Monday, November 1, 2010

For Whom Will The Polls Toll?

------------------------------
'Do you ever get the feeling that the only reason we have elections is to find out if the polls were right?' -- Robert Orben

'Journalists should denounce government by public opinion polls.'
- Dan Rather

'A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls.'
- Dan Quayle

------------------------------

One of the better polls has made its last prediction before tomorrow's elections:

HOUSE: +55 R
SENATE: +8 R
GOVERNOR: +8-9 R

The accuracy of this forecast will be known soon enough, as will the plethora of other forgettable speculations.

While I applaud the remarkable advances in technology and techniques for creating, conducting and interpreting polls, the idea has now been thoroughly co-opted for crass propaganda purposes.

Imagine that!
------------------------------

'There is no well-defined boundary between honesty and dishonesty.  The frontiers of one blend with the outside limits of the other, and he who attempts to tread this dangerous ground may be sometimes in one domain and sometimes in the other.'  -- O. Henry, Rolling Stones, 1912

'The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.'  ~Thomas Jefferson

'


If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed.  If you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed.'  ~Author unknown, commonly attributed to Mark Twain or Thomas Jefferson

------------------------------