Don't trust Strategic Vision's reported poll numbers

How likely is it that Strategic Vision LLC has just been making up the numbers it reports? The New York Times reports:

news organizations are rethinking their use of Strategic Vision’s numbers after the company was reprimanded [^* See below] last week by a professional association of pollsters for failing to disclose “essential facts” about its methods.
[...]
Strategic Vision was founded by Mr. Johnson and his wife, Laura Ward, as a Republican-leaning mom-and-pop public relations company in 2002. In 2004, the company branched out into polling, focusing on Senate and presidential races. One of its clients is the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice, based in Indiana, which supports the use of government vouchers to send children to private schools.

Like many of its competitors, Strategic Vision issued polls it said were self-financed, as a way of attracting attention and clients. The company was successful in part because its polling was prolific and was often among the earliest on a given race, like the one in which Ralph Reed, former executive director of the Christian Coalition, ran for lieutenant governor of Georgia in 2006.

Early on, questions were raised about how such a small firm could conduct so many self-financed polls, but Mr. Johnson, a frequent commentator on Fox News, said they accounted for the company’s entire marketing budget. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution repeatedly requested supporting documentation for the poll results but never received any, said James A. Mallory, senior managing editor. A spokeswoman for CNN said it had declined for years to use Strategic Vision’s polls.
[...]
The reprimand, by [^*] the American Association for Public Opinion Research, stemmed from an investigation it conducted after many polls showed Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton trailing in the run-up to the 2008 Democratic presidential primary in New Hampshire, where she went on to win. The association requested minimal information from 21 polling companies that, according to its professional guidelines, all polls should disclose, including sample size, response rate and polling dates.

Strategic Vision was the only company that did not provide the information, prompting a complaint filed with the association.

Let's see. New company. No track record. Based on a lot of publicity by the owner. Right-wing oriented. Refuses to provide sample size, response rate and polling dates which are minimal data for evaluating a sample poll.

That's a company to disbelieve whenever its name is associated with any poll.

They'll do something about this report quickly. My bet is that they will soon change the name of their company.

What is "Mainstream" America?

Kevin Drum lists the results from Washington Post polls on selected extremely important issues in an effort to determine what is really mainstream attitude today:

• 78% think George Bush is too unwilling to change policies in Iraq.
• 55% support legislation to withdraw from Iraq by next spring.
• 55% trust congressional Democrats on the war (only 32% trust Bush).
• 62% think Congress should have the final say about when to withdraw troops.
• 49% think Democrats have done too little to get Bush to change his Iraq policy (only 17% think they've done too much).

What this means is that there are two groups of extremists in America today. The first group is the Republican Party. The second group is the Washington, D.C. pundit corps.

The Democratic Party today represents mainstream American attitudes. The Republicans and the D.C. Pundits are the real extremists in America today.

Bush poll approaching lowest ever Presidential polls

Bush has dropped in the polls again, so that only Truman and Nixon are lower - and not by much.
This is from MSNBC:

2. Do you approve or disapprove of the way George W. Bush is handling his job as president?

Breakdown	Approve	Disapprove	Don't Know
Current Total	26%	65%	9%
Republicans	60%	25%	15%
Democrats	8%	87%	5%
Independents	20%	71%	9%

Trends

Dates	Approve	Disapprove	Don't Know
6/18-19/07	26%	65%	9%
5/2-3/07	28%	64%	8%
3/28-29/07	33%	60%	7%
3/14-15/07	30%	60%	10%
2/28-3/1/07	31%	61%	8%
1/24-25/07	30%	64%	6%
1/17-18/07	31%	62%	7%
12/6-7/06	32%	60%	8%
11/9-10/06	31%	63%	6%
11/2-3/06	35%	56%	9%
10/26-27/06	37%	53%	10%
10/19-20/06	35%	57%	8%
10/5-6/06	33%	59%	8%
8/24-25/06	36%	56%	8%
8/10-11/06	38%	55%	7%
5/11-12/06	35%	59%	6%
3/16-17/06%	36%	58%	6%
11/10-11/05	36%	58%	6%
9/29-30/05	40%	53%	7%
9/8-9/05	38%	55%	7%
8/2-4/05	42%	51%	7%
3/17-18/05	45%	48%	7%
2/3-4/05	50%	42%	8%
12/2-3/04	49%	44%	7%

Nixon got down to 23% just before he resigned, and Truman was at 22% in 1952. My bet is that Bush will continue to drop, and may plumb the depths not previously seen.

That's not is a difficult prediction considering that Bush is the worst American President ever.

Bush - Damned if he pardons Libby, Damned if he doesn't.

Bloomberg News reports that if Bush allows "Scooter" Libby to go to prison without pardoning him on his two-and-a-half year sentence then he will face a revolt by his core base. Those are the only support he currently has as President.

