Morals

From an interview on the PBS Newshour Wednesday:

RAY SUAREZ: Perhaps not politics from the pulpit, but one of the questions that voters were asked had to do with what closed the sale for them, and moral values was right up there with the economy and Iraq at 22 percent. It won a plurality in one set of exit polls

ANDREW KOHUT: Everyone who is reading those exit polls was taken back by that number. Many people said moral values or Iraq or the economy or terrorism in fact more than Iraq. Looking at that, I think, and I think there are probably other pollsters that hold this view, that measure is a little bit misleading.

Moral values in a list of things that you're asking people what issues are on their mind, that's a an ambiguous term; it's a term that has a social desirability factor from the point of view of conservatives. If you put moral values on a list, it's hard for many people to say they weren't thinking of moral values when they were making their decision.

And, most importantly, we asked open-ended questions throughout the campaign, the moral values questions never rose to the level of the conditions questions, the Iraq, economy or terrorism. I think...

I'm not trying to understate the importance of moral values in this campaign and the importance of that issue, that cluster of issues to the Bush campaign and to the Republican Party, but I think there was an overstatement of that in the exit polls, and it's going to become part of the narrative that explains this election and perhaps not quite accurately.

The Newshour also had a discussion with Rick Warren, Barbara Ehrenreich, Jim Wallis, and Morris Fiorina.