For a few months, I’ve put answers in the “polls” that are preposterous – they are intended to identify people who are deliberately answering the polls with the goal of creating useless results or just selecting every answer without reading and thinking about them.
One of the polls asked which radio hosts you think believe Barack Obama was born in Kenya. The question did not ask what YOU think the truth is. One of the choices is George Galloway – he was a member of the U.K. Parliament during the George W Bush era. He was a very vocal opponent of the Iraq invasion and accused George Bush of war crimes and tricking Tony Blair, making up the WMD rationale, knowing it wasn’t true – including coming to the United States Congress and testifying.
He is not a radio host, yet people selected him. As far as I know, he hasn’t expressed an opinion on the topic of where Barack Obama was born.
Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck have both made it clear they are not “birthers”. Chuck Harder and Larry King do not have radio shows. John Batchelor thinks birthers have mental health issues as does Phil Hendrie. Ed Schultz and Rachel Maddow are Progressive hosts.
Rusty Humphries, Alex Jones, George Noory and Aaron Klein have been the main ones whipping up the frenzy.
What’s your theory on why people answered that question the way they did? I could use some insights – maybe the wording of the question was unclear and I don’t see the flaw. Of the ones in the question that I didn’t mention above, what is their position? Many of the names I added without knowing one way or the other.
The poll asked which radio hosts we think BELIEVE Obama was born in Kenya. Long time listeners develop opinions of what their favorite radio hosts privately believe, even though the hosts don’t have the courage (or proof in this case) to offer their private opinions over the airwaves.
If the poll had asked which radio hosts have STATED on their show that they believe Obama was born in Kenya you might have obtained different results.
I accept that.
So it’s like the first half of Glenn Beck’s “There are many things that I believe that I shall never say, but I shall never say the things that I do not believe”
I’ll duplicate the poll and change the wording and we can compare results.
Here is my reworded question – I’ve taken it from one extreme to the other: “Which of the people in this list are talk radio hosts that you have heard say they believe Barack Obama was born in Kenya?”
– I’m making it moderately clear that some people in this list may not be radio hosts
– The requirement is that you have -heard- the host say it
– I chose “Was born” not a weasel phrase like “May have been born”
Weekend people tend to answer quite differently than weekday people, so I won’t get a real feel until tomorrow.
I just now participated in the new poll. The early results aren’t looking too good for validation of informed poll participants. Perhaps Larry King should get a radio show after all…