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Author Topic:   Fake polls, fake news
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 46 of 710 (799938)
02-18-2017 3:11 AM
Reply to: Message 28 by Faith
02-17-2017 6:24 PM


Keeper
You would dismiss Norman Dodd's testimony as similar to conspiracies about the moon landing? You are NOT worth talking to. Your opinions are worth nothing, and your advice to me is beyond insulting. There is so much in this world to cry about if you don't cry there's something very wrong with you.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people. Martin Luther King
I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend. Thomas Jefferson
Seems to me if its clear that certain things that require ancient dates couldn't possibly be true, we are on our way to throwing out all those ancient dates on the basis of the actual evidence. -- Faith
Some of us are worried about just how much damage he will do in his last couple of weeks as president, to make it easier for the NY Times and Washington post to try to destroy Trump's presidency. -- marc9000

This message is a reply to:
 Message 28 by Faith, posted 02-17-2017 6:24 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 47 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 4:03 AM NoNukes has replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 47 of 710 (799939)
02-18-2017 4:03 AM
Reply to: Message 46 by NoNukes
02-18-2017 3:11 AM


Re: Keeper
Glad you liked it. Of course I don't really expect the stuff that makes me cry to make a leftist cry, though it should.
Have you seen the interviews with Norman Dodd? Do you also dismiss them as lies?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 46 by NoNukes, posted 02-18-2017 3:11 AM NoNukes has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 48 by NoNukes, posted 02-18-2017 4:28 AM Faith has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 48 of 710 (799940)
02-18-2017 4:28 AM
Reply to: Message 47 by Faith
02-18-2017 4:03 AM


Re: Keeper
Have you seen the interviews with Norman Dodd? Do you also dismiss them as lies?
Uh, this is pretty much a rabbit hole. Let's just say that I'm glad to learn that you are not a moon landing conspiracy promoter .

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people. Martin Luther King
I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend. Thomas Jefferson
Seems to me if its clear that certain things that require ancient dates couldn't possibly be true, we are on our way to throwing out all those ancient dates on the basis of the actual evidence. -- Faith
Some of us are worried about just how much damage he will do in his last couple of weeks as president, to make it easier for the NY Times and Washington post to try to destroy Trump's presidency. -- marc9000

This message is a reply to:
 Message 47 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 4:03 AM Faith has not replied

  
caffeine
Member (Idle past 1024 days)
Posts: 1800
From: Prague, Czech Republic
Joined: 10-22-2008


(1)
Message 49 of 710 (799941)
02-18-2017 5:38 AM
Reply to: Message 24 by Faith
02-17-2017 5:29 PM


I'm not arguing from my own personal circle of family and friends, I'm arguing from what I see in those public venues, the HUGE support for Trump. Sure it's "plausible" that Trump supporters are in the minority but I know from the election that they aren't. When I see a poll that puts his popularity below 50% I know it's fake. Yes, I just know it. The same way you believe the lower percentages I believe they're fake. You can't prove it, you have to resort to the convoluted reasoning in your post that amounts to nothing. No evidence, no facts. We're both trusting in our intuition.
In the election Trump got about 46% of the vote. That would mean about 23% of eligible voters. How can you know a 45% approval rating is fake based on that?
I'm not trusting in intuition at all. I don't have any intuition on whether 40% or 50% or 60% of Americans support Trump. Looking at the polling, Gallup actually puts Trump's approval rating at 40%. Gallup's is amongst the lowest of the major polling companies - most put his approval rating in the 40s. Rasmussen is the only one with a majority - but the Rasmussen poll is a different measure than the rest; since it only counts people who say they intend to vote.
So the polls all seem fairly consistent - Gallup and Pew report about 40% in polls which include all adults (this includes non-citizens who can't vote).
Most polling agencies, which only poll registered voters, put the approval about 45%.
Rasmussen, which only polls the subset of voters who say they intend to vote, puts it a little over 50%.
Registered voters who do not actually vote skew Democratic in the US; while US residents who are not citizens would of course be expected to be concerned about Trump. So if this is 'fake', every polling agency in America is colluding together to pull it off.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 24 by Faith, posted 02-17-2017 5:29 PM Faith has not replied

  
caffeine
Member (Idle past 1024 days)
Posts: 1800
From: Prague, Czech Republic
Joined: 10-22-2008


