polls

Good Ethics News, But Not Much More Than That

/ Jack Marshall / 19 Comments

I take some solace from the Wall Street Journal poll that shows Nicky Haley clobbering Joe Biden in a hypothetical 2024 election. It is the strong evidence I have been searching for that a healthy majority of the public recognize what an epic disaster the Biden administration has been.

Seeing the accumulating polls elsewhere showing Biden trailing Trump by a couple of percentage points here and four or so there, I felt like Hillary, in one of her many pathetic 2016 campaign ploys, asking how it was possible that she wasn’t far ahead of Donald Trump, given the undeniable fact that he was, well, you know, Donald Trump. The WSJ poll (which gives Trump just a 4-point advantage over Biden, 47-43) restores a bit of my faith in the civic competence of the American people. Haley isn’t a particular impressive alternative, but she has executive experience, can put a coherent sentence together, is well short of retirement age, and appears capable of learning. All of this makes her infinitely preferable to Biden or Trump. She is, as I have pointed out before, a weasel whose integrity is dubious at best, and has not displayed enough of the kind of character traits that I believe a trustworthy leader must have in abundance, but if it’s her, Biden or Trump, the choice should be easy. A substantial number of my fellow Americans agree.

This is good. The American public, those with a firm grip on reality and some sense of self-preservation, apparently know that electing either Biden or Trump for another four years is a blind leap into the abyss, hoping to land on a ledge or find a branch to hang onto. Unfortunately, the poll is a) just a poll and b) doesn’t matter as long as Republicans, who get to choose the nominee, are dominated by Trump cultists impermeable to common sense.

Moreover if, by some amazing confluence of good luck and random events along with a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon rainforest, Haley were to prevail over Trump, it is nearly guaranteed that this destructive narcissist would run a third party campaign emulating the 1912 Teddy Roosevelt tantrum that gave the nation its most destructive POTUS since George mapped out a workable template. Trump would throw the election to Biden out of spite. Do you doubt that? Does anyone?

He’s the Once and Future Asshole.

Well, who knows—chaos theory and the fickle finger of fate (Cultural reference pop-quiz!) may have surprises in store. At least the poll provides evidence that most of the public realize how awful the Democratic reign has been. They also realize just how unpleasant—I’m choosing my words carefully—another four years of Trump will be, especially after progressives have been programed to believe he’ll be emulating Pol Pot.

It’s a good news/bad news joke. Not a particularly funny one, though.

Ethics Reflections On The “Shocking” Times/Siena Poll [Expanded…and Expanded Again]

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

Yes, The Horror! New polls by The New York Times and Siena College imply that if the 2024 election were held today between the two most likely candidates of the two major parties, President Biden would lose to Donald Trump by margins of 3 to 10 percentage points among registered voters in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania, five of the so-called “swing states,” with Biden only leading in Michigan. That projects Trump winning at least 300 electoral votes.

Says the Times about its own poll,

Discontent pulsates throughout the Times/Siena poll, with a majority of voters saying Mr. Biden’s policies have personally hurt them. The survey also reveals the extent to which the multiracial and multigenerational coalition that elected Mr. Biden is fraying. Demographic groups that backed Mr. Biden by landslide margins in 2020 are now far more closely contested, as two-thirds of the electorate sees the country moving in the wrong direction. Voters under 30 favor Mr. Biden by only a single percentage point, his lead among Hispanic voters is down to single digits and his advantage in urban areas is half of Mr. Trump’s edge in rural regions. And while women still favored Mr. Biden, men preferred Mr. Trump by twice as large a margin, reversing the gender advantage that had fueled so many Democratic gains in recent years. Black voters — long a bulwark for Democrats and for Mr. Biden — are now registering 22 percent support in these states for Mr. Trump, a level unseen in presidential politics for a Republican in modern times.

Well all righty then! What, if anything, can we glean from this, beginning with the understanding that it’s just a poll, we can’t trust polls or pollsters, and we can’t trust the New York Times or the news media? This poll could have been deliberately manipulated to push Democrats into dumping Biden, or to gull Republicans into nominating Trump, or to scare Democrats out of their deluded back-patting, or to make the GOP foolishly confident. Or the poll itself is just wrong, even today, never mind where things could go by November of 2024. Granted. But let’s suppose it is relatively accurate, arguendo, as lawyers like to say. Then what?

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A Poll, More Headline Deceit, And “What’s Going On Here?”

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

It begins with the prototypical “Nah, there’s no mainstream media bias!” decision by ABC News to bury the lede with a deceptive headline in an effort to minimize Joe Biden’s botching of his White House tenure. The latest ABC News/Washington Post poll had resulted in a stunning move away from Biden to Trump, showing the latter with a landslide level 51-42 lead if the 2024 election were held today. ABC’s headline: “Troubles for Biden not just his age in reelection campaign: POLL.”

