New CNN Poll: Voters want someone willing to undo Obama policies

[cali]

I'll say it again: Never overestimate the American voter. Yeah, yeah. That's mean and elitist. Well, just look at election 2014.

If you could create the perfect candidate to succeed Barack Obama as president, what would their background be and what would they think?

A new CNN/ORC poll finds most Americans say they would like a candidate who's a seasoned political leader, someone with an executive background, and someone who's willing to change Barack Obama's policies.

Rather than assessing the traits of individual candidates, the poll asked respondents to think about their perfect candidate and choose between two statements relating to several different traits often found in presidential candidates.

<snip>

Three statements generated wide-reaching support. Fifty-nine percent of Americans say they'd like a candidate who has been in the public eye as a political leader for many years over one who's new to the political scene. Further, 59% say they prefer a candidate with executive experience over one who's worked as a legislator, and 57% say their perfect Obama successor would change most of the policies enacted by Obama's administration.

There's a link to the poll at the site below.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/22/politics/2016-election-poll-perfect-candidate/index.html

[DonCoquixote]

1. propaganda

especially the whole executive beeswax, meant to favior GOP.

[LakeVermilion]

2. Must be a poll of Iowa Republicans...

On the other hand, it might reflect the disdain that the Obama administration has had in regard to public education. They have thrown a lot of hard working educators under the bus.

[MANative]

3. The truth is that only a very small percentage of Americans could accurately...

identify or explain any of Obama's policies, with the single likely exception of the ACA. I'd bet that the questions were worded in the generic rather than specific to any actual Obama initiative, enacted or not. "Do you want someone to keep or change the policies of the Obama Administration?" would sound about right.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

4. The exact verbiage:

The candidate would continue most of the policies of the Obama administration 41%
The candidate would change most of the policies of the Obama administration 57%

And this is why you get fairly useless results from such polls.

They don't specify the specific policies the person wants changed, or HOW they want them changed.

Are those polled against letting the poor have healthcare? We don't know.
Are those polled against using drone strikes all around the world? We don't know.
Are those polled against allowing gays in the military? We don't know.
Are those polled against keeping for-profit insurance companies in between you and your doctor? We don't know.

They could be 'against' most policies from the right or the left, and 'most' apparently means 'any policy I can think of while being polled'. And most people more easily remember things they're against than things they're for.

[MANative]

9. Another case of manipulation for the masses. And the tiny percentage...

of people who will even think to question what the poll asked and what its results mean (absolutely nothing of worth) is horribly depressing.

[JaneyVee]

12. True. Do they want ground troops or end of war.

Obamacare or universal healthcare.

[calimary]

30. Also could be the same illness that afflicts polls

that claim not to like the ACA. It will likely be interpreted as "thinks Obamacare sucks" BUT may just as likely be "don't like it because it didn't go far enough."

[HereSince1628]

5. As always...such summary numbers reduce a complex problem to a simple dialectic

FOr example dissatisfaction with Obama's approach occurs on the right and left for quite different reasons, but when summed together don't reflect that difference...

Reducing polling into simple dialectic interpretation is even dumber than trying to have representative national leadership inside winner takes all system for the highest branch of government.

[DamnYankeeInHouston]

6. That would include people who would want to make Obama's policies more progressive.

[bigtree]

7. wow, Cali

...that's a rather misleading headline for such an ambiguous poll.

'would change most of Obama's policies' - not undo, or repeal, but 'change.' Btw, is it really a surprise to find that 94% of republicans want to see that 'change' of his policies - or that only 22% of Democrats polled want those changes?

Which policies would they change? Who the hell knows from this poll? I'll bet this isn't something that's especially unusual for a two-term lame-duck, but it's definitely the type of push-polling I'd expect from CNN, and not something which I'd give any serious consideration.

[cali]

13. sorry, I don't have much faith in the electorate as a whole.