Message 50 of 710 (799942)
02-18-2017 5:59 AM
Reply to: Message 36 by Hyroglyphx
02-17-2017 8:44 PM


The other danger is that pulls on some strings. As was demonstrated in the election, they were manufactured depending upon who you was reporting the polls. And that's because they know they can manipulate how people think. Conservative pollsters were reporting that Trump was ahead while liberal pollsters were reporting that Hillary was ahead. Same data, different results. That's because there is nothing accurate about them. They are misleading and quite honestly irrelevant. How other people presume to vote should never be a consideration for how YOU want to vote or the reasons why.
Different polls do not contain the same data - that's why the results are different.
But what you say isn't really true if you look at the polls. All of the major polling companies consistently put Clinton ahead since September, with the exception of the one conducted by USC - paid by the LA Times. I don't really know much about the LA Times, but it doesn't seem to be a pro-Trump paper from what I can see. A couple of other polls occassionally showed a narrow lead for Trump, but then the same poll by the same company on a different date went back to Clinton.
It is of course possible to slant polls by collecting data in certain ways, or by the way you ask questions, if you wanted to do so; but I'm not sure where you're seeing these conservative polls that put Trump ahead. If by 'polls' you mean when a newspaper asks a slanted question of its own self-selected readership with a small-print caveat underneath that this is not a scientific poll then you'd be quite right - but those aren't polls, as the small print advises.
The idea that it's better to inflate your candidate's support is a bit of an odd one when you think about it. If an election is expected to be tight, the last thing you want to do is create a false impression that you are ahead. That motivates your opponents to get out and vote and encourages complacency amongst your supporters. Inflating support only makes sense for rank outsiders who need to convince voters they would not be throwing their vote away.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 36 by Hyroglyphx, posted 02-17-2017 8:44 PM Hyroglyphx has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22388
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


(3)
Message 51 of 710 (799944)
02-18-2017 8:21 AM
Reply to: Message 26 by Faith
02-17-2017 5:47 PM


Faith writes:
Exactly the same way YOU "know" it's 45% or less. You trust those sources, I don't trust them. Intuition, personal judgment, who we find believable. You have no evidence, so don't ask me for evidence.
But I do have evidence. I have in the past gone to polling websites to discover the details of their methodology, including even the exact phrasing of the questions they asked. I can and did, for example, go to the Gallup website to find the Gallop methodology for their daily tracking polls. If you have a problem with their approach, what is it?
So you did. I disagree. I consider 45% ridiculously fake.
And you know this how? I mean in a factual sense - what is the evidence upon which you base this judgment? Or is it just more intuition and personal judgment from the person who believes in witches.
After all the polls saying Hillary was going to win even as Trump racked up the electoral votes on election night, you still believe what the MSM says is "fact?
Of course I believe the mainstream polling - it was correct about Hillary leading Trump, since she won the popular vote by 3 million votes, a considerable margin. As I said before, the polling wasn't detailed enough to show that Trump would win by narrow margins in three key states that gave him a victory in the electoral college. Since more of the country preferred Hillary to Donald it makes perfect sense, especially given the many missteps and miscues, the combative and antagonistic approach, and the tendency to make up facts he likes and ignore facts he doesn't, that his popularity is low for a newly minted president.
The way they spin stories about Trump is so obviously disgustingly biased and you all just eat it up. It's so blatant I am amazed that even liberals swallow it uncritically. No, Trump is right to call them out in his press conferences. They ARE the enemy. Oh yes there is a big conspiracy out there to defeat Trump no matter what they have to resort to, and the media are the major part of it.
We already know how you feel. What we're wondering is whether there are any facts supporting what you believe. Have you any facts at all, or are your contributions to this thread going to consist only of you repeating your unsupported opinions over and over?
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 26 by Faith, posted 02-17-2017 5:47 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 52 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 2:55 PM Percy has replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 52 of 710 (799951)
02-18-2017 2:55 PM
Reply to: Message 51 by Percy
02-18-2017 8:21 AM


