1. What’s Rush Got to Do With Obama?

2. The Limbaugh Effect Did Dittoheads save Hillary’s Campaign March 4th, Texas her ‘Alamo’ –Bill said a ‘must win state’ Clinton ‘won’ TX by 100,000 votes out of 2,820,000 open primaryTexas an open primary

3. The Limbaugh Effect Rush, on March 3rd, tells 13 million listeners ‘hold their noses’ and vote HRC Dallas Morning News also reported rumors of efforts Bill O’Reilly mentioned it on Fox

4. The Limbaugh Effect Limbaugh: –“We need to sustain this soap opera” –“we need Barack Obama bloodied up politically”

5. The Limbaugh Effect Strategic cross-over voting –Sincere –Malicious, “raiding” When might voters engage in strategic voting? Did Limbaugh, et al affect level of strategic voting?

6. The Limbaugh Effect Strategic Cross-over Voting Requires a fairly sophisticated voted, and: –information about election outcomes –incentive to maximize effect of vote –institutional rules that facilitate action

7. The Limbaugh Effect Strategic Cross-over Voting Information –Ample polling information –GOP race known to be irrelevant –Obama ahead in national Dem polls –Head-to-head polls show Obama stronger vs. McCain than Clinton vs. McCain

8. The Limbaugh Effect Strategic Cross-over Voting Incentives –would a dedicated Republican care enough to cross-over? –how many cross-over for sincere reasons (like Ann Coulter, they really like Clinton)?

9. The Limbaugh Effect Strategic Cross-over Voting Institutions –what barriers? –what penalties? does voter lose ability to participate in other GOP contests? does voter need to re-register?

10. The Limbaugh Effect Strategic Cross-over voting Institutions –Old WA Blanket Primary said to be a ‘perfect setting’ to facilitate cross-over voting –What about new ‘top two’ primary?

11. The Limbaugh Effect Cross-over Voting What do we know? Most studies show cross-over is sincere –Support for popular incumbents in WA, CA Parties claim it exists –Dixie Lee Ray (but she won)

12. The Limbaugh Effect Evidence of cross-over voting in 2008 Democratic primaries? Exit Polls (which, suck...but forget that)

13. The Limbaugh Effect Evidence Trends in GOP participation in Democratic primaries / caucuses Trends in support for Clinton among Republicans participating in Dem events

14. The Limbaugh Effect Hypothesis If strategic cross-over voting exists, we should see more Republicans participating in Democratic events as McCain locks up nomination

15. The Limbaugh Effect Hypothesis If cross-over voting is malicious, Republican support for Clinton should increase as McCain locks up GOP nomination

16. The Limbaugh Effect Proportion of Republicans Participating in Dem Events through June 3rd, 2008

17. The Limbaugh Effect Ratio of Republican support of Obama to Clinton

18. The Limbaugh Effect Evidence In early events, 3% of voters were Republican –they voted 70% Obama, 30% Clinton On March 4th, 9% of voters were Republican –they voted 50% Obama, 50% Clinton

19. The Limbaugh Effect Explanations: 1) Clinton changed her style, went on attack, which appealed to more Republicans....and targeted GOP voters 2) TX, MS, IN Republicans more likely to be excited by HRC than Republicans in other states

20. The Limbaugh Effect Explanations 3) Gradual trend where some GOP voters saw their vote had more effect on Democratic side –strategic? yes. –hard to tell if sincere or malicious hedging

21. The Limbaugh Effect Evidence Average of about 4% GOP share in Democratic electorate –Each event = 0.5% greater GOP share of Democratic electorate –Open primary = 1.2% greater GOP share –NO CLEAR LIMBAUGH EFFECT

22. The Limbaugh Effect Evidence Average ratio of GOP support Obama to Clinton = 2.1 to 1 –each event = 0.2% decrease in Obama’s edge over Clinton among Republicans –each 1% increase in McCain’s lead = 0.1% decline in Obama among Republicans