POLY POLLS AND THE POLSTERS WHO TAKE THEM

The New York Times (Yes, I’m so ashamed, I’ve gone back to the font again) today had the results of a CBS/NYT phone-poll on all kinds of subjects. Now, to be fair, the article was one of the more fair I have read in the Times. It didn’t just report all of the anti-Bush results, carefully leaving out anything might be construed as good news to conservatives. That’s not to say they didn’t twist ANYTHING, hey look at the headline:

“Poll Shows Drop in Confidence on Bush Skill in Handling Crises”

Let’s just jump into everything. Look at this prominent quote form the article:

“Thirteen months before the 2004 election, a solid majority of Americans say the country is seriously on the wrong track…”

The question read this way:

“Do you feel things is this country are generally going in the right direction or do you fell things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track?”

My problem is that isn’t two fair comparisons. If you are not very happy where the country is going, your option is to say things are pretty seriously off track. The Times then drops the modifier “pretty”, meaning not too bad and just reports “seriously off track”. Now, that’s the New York Times I know.

It’s stuff like that that drives me nuts about the Times reporting. Look at this question:

“Which comes closer to your opinion about what the United States policy should be after the war with Iraq? The United States should not attack another country unless the U.S. is attacked first, OR the U.S. should be able to attack any country it thinks might attack the United States?"

Nice. How about asking if the United States should attack countries that might pose a terrorist threat to the United States?

When it came to the Democrats (and Wes Clark) running for the democratic nomination for President, if the Times didn’t use titles (Dr. Dean, Rep. Kucinich, etc.) nobody seemed to know who they were or who they would vote for. It that case, Wes Clark came out on top. If titles were used, rising from fourth place, Dick Gephardt jumped into first place, knocking Clark down to third. That shows the primaries are defiantly dictated by the rabid partisans (of which I am I proud member on the Republican side).

Like I said, the Times wasn’t too unfair in this article. They did mention some flattering statistics like:

“But more than 6 in 10 Americans still say the president has strong qualities of leadership, more than 5 in 10 say he has more honesty and integrity than most people in public life and 6 in 10 credit him with making the country safer from terrorist attack.

By contrast, the Democratic presidential contenders remain largely unknown, and nearly half of Americans — and a like number of registered voters — say the Democrats have no clear plan of their own for the country”

But, they also quoted two uninformed Americans and shock, shock! both were disappointed in President Bush. So, when I complement the Times on their article, it’s along the same lines of

“You don’t sweat much - for a fat girl”