This is a now common tool of the fake news game for those with the integrity to call it what it is: deceitful headlining to hide news that the media wants as little noticed as possible. The defensive rejoinder is always, “Oh, but that’s just the headline!”, but much of the public only skims the news and thus never sees more than the headlines of most stories. ABC News knows it, and when there have been stories that it (or other MSM propagandists for the Democrats) deems unhelpful to the cause, it uses this trick if not one of the other ones, like not reporting the story at all. Since this was ABC’s own poll, that one wasn’t an option.

Sure, the poll spelled “troubles” for Biden rather than just his age, as if anyone paying attention thought being old was the main problem with President Biden. But that’s not what the poll results indicate: they indicate that the public realizes that Biden has been a disaster as POTUS, and are pulling away from him at an accelerating rate. Bad polls affect party confidence, enthusiasm, morale and donations: that’s why most pollsters, who tend to be biased toward the Left like the media organizations that hire them, tend to skew poll results against Republicans. The honest headline for this poll would have been what was significant about it: “HOLY CRAP, A POLL RUN BY ABA AND THE POST STILL SHOWED TRUMP CLOBBERING BIDEN IN 2024! ARRRGH!!!” except that ABC’s partisan hacks didn’t want that to be the reaction in Trump Derangement Land.

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Saturday Morning Wake-Up (2): A Biden Presidency Ethics Train Wreck Update

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

1. I’ll introduce this by noting that an American Research Group poll found that public approval of President Biden’s handling of his job has fallen to just 39%.

Of the 39% of Americans saying they approve of the way Biden is handling his job, 65% say they expect the national economy will be better a year from now. (They are whistling past the graveyard.) Of the 56% saying they disapprove of the way Biden his handling his job as president, 71% believe the national economy will be worse a year from now. Why wouldn’t it be?

Of Republicans polled, just 3% approve of the way Biden is handling his job. 34% of Independents approve, but 80% of Democrats actually told another human being that they approve like the way Biden is running his Presidency because every thing is going so well. That’s incompetent citizenship. One can still be a Democrats and be able to honestly assess a disaster when a Democrat is at the helm of the Ship of State, can’t you? Talk about cult-like behavior.

2. Here’s a more encouraging poll, sort of: the latest Rasmussen Reports survey found that nearly three-quarters ,72%, of voters believe that “America is becoming a police state” under Biden. Rasmussen defined “police state” as “a tyrannical government that engages in mass surveillance, censorship, ideological indoctrination, and targeting of political opponents.” Targeting of political opponents? Why would anyone think that?

(Yes, I’m going to work that reference to Biden’s ‘anyone who opposes my party and government is a fascist and danger to democracy’ speech every chance I get. Lest we forget.…)

Republicans led the way with 76% expressing fears of totalitarian trends under Biden, but Democrats were not far behind at 67%. Combining the two polls, one can only conclude that a large number of Democrats like the fact that Biden is overseeing a developing police state. And I think that’s a correct impression.

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It’s Unethical For Democrats, the News Media And Activists to Gaslight The Public, But On The SCOTUS Affirmative Action Smack-Down, They Did It Anyway

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

The coverage of the recent rulings in Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina and Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard almost universally created the impression that they were further attacks on democracy by a rogue Supreme Court, foiling the will of the people. In particular, these decisions blocking institutionalized institutional racist discrimination, which is what higher education affirmative action is, were assailed as creating disastrous hurdles to black Americans as they strive to succeed in this nation plagued by systemic racism.

Two recent polls show that this narrative was fake news from the news media and misinformation from the Left. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey found that 65% of “Likely U.S. Voters” approve of the rulings, with 49% approving “strongly”. Just 28% disapprove of the conclusion that the prohibition on discriminating by race means no discrimination by race. You can read how the questions were posed here. Another poll from YouGov/The Economist asked “Do you approve or disapprove of Supreme Court’s ruling on affirmative action?” Both sexes, all races, every age group, and every level of income approved more than not. (See here.)

Yeah, I know: polls. In this case, however, these easily manipulated surveys perform a service. The Supreme Court’s function does not and should not involve following the mob, but appealing to mob emotions has been a central strategy by progressives as they seek to de-legitimize the one branch of the government they don’t control. An accompanying myth is that the Roberts Court is an obstacle to “the will of the people,” even when, as in this case, the will of the people is supported by the Constitution and our laws.

Even after a concerted and ongoing effort to inflict Marxist goals, racial quotas and “good” discrimination on the culture, our core values have stood up to the propaganda siege—so far.

There is hope.

Great Moments In Unethical Polling Manipulation: Grinnell College On “Gender-Affirming Care”

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

We should expect activists, politicians and journalists to engage in rampant deceit in their use of language to confuse and mislead the public. The abortion debate, a complex and ethically crucial societal controversy that requires clarity and honesty, has been just about permanently distorted by the routine use of deliberately deceptive cover-terms “pro-choice” and “pro-life.” One should we able to rely on educational and research institutions to be careful to avoid this malady, but as polls prove repeatedly, we can’t.

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On Rasmussen’s Terrible Poll, Conservative Media Spin, And Scott Adams’ Self-Cancellation

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

Ugh. Polls.

