Good morning.
Monday in Whitewater will be windy with a high of 38. Sunrise is 6:08 AM and sunset 7:39 PM for 13h 31m 10s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 9.1% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Library Board meets at 6:30 PM.
On this day in 1907, the Ellis Island immigration center processes 11,747 people, more than on any other day.
Yesterday’s post embedded UW-Madison’s 2022 Civic Fracture & Renewal Survey. Today’s post highlights the principal findings of the survey. Tomorrow’s post will assess the local implications, if any, of those findings.
First, here is the survey’s basic methodology:
The 2022 Civic Fracture & Renewal Survey was administered online by the SSRS survey firm from October 31 to November 14, 2022, with responses before and after the midterm election. SSRS supplied a demographically-weighted convenience sample of 3,031 adult Wisconsin residents and a probability-based nationally representative survey of 2,907 U.S. adult residents. We apply demography-based survey sample weights to better align estimates with the state and national populations.
Although non-probability samples do not have traditional margins of error, percentages from the full Wisconsin sample essentially have a margin of error of +/- 1.8 percentage points for point estimates near 50%, with smaller margins for estimates as they move toward 0% or 100%. Due to subsample size differences, the margin of error for estimates with Wisconsin Democrats (N=1,423) is +/- 2.6 percentage points, and the margin of error for estimates with Wisconsin Republicans (N=1,055) is +/- 3.0 percentage points. Democrats comprise 40% of the weighted sample, and Republicans comprise 42%.We are recontacting the same Wisconsin respondents for a follow-up survey in March 2023 so that we may understand their civic orientations better with additional questions, and so that we can examine stability and change in their views across a changing political environment.
These are the principal findings that stand out from the survey:
Civic Fractures:
• End of discussion: 60% of Wisconsinites stopped talking about politics with
someone with whom they disagree.
• Ending relationships: 1 in 6 Wisconsinites have ended a friendship or spend
less time with a family member due to political disagreement, including 25% of
Democrats and 10% of Republicans.
• Anti-democracy: 60% of Republicans who strongly approve of Donald Trump
agree “the traditional American way of life is disappearing so fast that we may
have to use force to save it,” versus 28% among Republicans who don’t approve.
Barriers to Political Participation:• Safety fears: one quarter of Wisconsinites say they avoid politics out of fear,
with higher levels among Black residents and religious minorities.
• Difficulty voting: 8% of Wisconsinites report some difficulty in the voting
process. That rises to 19% for the lowest-income Wisconsinites and 18% for
people under 30, limiting voter access and representativeness of WI elections.
Paths Forward:• Finding common ground: By a margin of 3 to 1, Wisconsinites endorse
compromise to get things done over sticking to principle no matter what.
• Trust in elections: 80% of Wisconsinites – including 78% of Republicans – are
confident that their votes are counted, showing resilience against widespread yet baseless claims of fraud. Similar numbers trust counts for in-person, while smaller majorities in both parties trust mail, absentee, and drop-box voting.
• Separating church and state: Wisconsinites favor keeping religion out of politics by a two-to-one margin, which helps preserve equal rights.
• Making a representative government: Large majorities of Wisconsinites— including most Republicans – support non-partisan legislative redistricting.
Tomorrow: How do these results compare with the experience of Whitewater, in the city and school district?
How octopuses taste with their arms: