Two recent online polls display the inherent bias sometimes found in them. There are still forces out there trying to distract the national discourse before the most important election of our liftimes, just two weeks away.

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October 24, 2006

Two weeks left before Americans everywhere stand up and say no more. This close to a redeeming moment in American history it is important to understand that there are still partisan factions out there trying to change general opinion and mood in this country before you walk into the polling booth on November 7. They wield the media as their weapon, making the absurd seem logical and trying to convince you to focus on things that will nudge you to vote for the current disastrous reign of the GOP. One weapon the media wields so effectively are polls.

The fact is that even a corporate media mouthpiece such is Charlie Cook has to agree that the polling is indicating a tsunami of change in the Senate and House. Even using slanted questions and dubious methods, the writing is on the wall. Two such polls today however jumped out at me and highlighted the importance of understanding HOW you are being lied to. The first one is from ABC News online. Hardly a "scientific" poll, it can be found here:

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/popup?id=2599476

Seems simple enough, right? A simple little poll designed to see how America feels about impeaching George W. Bush. The question was designed fairly enough:

"Do you think Congress should launch impeachment proceedings against President Bush?"

Fair enough, now let's take a look at the choices of answers. What? Not just a yes or no? Of course not because that would be entirely too fair. Here are the yes and no answers:

"Yes. He has led us into an unjust war and has infringed on America's civil liberties."

"No. He has done nothing that merits impeachment. He has done the best job possible."

Now, I would have preferred a simple yes or no and not this spoon feeding like the respondents are too stupid to understand why the question is being asked. That aside, in and of itself, this poll would have been fine as is, except ABC News decided that the respondents needed a "maybe" option:

"Maybe he should be impeached but there are more pressing problems to deal with right now."

Can anyone answer why this makes the entire poll useless? Because now there are two answers for yes, effectively trying to split the damage of the "yes" response into two categories. By doing so the poll designer is hoping for a higher number of folks voting for "no", so the poll results can be presented without getting into the nitty-gritty details of how many actually voted for both "yes" answers. This poll was designed to falsely show that America does not favor impeachment.

Granted, online polls are not scientific by any stretch, but they are used by the media in reporting to pretend that it is somehow representative of how the country is feeling about a particular event. We saw the same thing in the aftermath of Katrina when a poll asking who was to blame, had an option for Bush AND a separate option for the federal government. Never mind that Bush LEADS to federal government. The result was that the "poll" revealed that more people blamed the state and local officials and that was how it was reported. You had to actually go look at the raw data to realize that if you added the responses for Bush and the Federal Government, more people were actually blaming them.

It is too bad for the designers of this ABC News impeachment poll that America has had enough of five years of waste and abuse of power. The results of this poll at the time of this writing were as follows:

Yes 15,328
No 7,015
Maybe 3,104

Even with the blatant attempt to design a poll that would result in people saying no to impeachment, the poll actually reveals that more than twice the amount of people favor impeachment and if you correctly add the "maybes" to the "yes" column, you have a more than 10,000 vote differential in favor of impeachment.

The second poll that caught my eye was on the webpage for Sean "The Whore" Hannity. Now, I know, we should not expect anything less than subterfuge from Hannity but the absolute hubris of this poll is quite telling about why people who follow him are so clueless about what is really going on. A screenshot and write up about this poll can be found here:

http://bobgeiger.blogspot.com/2006/10/idiotic-hannity-polling-ignores-iraq.html

Once again, the question is quite fair:

"What issue is most important to you this election season?"

Fair enough, let's see the choices Hannity insulted his viewers with:

A) War on Terror
B) Economy
C) Foley Scandal
D) Other

As the writer on the blog opined... what's missing? Oh that's right, the number one issue according to any real poll that has been conducted, the Iraq War. This poll is designed for one thing only, to generate an overwhelming answer to option number one, "The War on Terror." Why? So Sean can then go and sell it on his radio and TV shows. So he can pretend that the number one issue heading into the elections is not the Iraq War, but the illusionary war on terror. Not surprisingly, 83% of his respondents chose the war on terror. This is the creation of false talking points. This is Lying 101 and no one is a more astute professor on the subject of lying, then Professor Hannity.

America knows better now. You must understand that 95% of mainstream media are owned by less than 10 companies, all of which have a vested interest in keeping the status quo. They will be assaulting you for the next two weeks. They will be showing you polls which are based on dubious methods and presenting it to you as fact. They will do whatever they can to convince you to vote GOP this November. They hope you forget about the economy, which the average American realizes is a sham. They hope you forget the Iraq War and how we were lied into it, lied through it, and are repeatedly told things are rosy as our kids come home in boxes we are not even allowed to see a picture of. They hope you forget about Afghanistan and how the Taliban is back in charge and opium production is higher now than before we invaded. They hope you forget that they left behind the no child left behind funding, rendering it useless, as our kids continue to be the last option for funding. They hope you forget the party of ethics have brought you Tom Delay, Mark Foley, Dennis Hastert, Tony "naughty emails" Snow, Duke Cunningham, Jack Abramoff, and countless other scandals. They hope you forget the malicious outing of a CIA covert operative for political payback and Scooter Libby. They hope you forget the Downing Street Memos. They hope you forget that tax cuts for the rich and their gloating over tying the raise in the minimum wage to the repeal of the Estate Tax on the billionaires of this country. They hope you forget the WMD, the mushroom clouds, WMD, the greeted as liberators, WMD, the Iraq oil will pay for the war, WMD, the stay the course, WMD, the war on Islamic Extremism, WMD, the last throes of the insurgency, WMD, mission accomplished, WMD, bring em on!, WMD, Osama bin Hiding and of course... WMD. They hope you forget the elimination of congressional oversight and the blank check this rubber stamp congress has given the president in his power grab to consolidate all power into the executive branch of government. They hope you forget torture as a national policy and the elimination of Habeas Corpus. They hope you forget the illegal wiretapping of American citizens. They hope you forget the appointment in 2000 and the stolen election in 2004. They hope you forget the over 800 laws they have allowed the president to ignore with signing statements.

They are mistaken. We will not forget this November. In two weeks America will rush to the polls to exorcise the demons of the Republican Party that have possessed our national discourse for five years now. This will be referendum on the Iraq War, the failed economy, and the levels of corruption unheard of at any point in American history. It will be a wake up call for a party that was given total power and squandered it away for million dollar back-room deals and a willingness to screw the average American for political expediency. Short if another Diebold miracle, the 800 pound elephant in the voting booth that so few are willing to really talk about, America will return to checks and balances, congressional oversight, and the notion that the truth, still matters to us.

Authors Bio:

Anthony Wade, a contributing writer to opednews.com, is dedicated to educating the populace to the lies and abuses of the government. He is a 53-year-old independent writer from New York with political commentary articles seen on multiple websites. A Christian progressive and professional Rehabilitation Counselor working with the poor and disabled, Mr. Wade believes that you can have faith and hold elected officials accountable for lies and excess, regardless of party.


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