Rasmussen found 55%. I believe Rasmussen, you believe Gallup. Those are the facts.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 51 by Percy, posted 02-18-2017 8:21 AM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 53 by JonF, posted 02-18-2017 3:24 PM Faith has not replied
 Message 54 by Percy, posted 02-18-2017 3:34 PM Faith has replied
 Message 55 by RAZD, posted 02-18-2017 3:44 PM Faith has not replied

  
JonF
Member (Idle past 167 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


(1)
Message 53 of 710 (799952)
02-18-2017 3:24 PM
Reply to: Message 52 by Faith
02-18-2017 2:55 PM


Gallup and every other polling organization except Rasmussen agree.
So, of course, you believe the one that always is a rightward outlier because you like it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 52 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 2:55 PM Faith has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22388
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


(1)
Message 54 of 710 (799953)
02-18-2017 3:34 PM
Reply to: Message 52 by Faith
02-18-2017 2:55 PM


Faith writes:
Rasmussen found 55%. I believe Rasmussen, you believe Gallup. Those are the facts.
But I don't disbelieve Rasmussen. In the absence of information about how they conduct their poll I would withhold judgment, but Caffeine says Rasmussen polls people who say they intend to vote, while the Gallup methodology I read doesn't say anything about selecting on the basis of voting intent. That could account for the difference. We cannot too easily compare histories of the Gallup and Rasmussen polls because Rasmussen only goes back to 2003. This means we couldn't compare how Bush's (either one) or Clinton's or Reagan's first 30 days Rasmussen poll numbers compare to Trump's.
But if you go to this Rasmussen webpage you can see that on February 17, 2009, just 30 days into his first administration Rasmussen gave Obama a +15 approval index, while today they're giving Trump a +2.
So on what basis do you reject Gallup and accept Rasmussen? Anything factual, anything at all?
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 52 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 2:55 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 56 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 3:53 PM Percy has replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


(1)
Message 55 of 710 (799954)
02-18-2017 3:44 PM
Reply to: Message 52 by Faith
02-18-2017 2:55 PM


So then let's compare the methodology of both.
I believe Rasmussen,
Because they consistently track more conservative than other polls and are the outliers in compilations of polls.
quote:
Methodology
For tracking surveys such as the 14-survey Election 2004 Survey Package, the automated technology insures that every respondent hears exactly the same question, from the exact same voice, asked with the exact same inflection every single time. A person taking our survey the week before the election will hear the exact same ballot question that another respondent heard six months earlier. this increases the reliability and comparative value of the tracking surveys.
The first step in any survey project is to design the study. For the Election 2004 Survey Package, we have designed a standard ballot portion of the survey including key demographics. Clients can add up to 10 custom questions per survey.
Following survey design, the Rasmussen Reports' questions are digitally recorded and fed to a calling program that determines question order, branching options, and other factors. Calls are placed to randomly-selected phone numbers through a process that insures appropriate geographic representation.
Sounds fair, but anyone who has done even a slight study of polling knows that the answers can be biased by the way the questions are asked and who gets asked. That's where the design of the study comes into play. They admit this:
quote:
Daily Presidential Tracking Poll
Some readers wonder how we come up with our job approval ratings for the president since they often don’t show as dramatic a change as some other pollsters do. It depends on how you ask the question and whom you ask.
Rasmussen Reports has been a pioneer in the use of automated telephone polling techniques, but many other firms still utilize their own operator-assisted technology (see methodology).
Bold for emphasis on where bias can be inserted into the polls, either intentionally or unintentionally.
Curiously I am having trouble finding even sample questions ... and if we can't review the questions we can't judge if they pre-bias the answers.
quote:
Evaluations of accuracy and performance
Criticism
FiveThirtyEight blog
In 2010, Nate Silver of The New York Times’ blog FiveThirtyEight ... went on to explore other factors which may have explained the effect such as the use of a likely voter model,[74] and claimed that Rasmussen conducted its polls in a way that excluded the majority of the population from answering.[75]
After the 2010 midterm elections, Silver concluded that Rasmussen's polls were the least accurate of the major pollsters in 2010, having an average error of 5.8 points and a pro-Republican bias of 3.9 points according to Silver's model.[64] ...
Obviously if you only ask likely republican voters or likely democrat voters the results will be different. If you ignore likely independent voters you are also building in a bias (democrats guilty here).
If you want to see how a badly (intentionally or not) designed survey uses highly biased questions see Mainstream Media Accountability Survey . Let me know if you don't see the bias.
Your turn.
Enjoy
Edited by RAZD, : No reason given.

