Approval of George W. Bush

688 Pages·2016·2.66 MB·English

Wayne State University
Wayne State University Dissertations
1-1-2011
Approval of George W. Bush: Economic and media
impacts
Gino Tozzi Jr.
Wayne State University,
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Tozzi Jr., Gino, "Approval of George W. Bush: Economic and media impacts" (2011).Wayne State University Dissertations.Paper 260.
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APPROVAL OF GEORGE W. BUSH: ECONOMIC AND MEDIA IMPACTS

by

GINO J. TOZZI JR.

DISSERTATION

Submitted to the Graduate School

of Wayne State University,

Detroit, Michigan

in partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

2011

MAJOR: POLITICAL SCIENCE

Approved by:

_________________________________
Chair Date

_________________________________

_________________________________

_________________________________
© COPYRIGHT BY

GINO J. TOZZI JR.

2011

All Rights Reserved
DEDICATION

To my Father

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I want to thank my committee chair Professor Ewa Golebiowska for the
encouragement and persistence on only accepting the best from me in this process. I
also owe my committee of Professor Ronald Brown, Professor Jodi Nachtwey, and
Professor David Martin a debt of gratitude for their help and advisement in this
endeavor. All of them were instrumental in keeping my focus narrowed to produce the
best research possible.
I also owe appreciation to the commentary, suggestions, and research help from
my wonderful wife Courtney Tozzi. This project was definitely more enjoyable with her
encouragement and help. Mr. Michael Kleingartner from Oakland University proved
invaluable with his help in auditing my content analysis of media coverage and assisting
me in my first venture into the R Statistical Computing Environment. His crosschecking
of my coding scheme and advisement on how to improve it significantly improved that
portion of my study.
I want to thank the Political Science Department and the Wayne State University
Graduate School for the financial and research support they provided along the way
which made this scholarly work far easier to achieve. I also appreciate the efforts that
Ms. Cindy Krolikowski, our Political Science Department Librarian, made to help me
with the campus databases to find my media transcripts. I thank the Administrative staff
within the Department of Political Science, Ms. Patricia Robinson, Ms. Delinda Neal,
and Ms. She’re Davis, who expedited this process saving me time and worry. I also owe
my appreciation to my family for their support, encouragement, and assistance.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication…………..........……………………………………………….………………….…ii
Acknowledgements……………………………………………………….…………..........….iii
List of Graphs.................................................................................................................viii
List of Tables....................................................................................................................ix
List of Figures...................................................................................................................x
CHAPTER 1 “Introduction”……………………………………………..………….............….1
Variables Influencing Presidential Approval…………………………………………..3
My Model for Approval and Its Relationships…………………………...……………9
Reasons to Study George W. Bush’s Approval Rate………………………………..9
Why This Is Different…………………………………………………………………..11
Looking Ahead………………………………………………………………………….13
CHAPTER 2 “Literature Review: What Effects Opinion Change of the Presidency”......14
Changes in News Media Coverage of Presidencies and Presidential Campaigns..
…………………………………………………………………………………………...14
Technological Changes in the News Media…………………………………………16
Trends in Media Influence on Public Opinion……………………………………….18
Media Effects on Presidential Approval……………………………………………...22
The Media’s Coverage of the Economy……………………………………………..23
The Economy and Presidential Popularity…………………………………………..24
Presidential Power over the Economy………………………………………………25
Theories on the Relationship Between the Economy and Presidential
Approval…………………………………………………………………………………26

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Sociotropic Economic Evaluations of the President: Past, Present, and Future..27
Influence on Approval: Inflation, Unemployment, and Personal Income………...29
Control Variables……………………………………………………………………….30
The Rally Effect………………………………………………………………………...30
The Honeymoon Effect…………………………………………..……………………33
Second Terms and Divided Government……………………………………………35
Moving Forward………………………………………………………………………..36
CHAPTER 3 “Initial Observations of Bush's Approval Rate”……...................................38
Bush’s Approval Rate………………………………………………………………….38
War and Bush’s Approval……………………………………………………………..44
The Economy’s Impact on Bush’s Approval………………………………………...46
Hypotheses on Bush’s Approval Rate……………………………………………….51
The Analysis of Bush’s Media Coverage……………………………………………54
Statistical Concerns for Bush’s Media Coverage Rating Variable………………..61
Criteria for the Coding of the Presidency in the Media…………………………….64
Bush’s Media Coverage: The Results from the Content Analysis………………..68
Approval Moving Forward…………………………………………………………….70
CHAPTER 4 “Methodology”…………………..................................................................72
Potential Problems with my Public Opinion Research…………………………….72
The Data………………………………………………………………………………..73
The Tests………………………………………………………………………………..80
Looking Forward……………………………………………………………………….82
CHAPTER 5 “Results”………………………………………..............................................84

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Macroeconomic Indicators During the Occurrence of Control Variables………...84
Bush’s Media Coverage During the Occurrence of Control Variables……………88
Test Results………………………………………………………………………...…..89
Granger Causality Test Results………………………………………………………………94
Success of Predictions………………………………………………………………………..97
Final Model Graph and Implications…………………………………………………………99
CHAPTER 6 “Conclusion”…………………………………..............................................102
Appendix A “Bush's Approval Rate Correlated with Time”............................................119
Appendix B “Media Coding Guidelines for Bush”.........................................................120
Appendix C “Media Coding Chart”................................................................................127
Appendix D “Sample Coding Form”..............................................................................623
Appendix E “Difference of Means Test”........................................................................624
Appendix F “Augmented Dickey-Fuller Test Results”...................................................625
Appendix G “Basic Descriptive Statistics”.....................................................................627
Appendix H “Correlation Table”.....................................................................................628
Appendix I “Variance Inflation Factors”.........................................................................629
Appendix J “Breusch-Godfrey Test”......…....................................................................630
Appendix K “Residuals”................................................................................................631
Appendix L “Multivariate OLS Regression”...................................................................632
Appendix M “Granger Test Results”..............................................................................633
Appendix N “Robust Regression of Quarterly Data”……………………………………..638
Appendix O “Granger Causality Test for Quarterly RDI change and Approval”……….639
Bibliography………………………………………………………………..............………...640

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Abstract………………………………………………………………….............……………675
Autobiographical Statement…………………………………………................................676

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LIST OF GRAPHS
Graph 1: Bush's Approval Rate.......................................................................................40
Graph 2: Real Disposable Income, 2001-2009…………….. ..........................................47
Graph 3: Consumer Price Index, 2001-2009..................................................................48
Graph 4: Unemployment Rate, 2001-2009.....................................................................48
Graph 5: Monthly Percent Change in Real Disposable Income, 2001- 2009.................49
Graph 6: Monthly Percent Change in Consumer Price Index, 2001-2009......................50
Graph 7: Monthly Percent Change in Unemployment Rate, 2001-2009........................50
Graph 8: Bush’s Media Coverage from AP and CNN…..................................................62
Graph 9: Bush’s Media Coverage Rating Moving Average.............................................69
Graph 10: Bush's Approval Rate and His Media Coverage Rating.................................70
Graph 11: Bush's Predicted and Actual Approval with Control Periods........................100

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