Some misguided fool at the conservative polling operation Rasmussen Reports convinced the gang to ask 1,000 randomly chosen Americans two questions:

1. Do you agree or disagree with this statement:  “It’s OK to be white”?

2. Do you agree or disagree with this statement:  “Black people can be racist, too”?

Question #1 is unforgivable—incompetent, irresponsible, unethical. “It’s OK to be white” was designed as parallel “gotcha!” linguistic retort to “Black lives matter,” an equivalent to “When did you stop beating your wife?” What does it mean? Agreeing with “It’s OK to be white” might mean, “I reject the premise behind Black Lives Matter and Critical Race Theory!” It also could mean, “Of course it’s okay to be white; any other position is racist.”

Disagreeing with the statement might mean, “I see what you’re doing there: trying to weasel out of white society’s obligation to recognize the intrinsic injustices it inflicts on black citizens!” Or it might mean, “I hate those honky bastards! They’re all the same: evil.” Without defining terms, no poll is legitimate.

Rasmussen should be ashamed of itself.

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These Are Poisonous Fruit Of Squandered Trust

/ Jack Marshall / 23 Comments

A just-released Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey concluded that 49% of American adults believe it is likely that Wuhan virus vaccines have caused a significant number of unexplained deaths. Twenty-eight percent think it’s “Very Likely” that the side effects of the vaccine have been deadly to many  in contrast with 37% who don’t believe that a significant number of deaths have been caused by vaccine side effects. Fourteen percent are not sure, the usual group that isn’t sure of anything.

You can question the accuracy of this poll or all polls, you can believe that the vaccine skeptics are hysterics, you can believe that these numbers are in large part the result of “misinformation.” However, there is no question that even if they are inaccurate, the numbers show a shocking level of distrust in the pandemic vaccines, and, by extension, vaccines in general as well the health professionals and elected officials who have promoted them. When asked if there are legitimate safety concerns surrounding the shots, or whether doubts have been seeded by conspiracy theorists, 48% said there that concerns are valid. Only 37% indicated that false conspiracy theories were behind the public’s fears.

Glenn Reynolds, the Beauchamp Brogan Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee College of Law and one of the most widely read conservative blogger, has it exactly right, writing, Continue reading →

The Elon Musk-Twitter Ethics Roller-Coaster Ride Continues

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

(I hate roller-coasters.)

The last week has demonstrated clearly, I think we can all agree, that 1) there is an urgent need for Twitter to be de-politicized, stripped of partisan censorship, and become a trustworthy platform for the unfettered distribution of news, information and opinion to the public, and 2) Elon Musk is too much of a loose cannon to be the manager of Twitter’s reform.

Yesterday almost qualified as a meltdown, or a tantrum, or something. Maybe a joke. Who knows with him? He teased his withdrawal from the daily management of the reeling social media giant. He hinted that the company was teetering on bankruptcy. He put his continued tenure as CEO up for a vote, pledging to abide by the results.

Chaos. Musk is quite a bit like Donald Trump, which shouldn’t be surprising: the successful entrepreneur/ CEO/ autocrat/narcissist is a well-understood personality type, and management by chaos is a management style that can be very effective for the short term in a private company (but not the U.S. government). I worked for a chaos manager for seven years, and he was brilliant at it, but I decided then and there that I could never operate that way. It is hard on subordinates, employees and stake-holders; only the chaotic manager enjoys the pressure. It is a non-Golden Rule management style that relies entirely on utilitarianism as its ethical justification. Yes, the methods causes breakdowns, anxiety and constant crisis, but if it “works,” it’s worth the pain. That’s what Musk has been doing.

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Déjà Vu Ethics: The Washington Post Is Stunned To Find That The Public’s Attitude Toward Affirmative Action Hasn’t Changed In 50 Years.

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

I’m not, nor should anyone else be surprised.

Writes the Post:

More than 6 in 10 Americans support a ban on the consideration of race in college admissions, according to a Washington Post-Schar School poll, but an equally robust majority endorses programs to boost racial diversity on campuses….On Oct. 31, the justices will hear arguments in cases challenging race-conscious admissions at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.If the court’s conservative majority reverses decades of precedent and prohibits the consideration of race and ethnicity, the Post-Schar School poll conducted this month finds 63 percent of adults would support the change. At the same time, 64 percent say programs designed to increase racial diversity of students are a good thing. Support for boosting diversity is high across racial and ethnic groups, while Black Americans are less supportive of banning race as a factor in admissions than people of other backgrounds.

Does this even qualify as news at this point? Back at the very start of the affirmative action movement in colleges and universities, polling always showed that the public objected to “racial quotas,” meaning that race and color would be a decisive factor in admitting college applicants, but if quotas were vaguely framed as “affirmative action,” meaning “let’s do something to avoid perpetuating a permanent underclass in American society by increasing the proportion of minority college graduates,” then the public was substantially favorable. Has any public policy question ever been more vulnerable to polling manipulation by choice of words?

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