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Exorcising Scandal in the White House: Presidential Polling in Times of Crisis
Author(s) -
ROTTINGHAUS BRANDON,
BEREZNIKOVA ZLATA
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
presidential studies quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.337
H-Index - 5
eISSN - 1741-5705
pISSN - 0360-4918
DOI - 10.1111/j.1741-5705.2006.02559.x
Subject(s) - presidential system , polling , white (mutation) , political science , white paper , public administration , media studies , law , sociology , politics , computer science , biochemistry , chemistry , gene , operating system
Several important works have addressed the issue of scandal in the White House; however, no study has used internal White House archival polling data to explore the phenomenon of presidential recovery from scandal. In this research note, we expand the analysis of presidential polling and connect these internal procedures to times of scandal in the White House across two presidents and three scandals. We identify four questions the White House is concerned with (through the polling) and we suggest polling is uniquely helpful in identifying answers to these questions that gauge the depth of presidential involvement, the ability of the president to continue to govern, the importance of the scandal to the public, and the fairness of the media.