The ‘Bush Hate’ Influence

Real Clear Politics has been tracking Job Approval ratings for Dubya for quite a while now. While I disagree with their methodology, it can still be an interesting, if untrustworthy barometer for the political weather in D.C. (the District of Corruption).

The present numbers say Dubs is at 33.9% Job Approval. Pretty grim. But there’s a range in there worth noting. More to the point, look who is where.

First off, I personally reject as currently valid those polls which are more than 10 days old, so that gives us the following, revised, spread:

Rasmussen: 40%
Newsweek: 30%
Time: 37%
CNN: 34%
CBS News: 28%
NBC/Wall St Journal: 35%

OK, that’s 34.0%, which is about where RCP shows it, but look at the 12-point range between polls in that same period. Folks, that’s not very much of a consensus, especially when you have to add in the 3.5 +/- point margin of error. If these polls can claim to be accurate, there’s really a nineteen-point range of variance in poll positions. There’s a scientific term for that, but in plain English it means that at least some of these polls are worthless, absolutely not worth your trust.

Just another reminder that some folks in the media are quite willing to lie to you.

As a comment for anyone interested in digging into the details, neither Rasmussen nor Newsweek was willing to release the party identification of respondents along with their press release of the poll results. In the CBS News poll, Democrats polled outnumbered Republicans 444-292.

Just something else to think about.