Pignanelli: A political veteran described the county mayor controversy with, "We Republicans have been waiting the last two months for the next shoe to drop. What we didn't know is that Nancy Workman was a centipede!" As a former Democratic Party officer and House minority meader, I wrestled numerous times with issues regarding colleagues and elected officials who violated the public trust and needed to be reprimanded or even ostracized. Thus, I empathize with Salt Lake County Republicans and their recent heart-wrenching and difficult deliberations. All Utahns, regardless of party affiliation, are grateful the GOP took needed action against Workman. Democracy only works if the public has confidence that no politician is above the law.
• The now raging inferno at the House of Workman is burning everyone nearby. A recent victim is Workman's attorney, Greg Skordas, the Democratic attorney general candidate. Skordas is one of the best criminal lawyers in the state, who vigorously represents his clients. Defending Workman required Skordas to publicly question the motives of longtime friend and former employer District Attorney David Yocom. Angered by Skordas' tactics, Yocom pulled his endorsement of Skordas. This is no small matter as Yocom was a leading supporter on the campaign Web site and chaired Skordas' candidacy announcement. Democratic insiders are now expressing concern the Workman case is consuming Skordas' time and hobbling his campaign efforts.


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• The hottest story circulating among political pundits this week was the incredible coup achieved by Mike Zuhl, campaign manager for Scott Matheson Jr. Two weeks ago, the Salt Lake Tribune completed a poll on the governor's race, showing a phenomenal 16 point lead for Jon Huntsman Jr. Learning of these results, Zuhl confronted the Tribune with an internal campaign poll illustrating the candidates were tied with 42 percent each. The Matheson survey was conducted by Peter Hart, a nationally renowned pollster not easily dismissed. Nervous about such different outcomes, the Tribune withheld publishing their poll last weekend (a strange and unprecedented action).
The Tribune's departure from tradition is significant because media outlets always utilize their own political analysis because they control the quality of methodology, questions, respondents etc. Polls conducted by campaigns can be easily manipulated (shocking!) and are usually rejected by reporters. Realizing the Deseret Morning News was about to print their poll, the Tribune was forced to run the story on Wednesday. Politicos noted the Tribune did not perform the standard feature of providing dates when the survey was conducted, verifying the Matheson poll had prompted the Tribune to stall.

The Deseret Morning News poll, conducted by the well-respected Dan Jones, shows Huntsman leading by 9 points. Because of his enormous local polling experience, most authorities believe Jones is closer to the mark. Thus, Huntsman is leading, but the gubernatorial election is still up for grabs.

Webb: Weird Polls. For better or for worse, survey research is becoming a bigger part of campaigns and news media political coverage in every election cycle. We're inundated by polls and, as Frank suggests, we've recently witnessed some pretty strange survey numbers.

The three recent gubernatorial polls, showing wildly divergent results, obviously can't all be accurate. The Tribune poll, done by Valley Research, gave Huntsman a 16-point lead. On the other extreme, the candidates were dead even, 42-42, in the Matheson campaign poll, done by GarinHartYang. That's a hefty difference. The Morning News' Dan Jones & Associates survey came out in the middle, with Huntsman up nine points.

So who is right? I 'd throw out both polls on the extremes and go with Jones. The Hart poll had some strange wrinkles, and sometimes out-of-state firms, even good ones, don't understand Utah political nuances, and they draw a bad sample.

The Valley Research Poll is hard to figure. Another question on the same survey had Initiative 1 losing, while at least three other polls have shown the initiative ahead by wide margins. (Disclosure: My firm, the Exoro Group, is supporting the initiative.) I don't believe either the Tribune or Valley Research was trying to skew anything, but I wouldn't trust that particular poll.

Any survey is just a snapshot in time, and circumstances can change quickly. Voters need to be smart consumers of political news, including survey results. Read widely, don't accept everything at face value, and consult with people you trust.

