What Is The Bradley Effect? Who Was Bradley?

The so-called “Bradley Effect” is a topic of conversation and, for Democrats, concern in the 2008 campaign.

What is the Bradley effect? Who was Bradley?

The Bradley effect is the idea that persons contacted by pollsters lie about support for a black candidate for public office. They tell the pollster they support a black candidate because they don’t wish to be seen as racist. But when they go to vote, they vote for the white candidate in the race instead of the black person they had told the pollster they favored.

This is the Texas Liberal Election Fact Of The Day.

A recent Associated Press story suggests that Senator Obama will have to have a lead in the polls of at least six points to overcome this factor on Election Day. This idea is disputed by a leading analyst of poll data. This New York Times article discusses the issue.

The term Bradley effect comes from the 1982 election for Governor of California. Los Angles Mayor Tom Bradley ( photo above), a black man, was leading in the polls over California Attorney General George Deukmejian. Mr. Bradley was a Democrat and Mr. Deukmejian a Republican.

Despite Mr. Bradley’s lead in the polls, Mr. Deukmejian won the election by a small margin.

From the New York Times 1998 obituary of Mayor Bradley—

“Tom Bradley, the sharecropper’s son who became Mayor of Los Angeles and presided over the city for two decades of explosive growth and change, died yesterday..He was 80. Mr. Bradley was Mayor from 1973 to 1993, an era in which Los Angeles was transformed from a collection of suburban neighborhoods to what Mr. Bradley liked to call a ”world-class city,” a place with glittering skyscrapers, a striking new skyline and a vibrant downtown…. His election as the first black Mayor of Los Angeles, which was then the nation’s third largest city and largely white, reflected a significant change in local politics in the United States. For most of that time, Mr. Bradley was an immensely popular figure whose stately bearing and placid demeanor seemed to reassure his increasingly polyglot city….Soft-spoken and self-effacing, Mr. Bradley shunned some of the perquisites that his stature and office might have brought him. Calling it a foolish waste of money, he refused to use a cellular telephone that was installed in his car, a former aide recalled. Still, Mr. Bradley learned to move as easily in the society of the fabulously wealthy as he did in the world of the poor and disadvantaged from which he had come.”

Is the Bradley effect for real? Have we moved ahead in the 26 years since 1982? Will a kind of reverse Bradley effect take place this year where Senator Obama actually gains votes because he is black?

Nobody knows.

( Please click here for information about black governors in the United States)

(Please click here to read about black U.S. Senators.)

Aurore Press To Release Jockey Club Book—Old Punk Rockers To Have Reunion Concert

 

Cincinnati’s Aurore Press will soon be releasing Stories For Shorty: A Collection Of Recollections From The Jockey Club 1982-1988. 

If you were lucky, you spent some time at Newport, Kentucky’s Jockey Club in the years mentioned above. 

The picture above from inside the Jockey Club above captures the essence of the place well.

Stories From Shorty will feature remembrances from Jockey Club patrons and performers. I think the book will be the publishing sensation of the fall.

Also, a Jockey Club reunion concert will be held Saturday night November 22 at Newport’s Southgate House. The doors open at 8. November 22 is the day of the release of the Jockey Club book.

Local giants such as The Thangs, SS-20, The Reduced and BPA will be just part of the musical lineup for the reunion show.  

Stories For Shorty will be released earlier in the day on November 22 at Shake It Records in Cincinnati. This event will take place at 5 PM at Shake It.      

I’m glad to report that I’ll be at the Southgate House for the show. I hope to see you there.

( Please click here for my greatest punk rock moments.)