July 23, 2004

Public opinion polls have always been deservedly suspect in the research world and viewed only as tolerable on a basis similar to the Nielson ratings – it's not good research, but it's the only thing we have.

The culprit has always been the expense of getting a statistically representative sample of the American public according to Census data. The reliability you see expressed as plus or minus some percentage of error or simply written off as "not scientific."

To avoid this massive expense every time they want a survey, the big opinion research houses like Gallup have set up panels. These are paid panels they return to time and again with different questionnaires, often by telephone, and carrying an obvious built-in bias. Although respondents are encouraged to express their true feelings, the fact that they are being paid often makes it more like a high school test than anything with valid emotional depth.

Today, we have an even greater bias that might be called the fear factor. Whether part of a paid panel or not, people are afraid to give the "wrong" answer or say anything too radical against the current administration for fear of being put on some sort of list or drawing attention to themselves.

No one wants the government breathing down their neck and it isn't difficult to imagine yourself being put on John Ashcroft's or the FBI's categories of the unfaithful or unpatriotic dissidents if anyone expresses negative feelings about Bush or his gang of war mongers.

After all, the pollsters contact you and that means that at the very least they probably have your phone number. From that, they can find out just about anything about you. Anyone who saw the movie "Enemy of the State" will believe that's possible.

In the current and upcoming election polls, when you see Bush's numbers dropping you can safely assume that the "Anyone but Bush" position is much stronger than the polls are indicating despite the democrats pick of a wishy-washy candidate who so far speaks in the same old platitudes we've heard from all politicians.

Another thing to keep in mind is that statistically a 50-50 split means that there is no difference in choice. Things might as well be decided by the flip of a coin.

We all saw this in the last elections when the State of Florida threw us into a two month tizzy and legal hassle over chads. The outcome was finally decided by the Supreme Court and the Electoral College and many, particularly democrats, have yet to understand that we are a republic. While the popular vote may be a democratic process the real outcome is decided by the hand picked Electoral College members who are under no obligation to follow the popular vote.

Worst of all, it's been four years and the federal government has done little or nothing to improve our methods of taking the popular vote. Instead of standardizing the process, which would cost less than the government borrows any day of the year, most of the country is still using the old punch card voting or even the bulky and older lever machines. And the Bush administration tried desperately to get Viacom's touch screen voting accepted, managing to get about a quarter of the country committed to this "no paper trail" unverifiable hi-tech voting technology that no one in their right mind should trust.

The media is now promoting the idea that this is going to be a close race. With a little more than three months to go, we can look forward to a constant bombardment of political rhetoric and analysis from the media nitwits with a few breaks for the Olympics, some lessons on what to eat, and the likes of the Scott Peterson trial.

With the chance of another election debacle staring us in the face it has become more and more crucial that we get an accurate count of the vote.

We can not only avoid the pitfalls of technology, but we can get a much more accurate and reliable count of the vote by leaving it in the hands of the volunteer precinct workers and count the votes by hand. It's not that difficult.

First of all, every precinct has anywhere from four to a dozen, depending on the size of the precinct, elderly volunteers who come directly from the neighborhoods where voting takes place. Call this the grandpa and grandma or "gramps" factor.

These people are not only honest and competent, but they grew up in schools that taught basic mathematics without the use of calculators or computers. They know how to count.

In the Fifties, I ran what was called the production department of a Chicago market research company where five people, including myself, could process up to 2,500 questionnaires a day with multiple questions and some open ended responses that had to be codified.

It's not difficult, and if necessary I can provide the step-by-step nitty-gritty process of how to do it.

Secondly, we should pay these people to do the count. These elderly retired people will probably be glad to make a little extra money tax free.

Thirdly, we should give them up to a week to process and recheck the data making certain it's accurate. There's nothing wrong with taking the extra time to guarantee accuracy. We could even cloister these people in luxurious hotels until they're finished.

The only people demanding instant results are the media and the politicians themselves. After boring us to death for two years, and certainly the last four to six months before going to the polling places, there’s no reason to rush the results.

Tell them to "stick-it."

Don't play their game of trying to be "first with the news." Monitor readers like Wolf Blitzer, Paula Zahn, et al, can get their kicks by first running around to the smaller precincts and communities like Twin Oaks, Illinois, getting the results in the presidential balloting, and later covering the larger big city precincts. It will probably bring even more advertising dollars for the networks.

In short, if you can't trust "gramps," you can't trust anyone.

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