The Patriot Post® · Challenging the Polls

Polls are notoriously far off the mark. Why is that? Is it ambiguously worded questions, misinterpretation of the question by the respondent or by the tabulator? Could there be bias in the questions posed? Possibly, it is a combination of these errors or simply misconceptions.

In any event, in the Rasmussen Report for August 6, 2011 is this remarkable and perplexing couple of sentences. “Americans don’t like the debt ceiling deal he [Obama] agreed to.” “But most voters think President Obama has a good chance of being reelected next year anyway.” Those statements would indicate a complete loss of the respondents’ collective intelligence.

Regardless of who is reporting there is or appears to be a tendency to read in that which is not there. Americans are not noted for their stupidity. All forms of news media including pollsters are regarded as less than truthful in their reporting.

I am of the opinion that the most reliable polls are those conducted by US Mail. The pollster supplies the addressed return envelope but NOT the prepaid postage. I am turned off by those organizations that ask some pertinent questions but follow up with a request for a donation. A really good poll should have no more that three or four questions. Americans have become rather jaded when it comes to responding to polls and tend to second-guess the pollster.

Back to the previously cited Rasmussen poll. “Just 14% of Likely U.S. Voters now say the country is heading in the right direction. That’s down from 17% a week ago, 21% the week before, and 25% the week before that. It is the lowest measured since November 2, 2008, just before Obama was elected president.

That result should very likely indicate to an intelligent respondent that America is not being led at all but is stumbling along on the edge of a precipice. The next paragraph confirms the notion of lack of leadership. "The Rasmussen Consumer Index, which measures the economic confidence of consumers on a daily basis, fell to a two-year low on Thursday and was just eight points above the all-time low of the post-9/11 era.

From my observation and reading of the pollsters’ reports, the pollsters may be well intentioned but are missing the big picture. The leader wannabe in the Oval Office is definitely not an economist, likely has never prepared or followed a budget, has relied on some self-centered notion that his ‘charisma’, which I fail to see, will accomplish whatever his goals may be.

Polls, being what they are, opinion, are not as reliable as facts. No country and no individual can expect to spend their way to prosperity. Obama has been told that but he is a talker, not a listener. Facts are simply obstacles for him to circumvent. Obama was unprepared to serve as President in 2008; he is more befuddled and dangerous today than when he announced his candidacy on Saturday, February 10, 2007.

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