The dumbest poll ever

The headline in USA Today reads: "Bush tops 'most admired' poll."

But that isn't exactly what the story says. The poll actually shows that President Bush and former President Bill Clinton are statistically tied as the most admired men. (Bush is the choice of 10 percent of respondents, and Clinton gets 8 percent. The poll has a margin of error of 3 percentage points, so Bush and Clinton are tied.)

Of course, the whole exercise is stupid. Sitting U.S. presidents, no matter how low their overall approval ratings, almost always come out at or near the top in these "most admired" polls. With nine out of every 10 respondents choosing somebody other than the so-called winner, the effort is rightly regarded as a waste of time.

And what are we to make of Hillary Clinton garnering six times as many votes as Laura Bush for the title of most admired woman? We should make nothing of it -- or of anything else having to do with this ridiculous poll.

Zogby poll on Hillary smells fishy

Zogby International is out with a poll purporting to show that Hillary Clinton is trailing each of the five top Republican presidential hopefuls -- a finding sharply at odds with the results of a Gallup poll.

The difference seems to be attributable to the fact that the Zogby poll was conducted online, a notoriously unreliable method of measuring public opinion.

It's understandable that right-wing bloggers would tout the Zogby numbers, but it's irresponsible of the mainstream media to follow suit.

Details on the matter can be found here.

POSTSCRIPT: These results from a Gallup poll (conducted by time-tested methods) show both Clinton and Barack Obama faring well in matchups against Republican candidates. (Be sure to check all four pages by clicking at the bottom of each.)

POSTSCRIPT II: Greg Sargent's comparison of the Zogby and Gallup polls is here.

Do Americans suddenly smell victory in Iraq?

There's a new USA TODAY/Gallup poll showing that 65 percent of Americans think the U.S. military surge in Iraq has not made any positive difference or has made matters worse, and that two-thirds of respondents want U.S. troops withdrawn by next April 1, and that 57 percent think the U.S. invasion of Iraq was a mistake to begin with.

You'd think those numbers would be discouraging to the die-hard war hawks, wouldn't you? Well, that's not necessarily the case. Some of them, in fact, are so delighted that the military surge is slightly more popular in this poll than in the last one that they're willing to hail the survey results as a massive sea-change in public opinion.

This blogger, for example, says Americans "don't want to leave Iraq because they know leaving Iraq--no matter how it is dressed up by Democrats--is defeat." Never mind that the poll shows that two of every three Americans do, in fact, want to leave Iraq.

This guy says the surge is "gaining support...and now Gallup is showing movement towards finishing the job."

Finishing the job? Buddy, you've been watching too many John Wayne movies. It's not a simple matter of macho bluster. The job is far from being finished, perhaps impossibly far.

Just the other day, Admiral Mike Mullen, President Bush's nominee for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, painted a less than rosy picture of the situation in Iraq in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Mullen said the Iraqi government has not made much progress toward the political settlement of differences between the Shiite Muslim majority and the Sunni minority. He said that without such a settlement, victory in Iraq is impossible, no matter how many troops we send there or how they long they stay.

Mullen also said the surge can't be sustained beyond April of next year, given current strains on personnel resources.

Since the admiral made those remarks, six Sunni cabinet ministers have said they'll boycott future meetings of the Iraqi government, thereby deepening the country's political crisis.

Meanwhile, four more U.S. troops have been killed, raising to 19 the death toll among Americans in the first six days of August. Iraq's power grid is on the brink of collapse. Violent Shiite militias are filling the void in southern Iraq created by the pullout of British troops. And 60 decomposing bodies were discovered Monday in a mostly Sunni area near Baquoba.

Still, some of the war hawks misread the polls and conclude that Americans suddenly can sense that victory in Iraq is just around the corner.

Sure it is. We just have to be willing to sacrifice more of our sons and daughters for the cause.

Dr. Frank is here

Dr. Frank Newport of the Gallup Poll pays us a visit today to show us the new depths to which President Bush's approval ratings have sunk.

Even one in every three Republicans gives the Great Decider a thumbs down.

Dr. Frank's here with disturbing news

The latest Gallup Poll shows that most Republicans don't believe in evolution.

Yipes! Even The Rascal didn't think the situation was that bad.

Gallup's Dr. Frank Newport has the numbers here.

Dr. Frank is here

If you had 15 minutes with President Bush in the Oval Office what would you tell him to do about Iraq?

That's the question the Gallup Poll put to the American people in recent days. Very few respondents said they would recommend that Bush pursue his present course. The rest, in one way or another, want the troops withdrawn.

Gallup's Dr. Frank Newport has the numbers right here.

Gay bashers aren't in the mainstream

For months now, the so-called pro-family crowd and various so-called Christian leaders have been howling to high heaven about the specter of legislation that would expand the federal hate crime law to cover sexual orientation.

The House already has approved such a measure (without, not surprisingly, support from Republican Rep. Don Manzullo), and the Senate is considering a similar bill. President Bush, however, is threatening a veto.

But the Gallup Poll is out today with numbers indicating that more than two-thirds of Americans -- including solid majorities of self-described Republicans, Christians and conservatives -- are in favor of the legislation. It's good to see that rank-and-file Christians generally are defying their "leaders" on this issue.

Read the numbers here, and check this video report from Gallup's Dr. Frank Newport.

Good morning, Frank

Frank Newport, the Gallup Poll dude, is here with the latest numbers on what you folks out there think about our glorious adventure in Iraq.

Oh, yeah?

I heard some caller this afternoon on WNTA Radio in Rockford claim that 88 percent of Americans want illegal immigrants out of the country, period.

That doesn't exactly jibe with the latest Gallup Poll, which you can check out on this video.