But if he does Pardon Libby before his prison sentence starts, then he will "violate Justice Department guidelines, alienate much of the public and run the risk of cover-up charges."

A Cable News Network/Opinion Research survey conducted after Libby's conviction found that 69 percent of respondents opposed a pardon while 18 percent favored it. At the same time, a pro-Libby firestorm is being fanned by self-described conservative bloggers and talk-radio hosts, and many conservative leaders are asking the president to step in. [Snip]

"It tells you what a deep, dark, dank un-spinnable hole Bush is in when he has to pardon a guy to appease 30 percent of the country," said Democratic strategist Chris Lehane, a former aide to Vice President Al Gore.

A pardon might also raise fresh questions about whether Libby had been acting at the request of his superiors. "I think he sort of took one for the team," said [Paul] Weyrich, [head of the Washington-based Free Congress Foundation, a small-government educational group.]

Bush already has the lowest poll ratings as President since Nixon the last few weeks before he resigned. Whatever he decides, his polls can only go lower.

Even now Bush was unable to get the Republican Party to get his Immigration Bill through the Congress. His Presidency is over but has 20 months left to run. His legacy will be the unnecessary preemptive invasion and badly botched occupation of Iraq. He still will obstruct whatever he can, though, so the U.S. is in for a long period on Automatic pilot.

ABC News Poll explains why Bush gets nothing done.

The latest ABC News Poll shows what the public think of Bush. It's not good.

Feb. 26, 2007 — A record number of Americans disapprove of the war in Iraq, and a clear majority now favors the eventual withdrawal of U.S. forces, even if civil order has not been restored there — potentially a tipping point in public attitudes on the war.

While solutions remain vexing, for the first time ABC News/Washington Post polls show a narrow majority of Americans support setting a deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. Two-thirds oppose George W. Bush's troop surge; most oppose it strongly. [Snip]

While rooted in Iraq, Bush's problems with credibility and confidence reach beyond it. Sixty-three percent of Americans don't trust the administration to convey intelligence reports on potential threats from other countries honestly and accurately. And 58 percent lack confidence, specifically, in its ability to handle current tensions with Iran.

This means that Bush has lost the American Voters' confidence in the one thing he can legally do without much help from Congress - foreign Affairs.

Religion, Culture not cause of violence in ME

Interesting poll here. The Program on International Policy Attitudes polls world-wide on various issues and periodically issues reports. The one I found particularly interesting is the worldwide poll asking whether violent conflict is inevitable between Islam and the West.

(The questions and methodology are found here.)

This was a "...survey of over 28,000 respondents across 27 countries conducted for the BBC World Service by the international polling firm GlobeScan together with the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) at the University of Maryland....between November 2006 and January 2007."

This poll is obviously questioning whether worldwide public opinion and current events supports the thesis of Samuel P. Huntington's book:

Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order

Dr. Huntington proposes that the clash beteen the West and the Islamic Middle East will result in a violent confrontation.

The result of the poll is that worldwide opinions do not support Huntington.

"The global public believes that tensions between Islam and the West arise from conflicts over political power and interests and not from differences of religion and culture, according to a BBC World Service poll across 27 countries. [Snip]

"The poll also reveals that most people see the problems arising from intolerant minorities and not the cultures as a whole. While 26 percent believe fundamental differences in cultures are to blame, 58 percent say intolerant minorities are causing the conflict – with most of these (39% of the full sample) saying that the intolerant minorities are on both sides.

"The idea that violent conflict is inevitable between Islam and the West is mainly rejected by Muslims, non-Muslims and Westerners alike. While more than a quarter of all respondents (28%) think that violent conflict is inevitable, twice as many (56%) believe that “common ground can be found.”

Since modern conservatives are right-wing authoritarians driven largely by fear of strangers and those who are different, they have clearly bought into Dr. Huntington's thesis.

Fortunately the majority of the rest of the world does not agree with them. Once our NeoCons and Authoritarians are out of office, that should make finding workable solutions to the problems in Iraq, Iran, and the rest of the Middle East a lot easier.

Note that I said "should", not "will." There is inherent uncertainty in this future set of solutions, and that uncertainty is part of what sets our right-wing Authoritarians and NeoCons off into fear, panic and anger. That's why they must be removed from the decision centers of American foreign policy.

Want specific names? Dick Cheney first, G.W. Bush second, and John Bolton has already been sent packing. The entire Cheney cabal, as described by Larry Wilkinson is part of our American foreign policy problem. It's a shame we can't have a coup, round them all up and throw them into prison. But that's what they'd like to do to us, and it is inherently undemocratic and unAmerican, so we don't do it. But I wonder if Patrick Fitzgerald would be interested in another Special Prosecutor job?

[Ah, fantasies, fantasies. When I was younger, my fantasies were restricted to supermodels and intelligent gorgeous actresses - Helena Bonham Carter? Laura San Giacomo? Why are political fantasies now clouding my horizons? Sensless, sensless.]