County Mayor. The final three weeks in the county mayoral race will be great political theater. Democrat Peter Corroon, by default as much as anything else, is clearly the frontrunner at this point, even though he hasn't defined himself very well. Republicans have their white knight in Ellis Ivory, but he's dragging a big weight into battle in the form of Nancy Workman.

Workman apparently won't campaign actively, but she'll get some percentage, maybe 10 to 12, of the vote just by being on the ballot and saying she's in the race. That might be enough to doom Ivory in a four-way contest. He already faces the near-impossible task of raising his profile, getting his messages out, and distributing stickers to Republican voters across the county in a very short time.

For the Republicans, Ivory's chances are about as good as a Hail Mary pass from the 50-yard line as time runs out on the clock.

Workman doesn't want to be a quitter, so instead she's going to be a spoiler. On top of everything else, that's not a great political legacy. She should come to her senses and announce she's absolutely out of the race and throw her support behind Ivory.

__________________
Cussing out low class inbreds isnt uninteligent, its honest

Good typing is not inteligent its dexiteritous.

Everything you just said is total bullshit

Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-V8Ek...eature=related

Evaluating Public Opinion Polls



Polls may look convincing yet be completely worthless
Public opinion is subjective and can change rapidly.
Consequently, polls sometimes produce conflicting or meaningless results, even when they are carefully written and presented by professional interviewers to scientifically chosen samples.
Pollsters can also set up surveys that deliberately shade the truth.
Four simple questions can separate the good polls from the trash.
Did they ask leading or biasing questions?
A leading question is one that leads the respondent to choose one response over another by its wording.
Leading questions are actually statements disguised as questions, and make respondents feel that only one response is legitimate.
For example: "Don't you agree that the look and feel of user interfaces should not fall under copyright protection?"
Prestige bias occurs when a statement, position, or response is associated with a prestigious person or group. Respondents may answer on the basis of their feelings toward the person of group rather than addressing the issue.
For example, a survey might state, "According to recent Gallup polls, 80 percent of the people support granting china Most Favored Nation Status. What is your opinion on this issue?"
This way of stating the position of a professional organization might easily sway people.
Did they ask the Right People?
Response bias
In 1936, the editors of Literary Digest conducted a Presidential preference poll of more than 2 million Americans.
The poll predicted that the Republican candidate, Alf Landon, would defeat Franklin Roosevelt.
Landon's loss made the Digest history's most famous victim of sample bias.
The Digest mailed more than 10 million ballots to households listed in telephone books and automobile registration records.
Might create a relatively representative sample today
In 1936, it substantially biased the sample toward those affluent enough to own cars and phones.
George Gallup and Elmo Roper used samples of a few thousand people to predict a Roosevelt win. Gallup and Roper carefully chose their samples to reflect a demographic cross-section of Americans
Some journalists and businesses today still make the mistakes the Literary Digest made 60 years ago.
The temptation to take a biased poll is great if you have a tight deadline and a small budget, as many news organizations do
Also, often produces "surprising" results, stimulating interest.
Non-response bias: Even when you start out with a representative sample, you could end up with a biased one.
Readers of women's magazines are frequently asked to fill out surveys on weighty subjects like crime and sexual behavior
Ignore the opinions of nonreaders
Biased toward readers who take the trouble to fill out and return the questionnaire, usually at their own expense.
Television news and entertainment shows post toll-free or even toll numbers that viewers can call to "vote" on an issue
These samples are biased in the same way
They are also prone to "ballot-stuffing" by enthusiasts. In other words, viewers who call 12 times get 12 votes.
Poll results based on "convenience" samples can be wildly misleading, even if the sample sizes are huge.
A call-in poll conducted by a television network in 1983 asked: "Should the United Nations continue to be based in the United States?"
About 185,000 calls were received.
Two-thirds said that the U.N. should move.
At the same time, the network conducted a random-sample poll of 1,000 people, and only 28 percent said the U.N. should move.
