I've already stated my opinion here. "Well they do shape popular opinion in my case. It's pretty complicated for me though, so I won't get into that too much.

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The people who were polled were not news anchors, but people in New Hampshire. The people of New Hampshire are the ones influencing others."

How other people vote partially influences me. Other things also partially influence me. I mentioned that it was complicated in my case.

Well the polling in this country has been accurate predictors of what's to come. In the 2006 election many polls showed low approval ratings of Bush and the Republican congress. Many conservatives just shrugged them off as just make believe numbers. It's no coincidence that many Republicans also lost their seats in Congress after the elections.

The significance of this case is that there are two different polls made at nearly the same time which show the same trend. They are also very large and precipitous trends, so that should be seen as having a fair amount of reliability for what they say they show.

The poll numbers in this country have been changing a lot. Anyone who stays home for this event has only themself to blame, not the media. If you don't go and do your civic duty, it's your fault. If you don't go and support your candidate, it's your fault. If you get demoralized by a poll and don't go to vote, it's your fault, not the media's.

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It's not that they might be outrightly fake, but the way the data is collected and because of who is responsible for collecting it and then reporting that data...well, it might as well be fake.

You're expecting an impartial rendering of poll results from a source we already know going in is not impartial. How do we know that? Because someone owns them, owned media is not impartial - that doesn't mean it's inherently evil, but it does have an agenda to serve those that stand to earn profit from the service it provides, it's not a conspiracy theory, it's how our system works.

No one person or company is unbiased. All I'm saying is that we should recognize that and take it into account when we read, see, or hear news stories, polls, or anything else when they're told to us by corporate owned media.

The thing is...most people don't do that - they don't question who provides them with their information - they expect and take for granted that it always comes from an impartial source. Media companies and their owners know this and that's why we end up with skewed or misleading headlines, soundbites, and poll results. It all serves a purpose beyond just pure benevolence.

People tune in and tune out quickly and they don't often read the small print. The media companies count on it, thus the print is small and the info on who is polled is often unreported or generalized upon. You and I are more discerning, so we see these things...I'm saying polls and such influence popular opinion to the peoples' detriment because most people don't have the discerning eye that we do...it's sad but it's true.


Yes, for me it's fine because I take the time to read the small print and then I know the poll isn't worth paying attention to. But that's you and I. Most people glance at these things and are influenced by how they have the candidates placed without reading or even seeing the small print to know where they have them placed doesn't mean much.

That's why the print is small in the first place, so most people don't come to this realization. Polls aren't used or meant for people who care about the details...in fact it's just the opposite, and that's where the control comes in.


No, I don't think that pollsters are necessarily lying...that isn't what I've said. What I am saying is they use these unscientific, unquantifiable polls as a means of shaping public opinion. They very well could be lying about the poll results...exactly what system of accountability is there in place for us to personally check on who they polled and what all the actual answers are? We don't know...but I will say plus or minus 5 points is plenty of room to distort things.

I mean, it's pretty easy to create your own numbers. All you have to do then to avoid being overly challenged on how you got those numbers is to create a cop out like "margin for error" to avoid accountability.

Does that mean that someone working the phones conducting the network poll could purposely mark down a Giuliani vote as a McCain vote? Yes, they sure can given they have all that room under their self imposed "margin for error".

A margin for error allows the company conducting the poll to show someone who's actually polling at 13% for example and sitting in third place, to be reported by them on the news as really being at 8% and sitting in fifth or worse.

May not mean much to you or me but that difference is huge when it's reported as a fact to the broad spectrum of the general population.




Well, trust me I'd much rather live in your version of reality than mine. At least in yours the media doesn't hold too much sway over popular opinion. Unfortunately I have to live within my perception and it's hardly as rosy.

And no, I have no reason to be anti-American considering we in Canada live in pretty much the same system as you. We watch the same tv and movies, buy the same papers and magazines...etc etc...we're not a republic so the way we choose our leaders is different but the similarities outweigh the differences...as much as some Canadians hate to hear that. It's the truth.