[hatrack]

8. And it's from the SQUIRREL!!! News Network

We'd better get right to work, huh?

[onenote]

10. More precisely 94 percent of repubs

The only surprise is that it wasn't 99.9 percent. And the 22 percent of Democrats who want change almost certainly don't want the same change as the repubs. In other words the poll results are basically worhless.

[winter is coming]

11. I wonder how much Jeb spent on that poll. n/t

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

14. Yeah, let's go back to the glorious days of endless war, deficits and economic collapse!

Freedumb!

[global1]

15. My Motto - Don't Trust Polls Or Campaign Ads.....nt

[NaturalHigh]

16. Huh?

If anything, President Obama didn't (or wasn't able to) go far enough? Remember all the "socialist" rhetoric the Republicans threw at him? I wish we'd seen a little more socialism.

Granted I'm not a big fan of the President's gun policies, but he never got them enacted anyway.

Obamacare? Should have been single-payer, universal healthcare in my opinion. Limbaugh wants to call that socialism? Fine with me. I think most people are starting to understand what nuts he and his ilk are anyway.

[GeorgeGist]

17. I suspect this poll is fake, like CNN.

[Wounded Bear]

18. Criticism above is noted, but a funny thing...

and I'm not a diehard supporter, but...

Hillary wins on at least two of those items.

[hedda_foil]

21. Yeah. And JEB wins on all of them.

If other polls come in this way, and this one isn't an outlier, Hilary won't stand a chance. Honestly, I'm stunned by these statistics.

[Wounded Bear]

28. I disagree...

Jeb hasn't held office in years, and hasn't been much in the public eye during that time because of the name recognition.

Hillary has been kept in the public eye through the endless Benghazi investigations and other RW bullshit. They hate her and they've been giving her a lot of free publicity.

[daredtowork]

19. Obama Policies = Policies Made While Black

As several other comments stated, few people could actually identify what the policies of Obama's administration have been.

Even the ACA would be a hard one to tease out since the actual experience of that has been largely controlled by the States.

[hughee99]

20. Would this be treason or sedition?

With this story, CNN has sent a message to Iran that the president's policies can be changed AND that a majority of the American people are looking for someone who WILL change president Obama's policies.

I think that undermines the president's Iran negotiations even more than just suggesting that the president's Executive agreements can be changed by the next president, so if there was even a question that the idiotic letter the Republicans wrote was a violation of the Logan Act, this story should be a slam dunk.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

22. Please tell me you forgot the sarcasm smiley n/t

[hughee99]

23. I did.

I wasn't one of the people arguing that the republican's letter, scummy and inappropriate as it was, amounted to any sort of actionable treason or sedition, but for those people who did argue that, doesn't it weaken president Obama's bargaining position even more to say that not only CAN the next administration undo executive actions from the Obama Administration but also that a majority of the American public (at the moment, if this poll is believed) are looking for a president who WILL do that?

[Pisces]

24. When you only poll Repubs this is the result. I think Wolf Blitzer gives Bibi back rubs every chance

he gets.

[demwing]

25. What % said they want to end Obama's policy

of allowing a black man to live in the White House?

[samsingh]

26. it's such a stupid poll - i'd be embarrassed if i was in charge of it.

[BeyondGeography]

27. Like the policy where I got older every year he was President

Fuck that.

[PM Martin]

29. Jeb will bring more illegal wars, trillion dollar deficits, and another housing bubble.

Is that what most Americans want?

[Agnosticsherbet]

31. Interviews with 1,009 adult Americans conducted by telephone by ORC International on

March 13-15, 2015. The margin of sampling error for results based on the total sample is plus or minus 3 percentage points.
This sample includes 605 interviews among landline respondents and 404 interviews among cell phone respondents.

http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2015/images/03/22/2016.wish.list.pdf

51% wants a candidate that agrees with them on all major issues.
57% want to undo all of Obama's policies.

Sounds to me like their sample was a bit skewed toads the right.