because it likely affected Bush’s approval rate during the first seven months of his presidency.
Another control variable to account for is President Bush’s second term. The

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    Copyright 2011 by Northwestern University School of Law Vol. 105 Northwestern University Law Review Colloquy THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT AND POPULAR CONSTITUTIONALISM Ilya Somin* INTRODUCTION The rise of the Tea Party movement followed a period during which many academic students of constitutional law focused on ―popular constitu- tionalism‖: the involvement of public opinion and popular movements in influencing constitutional interpretation.1 Many of these scholars argue that popular constitutional movements have a beneficial impact on constitution- al law,2 and some even contend that popular constitutionalism should sup- plant judicial review entirely.3 At the very least, the last generation of constitutional scholarship has established that public opinion influences and significantly constrains judicial interpretation of the Constitution.4 Most of the previous scholarship on popular constitutionalism focuses on movements identified with the political left, such as the civil rights *Associate Professor of Law, George Mason University School of Law. For helpful suggestions and comments, I would like to thank Jonathan Adler, Jared Goldstein, participants in the 2011 AALS panel on the Tea Party and the Constitution, and the editors of the Northwestern University Law Review Col- loquy. I would also like to thank Eva Choi and Eric Facer for helpful research assistance. 1 See, e.g., LARRY D. KRAMER, THE PEOPLE THEMSELVES: POPULAR CONSTITUTIONALISM AND JUDICIAL REVIEW (2004); MARK TUSHNET, TAKING THE CONSTITUTION AWAY FROM THE COURTS (1999); JEREMY WALDRON, LAW AND DISAGREEMENT (1999); Matthew D. Adler, Popular Constitutio- nalism and the Rule of Recognition: Whose Practices Ground U.S. Law?, 100 NW. U. L. REV. 719 (2006) (link); Larry Alexander & Lawrence B.
  • Everything You Need to Know About Polling

    Everything You Need to Know About Polling

    (Almost!) Everything You Need to Know About Polling Christiana Lilly, Fellowship Coordinator Hi, I’m ● Fellowship coordinator at Christiana! Hearken’s Election SOS program ● Freelance journalist based in South Florida ● Past president of SPJ Florida chapter Weeks leading up to Election Day are CRAZY ● Candidates participate in debates, react to breaking news, politicians and groups will share their support for candidates, and more. ● Newsrooms also generate a lot of stories from polls released by agencies around the country — research centers, think tanks, and universities. Who conducts polls? Major Polling Agencies ● FiveThirtyEight ● Gallup Poll ● Quinnipiac University ● Monmouth University Polling Institute Polling Institute ● Rasmussen Reports ● Marquette Law Poll ● Pew Research Center ● Public Policy Polling Other Agencies to Note ● Williams Institute and Gill Foundation focus on LGBT issues ● American Association for Public Opinion Research What should I look at when reading a poll? When was the poll How many people conducted? were polled? As we’ve learned in Is the number of people 2020, a LOT can happen they talked to enough to in a short period of time! correlate to the whole country? People are constantly changing their minds, and swing voters might be swayed by developments. Who conducted the How was the poll Check the word poll? conducted? choice Is the pollster a reliable, Was the poll only done in People can be swayed by reputable source? certain states? using different words. Example: Obamacare How long have they been What method did they versus Affordable Care around, what is their use? Act. record? Margin of error Question anomalies Each poll will share their If the results look margin of error on the strange to you, try and poll, as nothing can be investigate how they got 100 percent perfect.
  • Citizens United, Issue Ads and Radio: an Empirical Analysis

    Citizens United, Issue Ads and Radio: an Empirical Analysis

    CITIZENS UNITED, ISSUE ADS AND RADIO: AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS Christopher Terryl and Mitchell T. Bard' I. INTRODUCTION When the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Citizens United v. FederalElection Commission,' it was unlikely the justices expected the case to elicit much of a reaction beyond those who closely follow the worlds of constitutional law and the game of politics. After all, a ruling on whether corporations can spend money supporting candidates for office would hardly seem to trigger the kind of popular outcry usually reserved for hot-button cultural issues like abortion or affirmative action. Yet the decision created what Barry Friedman, a law professor at New York University, called the "only one firestorm" 2 of the seven-year tenure of Chief Justice John Roberts, a reaction that is said to have surprised the chief justice and may have contributed to the erosion of public confidence in the Court as an institution.' In addition to sparking outrage in certain circles, both inside and outside of government, the case has remained front and center in American politics, playing a role in the debate on issues as varied as the Republican presidential race and the Supreme Court's consideration of the constitutionality of the University of Wisconsin, Ph.D. 2012. Dr. Terry is a lecturer of media law, history and policy in the Department of Journalism, Advertising and Media Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. - University of Miami School of Law, J.D. 1993. Mr. Bard is currently a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication, where his research primarily focuses on how the atomization of the 20th century mass media system has affected news, especially on television and the Internet.
  • Prosecuting Abuses of Detainees in U.S. Counter- Terrorism Operations

    Prosecuting Abuses of Detainees in U.S. Counter- Terrorism Operations

    International Center for Transitional Justice CRIMINAL JUSTICE FOR CRIMINAL POLICY: Prosecuting Abuses of Detainees in U.S. Counter- terrorism Operations An ICTJ Policy Paper November 2009 Carolyn Patty Blum, Lisa Magarrell, Marieke Wierda Cover Image: Redacted page (52) from Counterterrorism Detention and Interrogation Activities (September 2001-October 2003), a May 2004 Special Review by the CIA’s Office of the Inspector General. Portions of that report have been declassified through litigation by the American Civil Liberties Union and other organizations under the Freedom of Information Act. The Bush administration released a few paragraphs and lines of the report in May 2008 and the Obama administration went considerably further in an August 2009 reclassification. Regardless, this page and many others, including all of the In- spector General’s recommendations, remain classified as of this writing. Ques- tions persist about the full scope of abuses under U.S. policies on rendition, de- tention and interrogation. ICTJ’s policy paper relies on declassified information and other reporting to make the case for a thorough criminal investigation of abuses in counterterrorism policy and operations. Such an investigation must include those parts of the “dark side” still hidden from public view. CRIMINAL JUSTICE FOR CRIMINAL POLICY: Prosecuting Abuses of Detainees in U.S. Counter- terrorism Operations November 2009 An ICTJ Policy Paper Carolyn Patty Blum, Lisa Magarrell, Marieke Wierda International Center for Transitional Justice ICTJ New York 5 Hanover Square, 24th Floor New York, NY 10004 Tel + 1 917 637 3800 Fax + 1 917 637 3900 About ICTJ About the U.S. Accountability Project The International Center for Transitional Justice works The U.S.