:: Friday, April 09, 2004 ::

CNN's Meaningless Polls

The results for this really ineffectual CNN poll were split exactly 50/50 when first checked.



No wonder, there are just too many ways to intepret it:

• Yes, it's what I expected - we're doing fine, just hang in there.
• Yes, we're in a quagmire as predicted before we ever went into Iraq.
• No, we're doing better than expected. This recent violence just represents the last ditch attempts of a defeated enemy on its way out.
• No, we're doing worse than I expected. I thought we'd have this wrapped up a long time ago and be having elections by now.

Whether the percentages change or not is irrelevent. The question is so vaguely worded that it makes the results essentially meaningless.

The poll on the CNN International site is a little more straight forward:



And the results? 34% Yes, 66% No when last checked.

Insert the usual boilerplate about the inaccuracy of such polls here.

It's fascinating to watch how these polls differ on CNN's U.S. versus International sites. Sometimes, they have the same poll. And the results can be radically different on the U.S. site versus the European site. Sometimes, they have the same poll, only slightly reworded, but effectively spinning the poll in a different direction for the audience. And often the polls are entirely unrelated.

:: Unknown 8:16 PM | [+] ::
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