The Democratic Party: A Friend of Edgar Martinez
By Rodger Payne directs us to this article by Jeff Gill and Christopher Zorn:
Most important, and consistent with our expectations, we find that self-identified Democratic Party members are more likely to support the DH rule than are either independents or Republicans; the odds ratio of 1.90 suggests that, on average, Democrats are 90 percent more likely to support the rule than are independents. This implies (we think) that the values that draw the respondents to the Democrats are linked to those associated with supporting the rule. At the same time, the reverse is not true: Republicans are no more or less likely to support the DH rule than are political independents.
Rodger comments:
As Zorn and Gill explain, the DH is arguably the greatest rules change in the history of baseball — and Democrats are more accepting of “socio-political” changes. Younger fans like the DH a bit more — each year of age decreases support for the DH by 1.3%. They also find a gender gap. Women are three times as likely to support the DH as men. All respondents were self-identified baseball fans, included in a larger CBS News survey taken in 1997.
Interleague play did not engender the same sort of socio-political division.
Fascinating. I’m kind of surprised at the size of the gap, although it does make some sense that traditionalist baseball antiquarians would identify with the political party that pushes a more or less similar identity. For a very few, I suppose the fact that the union likes the DH could be a key factor…