From: crb2@Ra.MsState.Edu (Chad R. Berthelson)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.bush,alt.politics.elections,alt.fan.dan-quayle
Subject: Anyone else notice the polls?  (MEDIA BIAS)
Date: 16 Oct 92 15:28:49 GMT
Organization: Mississippi State University

I, being very interested in the politics of the season, have
been trying to 'watch the polls' and get especially interested
after a big media event (debate).  I watch five national news
programs to see if the polls are shown.  The last set of polls
that I saw was the day after the 1st presidential debate, and
they generally agreed with each other (Clinton was 14-15 points
ahead of Bush, with Perot lagging at 10-11%).  Since that day
and especially since the VP debate, the only polls I have seen
are 'who won the debate' type, no 'who would you vote for today'
ones.  

Last night I saw NBC, CBS, Headline News, all of which said
something to the effect of 'Clinton's people are confident
because he is going into this debate with a 'double digit' lead.

THEN I turned to ABC (who started a graph the day Perot reentered
of poll results, but havent' shown it in a week) showed the graph,
albeit only for about 5 second.  It showed:

		Clinton 44%
		Bush    37%
		Perot   11%

which means that going into the debate, at least by ABC's poll
Clinton only lead by HALF what he did a week earlier and NOT
a 'double digit' lead.

I saw the general trend down on the clinton line and the general
up on the bush line were about the same day, was that the VP
debate? or did I miss something?

The funniest thing about the whole ordeal (more funny than
noone even reporting what going the other way would have been
seen in a drastic movement in the polls) was the commentator
said (as the graph popped up briefly) that other polls
probably differ, but this is what ABC found, and to remember
that with a 4% margin of error the Clinton lead could be as 
much as 13%!  My immediate thought was 'now that's grabbing
for air!', because the 4% error ALSO means that Bush oculd
be in the lead!  Sheez...the news is really turning into
a no-holds barred, we're gonna do anything it takes to get
Clinton elected, silly looking group.

I think it was Clinton's advisor (James Cam..??) that told
one of them last night that 'people don't need you to tell
them what to think about what the candidates said, they
heard the questions and answers just like you did' and 
another person on c-span (a caller) responded to a media
guy (who had just said that the reason they told people
what had just happened was that they 'could add insight'
to what was said) by telling him that if he and the
rest of the media was that much smarter than the rest of 
the Americans, maybe we should change the system so only
they could vote..that would keep us stupid people out
of the process....

I think anyone who could watch the major networks and not
see some bias is really out there, farther than the buses
go.

Chad

--

Chad R. Berthelson		Graduate Research/Teaching Assistant
crb2@ra.msstate.edu		Biological Engineering
cberth@abe.msstate.edu		Mississippi State University
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