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SpeakOut.com Instant Viewer Response Results:
Lieberman Scores High With Democrats But Loses Independents On Affirmative Action

LOS ANGELES, CA - Wednesday, August 16, 2000 -Vice presidential candidate Joseph Lieberman reaffirmed his commitment to affirmative action in his presentation last night. (For Summary Graphic Analysis: http://www.speakout.com/activism/msnbc/lieberman_graph.htm)

But that support immediately cost him the approval of the all-important swing voters, according to a weighted online survey of likely Gore, Bush and undecided voters conducted by SpeakOut.com.

For the first eight minutes of his speech, Lieberman received some of the highest ratings of the convention from non-Democrats among the more than 500 participants in the online focus group.

But swing voters and Republicans withdrew their approval when Lieberman spoke of affirmative action and never moved their dials above 50, the neutral mark, until the end of his speech, when he praised his father and America.

Unlike Clinton’s presentation, reaction to Lieberman’s speech revealed no gender gap. Men and women reacted very similarly throughout Lieberman’s presentation.

“Joe Lieberman has a compelling personal story that draws in Democrats, Independents and Republicans,” said Democratic pollster, Peter Hart. “Added to that is the fact that he hit home with Independents several times when he talked about the promise of America.”

“Lieberman’s remarks on affirmative action were certainly music to Maxine Waters ears, but undecided swing voters didn’t like what they heard,” said Will Feltus, SpeakOut.com’s Director of Polling. “Until this point in the speech, Lieberman was making a very favorable impression on undecided voters.”

Lieberman’s scores from Democrats sailed in the high 70’s and 80’s for most of his speech, only slightly lower than Clinton’s, the highest of the convention so far, according to SpeakOut.com’s interactive surveys this week. Democratic participants gave Lieberman his highest marks for his comments on anti-discrimination, the environment, his history as “a people’s advocate,” and his defense of the Clinton administration’s military policies, which he said were under attack by Republicans at their convention.

Undecided voters began turning their dials sharply south as Lieberman spoke about affirmative action, made his first criticism of the Republican party and cracked a joke about the GOP convention, saying “not since Tom Hanks won an Oscar has there been that much acting in Philadelphia.”

After the Hanks joke, Republicans and Independents kept their dials below the neutral mark of 50 and dipped even further down the scale when Lieberman talked about campaign finance. The same campaign finance comment brought the highest scores of his speech from Democrats.

In addition to the real-time dial survey, participants were asked a couple of multiple-choice questions. Asked whether Lieberman was an asset to the Democratic ticket, 100% of participating Democrats said yes and 56% of Republicans said no. Among swing voters, 45% said the choice of Lieberman had no effect on their vote, 35% said he was an asset and 18% said he was a liability. Lieberman’s speech got a favorable rating from 92% of Democrats, 45% of Independents and 15% of Republicans participating in the survey.

About the MSNBC/SpeakOut.com Viewer Response Room: The results of this poll reflect the average opinions of convention watchers who choose to participate in the online, Internet research project. Participants watched the live broadcast of convention proceedings and registered their moment-to-moment reactions using a 0-to-100 scale where zero indicated a very unfavorable reaction, and 100 indicated a very favorable reaction. Although the participants in the Viewer Response Room are not a scientific sample of all American voters, the average results were weighted to reflect the national party identification and gender of all voters.

For complete results of tonight’s SpeakOut.com/MSNBC Internet Dial Poll of Joseph Lieberman’s speech, link here http://www.speakout.com/activism/MSNBC/results/

About SpeakOut.com

Based in Washington, DC, SpeakOut.com  is America’s leading non-partisan Internet activism Web site and online opinion research company. Launched in February 2000, SpeakOut.com’s primary mission is to enhance the democratic process by enabling citizens to have a direct impact on the decisions that affect their lives. Users enjoy a wide variety of news and information tailored to their interests and activism tools allowing aggregated messaging to a vast array of public officeholders, candidates, business and news executives.

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