And so, yes we watch the same news, and yes I recognize that the people who own the news I watch have an interest in what is and is not reported. It's just the way it is. The business exists to make money first...and you don't maximize your profits by reporting on things that could end up hurting you in the long run. That would be just shooting yourself in the foot. Those companies didn't get that big and that wealthy by accident.

Your fundamental argument is that the media is telling a flat out lie with all of its polls. You are not saying that the media is biased and choosing to under report some stories and over report on others. You are not saying that the media has personalities that present their political ideologies as if they were fact. While I don't agree with those arguments, even those would be less extreme than what you are saying.

You are saying that the polls are a flat out lie. You are saying that if the poll interviews 500 people and 25% like candidate 1 and there is a 5% margin of error, that the media made up the 25% number sometimes and other times they will lower or raise that number depending upon if they like a candidate or not.

So you have stated a very bold theory, just like people claim that secret societies control the government, or that there are aliens in a secret base.

Do you have one shred of proof for your theory?

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No, I read that, I just don't see what you'r trying to say with "they do shape popular opinion in my case" as your case doesn't necessarily have anything to do with popular opinion - maybe it's just a misunderstanding, maybe it leads back to it really being too compliacted to explain

I never said anything else. Anyone not voting in a democratic election is, imo, an idiot. But that doesn't change the fact that polls and therefore the media that publishes them, does have an effect on the outcome What happens between the publishing of the polls and the elction, and why it happens, is irrelevant to my point.

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If polls shaped public opinion that significantly, they wouldn't change much. Polls do have an effect, to be sure, but it's not clear that the effect is to make them a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's just as likely that if anything, they make people look harder at the frontrunner and makes people more likely to abandon him or her.

Anyway, go Obama and McCain!

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I told you that I did not want to make this about me, but since you seem confused by quick remarks about my own beliefs, I will have to go in-depth to explain.

I have been doing my best to figure out who to vote for. I do not like Hillary for several reasons. She has cheated the system in that she did not deserve her Senate seat. She does not deserve to be the frontrunner of the Democratic Party. It's a form of nepotism. She owes it all to the mere fact that she is the husband of a former President. That's wrong.

Also, I do not like her selfish ambition. Dozens of polls and my own personal conversations with other people have shown that many people do not like Hillary. Hillary sacrifices her own ideals for her ambition. Despite her awful character, her political policies are a close match to my own. So this is the dilemma I have struggled with. A character I hate, but policies I like.

Another factor is ELECTABILITY. I fear that the United States is not ready to stop being racist against blacks and that they will discriminate against Obama. That is where the polls come in. When I see the polls against him, it shows me that I better bet on Hillary, since Americans will be too racist for Obama to win. When I see Obama winning, it tells me that it is safe to vote for Obama. Now I have been keeping this a bit simple, but just so that my ideas are not distorted, I will make one further clarification. It is not the polls that are the key. It is the polls that give advance notice of the STATE ELECTIONS. That is the key. When I see that Obama wins state elections, that shows me that it is ok to vote for him. The polls are a window to the state elections.

So to put things into that simple framework we were talking about. Polls are important as well as other things (i.e. character and policies). I said it would be complicated.

No, that's wrong. It's not the media that affects the election, it's the electoral system that affects the election. The polls are only things that give people like myself an early warning of what the electoral system will produce.

I will have my mind made up in advance, others will figure it out later. That is the difference the poll has made for me.

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First of all, thanks for taking the time to clarify your point

Eventhough you think it's wrong, I don't. First of all (maybe i used unclear wording) i didn't say that the media influences elections (although it probably does, but that's an entirely different matter), polls that come to us THROUGH the media do. I posted you an example of my country where there's a strong chance it happened, but I'll roll it out from another point of view.

Imagine polls didn't exist. You wouldn't know if Obama or Hillary is ahead in New Hampshire, which would mean you could not be strategising the way you are, which means there is a very realistic chance of you voting in a different way that you would now (i.e. with polls). You basically just stated yourself that polls influence who you are going to vote for. For what reasons, again, I don't care (well, I kinda do, but it's irrelevant to my point) - but you said yourself that if Hillary was ahead in the polls, chances are strong you'd be going for her over Obama. As Obama seems strong, he's growing more likely to getting your vote.

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WOW this could be a STUNNING defeat for Hillary.