SLANTED Media - I'm SICK of it

[DemoRabbit]

My husband comes home from work and tells me "what do you mean we shouldn't worry about NY... McCain and Obama are TIED"...

I nearly spit out my spaghetti when he said it... and demanded he tell me where he read it...

He looked up "Obama New York" on Google News... and here's the results...



When you actually CLICK on the link http://www.newsday.com/news/local/politics/ny-stpoll0916,0,964790.story
the headline is:

"McCain closing gap on Obama in NY poll"

When you actually READ the article... you see...

"Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic nominee, leads Sen. John McCain, the Republican nominee, 46 percent to 41 percent in a survey of 626 registered voters by the Siena Research Institute in upstate Loudonville. The survey, conducted last week, had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points."

WTF? 600 people in rural upstate NY?

I am SO sick of the media reporting shit this way... Let me tell you, it is HARD to remain optimistic when you read all the crap they say about the polls, and it's even WORSE when they are deliberately misleading!

[endarkenment]

1. SRI might be in upstate

rather than the people they surveyed. However, +- 3.9 me is less than the spread, so the statement 'statistical tie' is a flat out lie.

[DemoRabbit]

4. Could be, but 626 is a joke compared to the population

Some areas of NY are heavily republican... no one can deny that... but I'd really like to see other polls.

[Berry Cool]

5. If the sampling is done properly, the small sample size doesn't matter.

What matters is, how representative is it?

And yes, the research institute itself is in Loudonville. They're not saying they polled 600-odd people in Loudonville.

On edit: But, if you include the margin of error, it's a tie anyway. The lead is misleading if it implies one or the other is ahead when the results are a 46-41 with a margin of error of 3.9.

[Bippity Boo]

2. Talk about slanted...

Did you catch the part of the Obama/McCain 9/11 "service" appearance where the "moderator" asked Obama if the college they were speaking in should allow the ROTC to recruit on campus since they allowed the leader of Iran to speak there? The two things have nothing to do with each other. The leader of Iran is not recruiting anyone to join the military! Talk about loaded questions. Then afterwards when Obama agreed to this hypothesis so as not to appear "unpatriotic," the slogan ran across the bottom of the screen: "OBAMA: ROTC SHOULD BE ALLOWED ON CAMPUS." Ugh.

[DemoRabbit]

3. I hear ya

It's gotten REALLY annoying. I used to augh everytime I heard one of the republicans say it's a "liberal media"... now I just get PISSED. The last 24 hours I keep hearing how McCain is lying so badly, "but Obama is too"... and I'm like HUH???