Systematic "intentional" biasing
Conflicts make news. When journalists are trying to liven up a boring political story, they need angry, well-informed citizens
This is one reason why older men may be quoted more often than other groups.
Those aged 50 and older are more likely than younger adults to follow news stories "very closely," and men are more likely than women to follow stories about war, business, sports, and politics.
Two-thirds of regular listeners to political talk radio programs are men, according to a 1996 poll taken by Roper Starch Worldwide for the Media Studies Center in New York City.
Republicans outnumber Democrats three to one in the talk-radio audience, and 89 percent of listeners are white, compared with the national average for voters of 83 percent
Three in five regular listeners to political talk radio perceive a liberal bias in the mainstream media, compared with one in five nonlisteners.
Do not be confuse this with normal sampling error
For example, the CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll of January 5-7, 1996, showed that the proportion of Americans who approved of President Clinton's performance had dropped to 42 percent, from 51 percent on December 15-18, 1995.
Polls conducted that same week by Washington Post/ABC and New York Times/CBS showed that his approval rating was 53 percent and 50 percent, respectively. This made for a few wild days at the White House, until the next Gallup survey showed a sudden rebound.
Reputable surveys report a margin of error-usually of 3 or 4 percentage points-at a particular confidence level-typically 95 percent
This means that 5 percent of the time, or 1 time in 20, the poll's results will not be reliable.
The other 95 percent of the time, it is within 3 or 4 percentage points of the "truth." This sort of inevitable statistical problem explains the blip in the January Gallup poll.
Which questions came first?
The order in which questions are asked can have a big effect on the results.
In late May 1996, the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll reported that 55 percent of Americans believe taxes can be cut and the federal deficit reduced at the same time, compared with 39 percent who do not believe this.
The same week, New York Times/CBS reported a dead heat of 46 percent who believe and 46 percent who do not.
This variance was way beyond the margin of error.
The questions were almost identical in their wording
But the order of questions in the Gallup poll may have biased the results
In the CBS poll, questions before the tax cut/deficit question were not related to the subject
Gallup first asked respondents if they favor a tax cut. Then it asked those who did if they would still favor it even if it meant no reduction in the deficit. Then it asked all respondents if they believed both could be done at the same time. By that point, "some of Gallup's interviewees may have felt invested in the idea of a tax cut
Most people want to appear consistent to others and to be consistent in their own minds.
When a pollster asks a series of related questions, this desire can lead people to take positions they might not have taken if they were asked only one question.
What was the question?
Question wording is extremely subtle.
In the hours after President Clinton's November 27, 1995, speech announcing that 20,000 U.S. troops would be sent to Bosnia as part of a NATO peace-keeping mission, three major news organizations took reaction polls. CNN/USA
Today/Gallup found that 46 percent of Americans favored Clinton's plan, while 40 percent were opposed.
CBS found that only 33 percent were in favor, and 58 percent were opposed
ABC said that 39 percent were in favor, and 57 percent were opposed.
The CNN poll was probably more in favor because it did not mention that the U.S. was sending 20,000 troops
CBS and ABC gave respondents the chance to react to that substantial number, which drove down their approval.
In addition, CBS described the troops' mission as "enforcing the peace agreement," while ABC and CNN described the troops as part of "an international peace-keeping force."
CBS's harsher wording may have contributed to its respondents' harsher judgment of the Clinton decision.
Sometimes words are problematic because they are too vague
In April 1996, the Pew Research Center asked which Presidential candidate was best described by the phrase: "shares my values."
By this measure, Clinton beat Dole by 47 percent to 37 percent
But when CBS and the New York Times asked whether each candidate "shares the moral values most Americans try to live by," 70 percent said that Dole did, but only 59 percent said so of Clinton

__________________
Cussing out low class inbreds isnt uninteligent, its honest

Good typing is not inteligent its dexiteritous.

Everything you just said is total bullshit

Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-V8Ek...eature=related