{"id":11557,"date":"2013-04-05T09:18:18","date_gmt":"2013-04-05T16:18:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/?p=11557"},"modified":"2013-04-05T09:18:18","modified_gmt":"2013-04-05T16:18:18","slug":"toward-a-better-polling-analysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/2013\/04\/05\/toward-a-better-polling-analysis\/","title":{"rendered":"toward a better polling analysis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Your polls of stupid things believed by peopl<\/a>e.<\/p>\n

There is a lot of money going into the “Global Warming Hoax” claim, so from a marketing point of view that one is a little like pointing out that people know the visual landscape of the logos for big corporations and don’t really know the visual landscape of types of trees around them.<\/p>\n

13% of voters think Barack Obama is the anti-Christ, including 22% of Romney voters<\/em>.
\nThere is a way in which some conspiracy theory “agree” pollings are just assertations of vehemint oppostion. \u00c2\u00a0This also goes to to the percentage of Democrats who were polled with 9\/11 Conspiracy theories — and I will also note there was always a bit of wiggle room within some questions. \u00c2\u00a0 [What does it mean “the US government allowed 9\/11 to happen<\/em>“… which, is true to some extent by definition.]\u00c2\u00a0But I think nothing might be moreso than asking if you think the President is the anti-Christ. \u00c2\u00a0I have no way of digging into these 13 percents and 22 percent figures. \u00c2\u00a0The more interesting number would be the percentage of Obama voters who think Obama is the anti-Christ.<\/p>\n

A bemused comment to one poll:
\n“15% of voters say the government or the media adds mind-controlling technology to TV broadcast signals (the so-called Tinfoil Hat crowd)”<\/em>
\nThis technology is commonly known as “commercials”.<\/em><\/p>\n

And two figures to poke at.
\nJust 5% of voters believe that Paul McCartney actually died in 1966
\n4% of voters say they believe \u00e2\u20ac\u0153lizard people\u00e2\u20ac\u009d control our societies by gaining political power.<\/p>\n

The “Paul McCartney died” poll doesn’t really have any repercussions in terms of politics — that I know of. \u00c2\u00a0(Also a yes answer might be a method to shout “Woot” to the Beatles, so I don’t know if this poll means anything.) \u00c2\u00a0But the 4 percent of voters casting their lot for Lizard People — this being the “David Icke” crowd. \u00c2\u00a0A thing about this figure. \u00c2\u00a0If you believe Lizard People control our societies — what’s the point of voting? \u00c2\u00a0The more interesting polling date might be to see what percentage of people who believe Lizard People control our society … \u00c2\u00a0vote.<\/p>\n

Here’s some more data points, which an Allison Morris requested I share here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Question number one… “Who is President Obama’s nominee for Secretary of State”. \u00c2\u00a0A basic problem with this multiple choice poll… if I were to do it, I would throw in Chuck Hagel for the simple reason that he had been selected as Secretary of Defense, and I believe that the two stories would cross-current and lower the “correctly identify as Kerry” number a tad.
\nAlso why does that John Kerry look like Michael Dukakis in the tank?<\/p>\n

No, I’m not terribly surprised people don’t know Elizabeth Warren. \u00c2\u00a0I would not be able to identify Syria on the map in a blind test I’m afraid, but I’d likely get this test answer right. \u00c2\u00a0 I may add that if you threw me these infographics instead of a photo, I wouldn’t blame anyone for not getting the names right. \u00c2\u00a0(See Kerry too… and Boehner is not sufficiently orange in complexion.)
\nDid the test-makers just toss in Texas on the Same Sex Marriage questionaire to get a “stupid” percentage, and why didn’t it include for the “circuit crossing” effect a state like, say, Massachusetts?<\/p>\n

My biggest take away from this is the Lizard People question, by the way. \u00c2\u00a0No, really… I want to know what percentage of Lizard People people vote, and what the Lizard People voters base their voting choices on. \u00c2\u00a0(It’s a bit like the “two party duoploy”, but without the suggestion of a lesser of two evils.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Your polls of stupid things believed by people. There is a lot of money going into the “Global Warming Hoax” claim, so from a marketing point of view that one is a little like pointing out that people know the visual landscape of the logos for big corporations and don’t really know the visual landscape […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11557","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11557"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11557\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11560,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11557\/revisions\/11560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}