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
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This message is a reply to:
 Message 52 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 2:55 PM Faith has not replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 56 of 710 (799955)
02-18-2017 3:53 PM
Reply to: Message 54 by Percy
02-18-2017 3:34 PM


As JonF said, I believe it because I like it; that is, my impression of how Trump is doing is a lot higher than Gallup's polled people, and my impression of the favorable comments on conservative talk shows is too-- forget anything left, a bunch of crybabies, flamethrowers and assassins, what a crowd -- and I don't trust ANYTHING in the "mainstream" including polls. Evidence, schmevidence, that can be faked too, very easily with polls.
Here I am sitting in the Coffee House, enjoying my macchiato, I'm happy to chat and compare notes but demanding evidence belongs somewhere else. IMHO.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 54 by Percy, posted 02-18-2017 3:34 PM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 57 by JonF, posted 02-18-2017 3:59 PM Faith has replied
 Message 58 by RAZD, posted 02-18-2017 4:11 PM Faith has replied
 Message 62 by Percy, posted 02-18-2017 4:47 PM Faith has replied

  
JonF
Member (Idle past 167 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


(1)
Message 57 of 710 (799956)
02-18-2017 3:59 PM
Reply to: Message 56 by Faith
02-18-2017 3:53 PM


Yep. Reality or truth doesn't enter into it. You like Trump, therefore everybody does.
Pathetic.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 56 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 3:53 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 59 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 4:11 PM JonF has replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


(2)
Message 58 of 710 (799957)
02-18-2017 4:11 PM
Reply to: Message 56 by Faith
02-18-2017 3:53 PM


As JonF said, I believe it because I like it; that is, my impression of how Trump is doing is a lot higher than Gallup's polled people, and my impression of the favorable comments on conservative talk shows is too-- ...
In other words you are only sampling a pro-Trump crowd and are amazed that they are pro-Trump. Fascinating.
Current estimates put that bubble population at 29% of the total American population.
Enjoy

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
RebelAmerican☆Zen☯Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.


Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 56 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 3:53 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 61 by Faith, posted 02-18-2017 4:42 PM RAZD has replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 59 of 710 (799958)
02-18-2017 4:11 PM
Reply to: Message 57 by JonF
02-18-2017 3:59 PM


No sweetie, not "everybody," I'm only too miserably aware of the Dishonorable Opposition I mentioned, who hate him and want him dead, and misrepresent everything he says and treat him with disgusting disrespect and word their "news" reports with denigrating language that the haters swallow uncritically. My side hated Obama with at least as much fervor but overall we let the American traditions work, we didn't try to kill him, we didn't try to burn down the country, we more or less politely let his supporters have their day. I merely have the impression that Trump hasn't lost favor as the poll suggests he has. And when I keep hearing that Twitter has been manipulated to show only negative responses to his tweets, sorry, I see that objectivity is gone gone gone from the American scene. The Left is plotting a coup or an assassination as we speak. Meanwhile Trump has been doing a great job considering the saboteurs attacking his every move.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 57 by JonF, posted 02-18-2017 3:59 PM JonF has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 68 by JonF, posted 02-18-2017 5:10 PM Faith has not replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 60 of 710 (799959)
02-18-2017 4:28 PM


Oh and those rowdy Townhall discussions. I wonder how many were taken in by that piece of Leftist theater. Unfortunately that sort of thing works with a lot of people. Golly gosh, maybe people really did like Obamacare. Well, the Left did, who knows why since it forced businesses to cut back on employees or hire only part-time, since it costs too much for the average person. It was astonishing to see those meetings with all that leftist style screaming and disruption being passed off as normal or even conservative opinion. The Left is just plotting and plotting and plotting, it's all designed to make things LOOK a certain way, make it look bad for trump, make it seem that most people really don't approve of his agenda. Media reports carry this lying crap, infiltrators are paid to create scenes and burn things down. And Trump is blamed for all of it. This is not America. Don't try to get me to believe your polls.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

  
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