NEWS FLASH: Power Line has debunked NYT health care poll!!
June 22, 2009 4:01 pm ET by Eric Boehlert
Y'know, the one from Sunday which showed an astounding 85 percent of Americans support health care reform, 72 percent want a government-run system, and a solid majority said they'd be willing to pay more taxes to make the reform a reality.
Y'know, that one.
Fear not conservatives, Power Line is so on it. Turns out the Times polled too many Democrats and according to Power Line the poll "skewed left." And since the Times poll didn't ask enough Republicans their opinion, or actually, since the Times didn't ask the right Republicans their opinion, the survey results are invalid. It's a "bad pool."
Phew! Close call.
Slight problem, though. Power Line's knee-jerk conclusion was that if the Times had polled more Republicans, or the 'right' Republicans, than the health care results would have been different because, as Power Line seemed to suggest, everybody knows Republicans oppose government-run health care.
Except, apparently, Republicans who live in the United States. According to the Times survey, 50 percent of Republicans favor government-run health care. So why would it matter if Times pollsters had contacted more of them?
FYI, the Times sampling in terms of party affiliation was in line with years' worth of previous polls. So how did Power Line prove that the survey skewed left? From this single question and response:
See, Obama didn't beat McCain 48 percent to 25 percent last November, which proves the poll "skewed left." Of course, a more logical take-away from that specific Q&A would be that not that many Republicans want to admit to voting for McCain. But that's not what the detectives at Power Line deduced. They announced that single question meant the entire poll was invalid.
I'm sure Power Line readers are relieved.
(h/t Suburban Guerrilla)
Media Matters: The Palin chronicles
The Friday Rush: A series of conflicts
Contrary to media hype, Sarah Palin is very unpopular
I hope Eric realizes that but the way he wrote the article I'm not so sure. Maybe math isn't his strong suit?
48-25 still is not a representative sample of voters. And if Boehlert is willing to argue that perhaps they didn't answer the question truthfully, why would he believe the other answers?
On the other hand, it's well known that following an election more people say they voted for the winner. In 2004 people were asked who they voted for in 2000, and the results had Bush winning in a landslide.
There is no reason to believe that CBS and The New York Times didn't conduct the poll correctly, with a random and representative sample of American adults.
It's easy to say you're for Health Care reform without knowing the specifics of what it will cost and how it's going to be paid for. It all depends on how the question is asked.
While a majority of Americans overwhelmingly support Health Care reform, the number goes down dramatically when you start talking about specifics.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/jun/16/americans-united-change/62-percent-support-health-not-barack-obamas/
The US currently spends more than twice as much per capita on health care as other industrialized nations and still does poorly in basic indicators like life expectancy and infant mortality. We can afford to do better.