Questionable NH Exit Poll question... (about Dean)

[reprehensor]

From Campaign Desk, cjr.org, January 27.
http://www.cjr.org/blog/archives/cat_distortion.asp#000063

"Most of the questions asked in the official exit poll for the New Hampshire primary today are routine: Are you liberal or conservative, black or white, male or female, and, by the way, how did you vote?

But then out of nowhere comes this sucker punch:

"Regardless of how you voted today, do you think Howard Dean has the temperament to serve effectively as president?"

No other questions about specific candidates were asked.

What's that about?

Reading from an official statement, a harried spokesperson for the National Election Pool, a consortium of ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, Fox and the AP that administered the poll, told Campaign Desk: "Dean's temperament has been much discussed throughout the campaign. He fell from a significant lead in New Hampshire. Did questions about his temperament after the Iowa speech contribute to that? The exit poll would be remiss if it didn't try to find out."

The spokeswoman stressed that because this was an exit poll, it wouldn't affect New Hampshire's results. She's wrong; the very existence of the question, first reported this afternoon by Howard Kurtz at WashingtonPost.com, could well sway late voters.

More important, what about South Carolinians, Missourians, Arizonans, and all the rest who have yet to vote? Even if few startled New Hampshire voters answer "no" to that loaded question, it seems certain to make news -- and to supply ammunition to Dean opponents.

Simply by tossing that stink bomb into the official exit poll, the networks and their consortium have blatantly inserted themselves as players, rather than reporters, in the Democratic primaries to come."

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

Thanks National Election Pool! Thanks a bunch! Jerks.

[Frances]

1. I was extremely offended by that question

It was totally inappropriate.

If they felt that they must include it, then they should have asked this question about all of the other candidates AND Bush.

[lancdem]

2. I agree it was a dumb question

but I doubt it swayed any voters.

[bushwakker]

3. inappropriate

more rw b.s.

[mrdmk]

4. This is what happens when you say "Media Caps"

This is a fact of life the media did not want the old media caps to stay at 35% of the nations viewing population. They attempted to keep this change at the FCC under the radar and now the media wants a 39% of the nations viewing population so CBS/Viacom and Fox/News Corp does not have sell 4% of their stations and the rest can pick up a few extra. This is Media Bull Shit, Kerry has stated no plans about the media and needs to called on it. These are public airwaves folks; we own them, not the corporations.

Also we need public accountability of the news, thus any news that is deceiving or designed to manipulate the public will cost the broadcaster their license. This will take some of the steam out of the propaganda machine.

[buycitgo]

6. absolutely correct! did you see Durbin talking about this yesterday?

he made exactly that point, and Dean's the one who's hit it hardest.

could THAT be why they're going after him hammer and tongs?

[mrdmk]

7. No, I did not buycitgo

:hi:

[buycitgo]

5. good one.......I got so mad I started a thread on that yesterday

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=206290&mesg_id=206290

in response to Cathie Levine's asinine defense, from a NON journalist who's looking into this very disturbing occurrence:

The more pressure we can bring to bear, the better. I think that the average American will be outraged by this kind of thing. It's bad enough when campaigns push-poll (and that is what this is - the argument about it coming after the vote is bullshit - there are lots of primaries left, and the talking heads will be flogging this data to death through all of them), but when the networks start doing it....I wonder, is there any oversigh at all left on the networks? I'll have to look into that too - both the FEC and the FCC.

this has already been personally investigated by someone...not a journalist, of course.

here's what he's found out so far, on his own......his words, his permission:

Update on the National Election Pool post.....

I just called them and spoke to a Larry Rosin. I told Larry I am a free-lance journalist ( I don't think I lied - if Cal Thomas is a journalist, so am I - after all, I'm reporting it right here...)living in Brisbane, Australia, and I asked him about the poll.

He hemmed and hawed and put me on hold 2x, then passed me off to Liz Doyle. I went through the explanation again and she started sputtering too, and made a comment about my not having an Aussie accent. I told her I was an American, and that my I would be happy to give her my phone number if she wanted to call me back and verify that I was in Brissie. She then put me on hold and when she came back, she told me that Larry Rosin was the person I needed to speak with. I told her that was fine, as I'd just been speaking to him.

When Larry came back on the line, I read him the question and had him confirm that it was A: on one of the two polls, and B: that the wording was reported correctly in the Howard Kurtz column. He confirmed both.

I then asked him how they came up with that particular question, and if they had asked similar questions about any other candidate. By this stage, I was almost feeling sorry for him - his voice was shaking and he couldn't get two words out without tripping over them.

He explained that they didn't actually decide what questions to ask, they just do the polling. I asked who came up with the questions. He told me the "pool" does, and began explaining which networks were in the pool. I asked if he could tell me which network, and if possible, who at that network had submitted that question. He said he didn't know, but that the questions had all come through Kathy Levine of ABC in New York.

I asked if he could tell me how to contact her and he refused to give me that information. I asked him if he had received any other calls on this yet, and he sounded even more panicked. He said they hadn't and asked me how I got their information. I told him I googled "National Election Pool" and bingo - there they were. He then asked me if they should expect more calls and I told him I'd seen their information posted on at least one left-leaning forum.

Now I'm off to see if I can find out how to contact Kathy Levine, and then I think I'll call Larry back and ask a few questions about what, if any, criteria they use to decide what is acceptable for polling questions - are there any policies in place? Is there any question you'd refuse to ask? etc.

But what I really want is to get Kathy Levine (Not sure of the K - could be a C - I'll have to find out from her...) on the phone and find out who came up with this question, who authorized it, etc.

nobody seems to care a whole lot about this, but you can be SURE that it's going to be used against whoever is the flavor of the day during the rest of the primaries; it also bodes VERY ill for what may happen, given similar circumstances next november