While Sarah Palin
and Hurricane Gustav dominated talk on the abbreviated
opening day of the 2008 Republican National Convention, a
prominent Republican pollster confirmed that the
recent change of language describing Proposition 8 was
a positive one. At a forum on voter turnout in
Minneapolis on Monday, Stephen M. Kinney, a longtime
California researcher and a partner at Public Opinion
Strategies, acknowledged that describing the ballot
measure's effect as eliminating the right to
same-sex marriage would bode well for its defeat.
"You guys really
lucked out -- I can guarantee you it's going to make
a major difference," Kinney told The Advocate
at the Pew Center on the States event, where topics such as
voting-machine vulnerabilities and the impact of first-time
voters were addressed by various experts. After the
California Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage
in May, state attorney general Jerry Brown changed the
description of Prop. 8 that will appear on ballots in
November to reflect the fact that the measure will
"eliminate [the] right of same-sex couples to
marry." Formerly the wording simply affirmed that
"only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or
recognized." (Attesting to the importance of the language,
Prop. 8 supporters sued to keep the original
description but were denied.)
Kinney, who's
conducted polling for former California governor Pete
Wilson and many other Republicans in the state -- and whose
colleague, Bill McInturff, is the chief pollster for
John McCain's presidential campaign -- added that
Prop. 8 is energizing voters on both sides of the
same-sex-marriage debate, particularly the older white males
and Hispanic women who tend to favor the initiative
and the libertarian types who tend to oppose it. He
also said that young voters, defined as between the
ages of 18 and 29 and who typically support gay rights,
would definitely turn out on Election Day, contrary to
long-standing patterns.
Nationwide,
Democrats have seen an increase of 192% in young people
registered to vote in 2008 than in 2004, substantially
dwarfing those who've registered to vote as
Republicans since the last presidential election. And
while many observers wonder if they'll actually cast
a ballot come November 4, Kinney has no doubts that
they will. "Every indication we have is that
they'll show up, because their man won," he
said, referring to Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Surely
that's another positive sign for opponents of Prop. 8.
