The Globe: Tories take hit as voters turn their attention to leadership Canadians are growing increasingly negative in their impressions of Tory Leader Stephen Harper . . .
CTV: Conservatives, Harper both lose support: poll The Conservative Party has lost more support, a new poll has found -- and that can be tied to a popularity drop for its leader Stephen Harper. . .
London Free Press: Liberals must hope Harper hangs on It's a sure sign Stephen Harper is in big trouble when the Liberals are desperately praying the Conservative leader won't quit before the next . . .
580 CFRA Radio: Canadians Have Unfavourable View of Harper, PM 60 per cent of Canadians surveyed by the Strategic Council had an unfavourable view of the Conservative leader, compared to 40 per cent who view him positively . . .
The common thread the headlines and opening statements is that Harper is a liability to the Conservatives and people don't like him.
Further in each article you'll read that 60% of people view him negatively, compared to 56% who view the Prime Minister negatively.
This is a poll that is considered accurate to +/- 3.1%, nineteen times out of twenty.
Does that not mean that Harper and Martin are statistically tied in terms of negative perception?
Should it not be bigger news that the country hates the Prime Minister at least as much as the guy they didn't vote in?
The media keeps trying to tell me that there is no media bias, and in truth, I am finding less of it on the opinion pages -- but this sort of story is a news item. Its presentation is supposed to be neutral.
Playing up Harper's negative numbers, and playing down Paul Martin's similar negative numbers is hardly neutral. It is a distortion of the poll results which can only have been done for one reason -- to lead the reader in a particular direction.
I don't doubt the polls accuracy, or the professionalism of those conducting the polls -- the bias comes from those who report the polls. By choosing to focus on Harper's negative numbers -- which are hardly surprising in the week where the media had jumped on the 'doctored tapes' bandwagon -- and just breezing by Martin's equally abysmal showing much later in their articles, these media outlets have downplayed the PMs consistently negative ratings in the polls.
Bias in the news pages is far more troubling than bias in columnists -- and yet time after time, we see opinion and skewed information passed off as impartial fact.
I still think polls create public opinion rather than reflecting it. They are self-fulfilling snapshots: a brief blip in time becomes the final print because the image becomes etched in people's minds.
There is no way to counter-spin this kind of reporting -- once it's out there -- it's just out there.
canadianna
10 comments:
Now you know why I don't subscribe to the Globe and Mail any longer, or watch much television.
Yah, I saw the CTV Newsnet report on the poll findings and they only made passing reference to Martin's 56% unfavourable ratings.
Great observations!
"I still think polls create public opinion rather than reflecting it."
In a nation with a high proportion of sheeple, that is indeed so. Add to that the large number of sincere non-sheeple who are just too stressed and busy trying to survive (when is Tax Freedom Day again?) to do much more than glance at the headlines, let alone analyze surveys, and you have conditions perfect for spinmeisters of both the political and media persuasion.
Do you ever wonder who actually gets polled? If you are polling in large diverse urban areas like Toronto, Montreal or Vancouver it does not necessarily reflect what people in the rest of the country are thinking.
Most of the polls we see are contrived...and politically motivated to create low morale amoung non liberal cartel partisans.
As someone who has dealt with statistical process control and audit in my professional career, I can state the methodology of the big pollstaers is scientifically flawed and the motivators are certainly not scientific.....if you want to keep your objecive vision on balance and make realistic assessments of public affairs, ignore the pollsters...they are either economically partisan, scientifically fallacious or both.
What I find discouraging, is not the polls themselves, but the reaction to the polls by many CPC supporters. They've decided that the problem is Stephen Harper. His oposite, Paul Martin, lies publicly, has got all kinds of dirt on his face, and has no policy... no none... he makes it up as he goes. Harper is a policy wonk... I mean he is MR. Policy... and he's proven that he stands behind principle, more than expediency. In a time when corruption and payoffs are part and parcel of government, I can't think of a better leader to have. Furthermore, are people so dense that they think the media would treat any other CPC better.
Well, maybe the media and more Ontarians would treat a statists, elitist, billionaire, Central Canadian CPC leader well, if he had worked for Power Corp at one time and/or had affiliation with Power Corp. board members... as did Belinda.
Hmmmm... maybe Belinda should be bribed back.
Please . . . no . . . don't even say it!! Someone might hear you and think you're serious.
You're right though. That was my frustration too - the Tory response.
I like Harper, but for the past oh, I dunno -- three elections -- I've thought anything but Liberal.
The polls are just so much BS, but yes, it's frustrating when you hear people buying into the spinmeisters' take on things, like "Harper's got to go" and my other favorite "where are the CPC policies" (ummm, looked at the cpc website lately? noticed those 1" stories about Harper delivering speeches on page 87 of the G&M?)
argh
I have to agree with polls creating public opinion rather than reflecting it. It's very much like a credit score from a credit bureau. If you miss a payment or two, your score declines. On you next trek to the bank, you will probably find that due to your lower score you will have to pay a higher rate of interest on your new loan. By making your payment higher ( due to the higher interest rate ) the lender is placing your probability of repaying your loan at the level of risk that the credit score claims you represent. With a better score, you could get your loan at a better finance rate, giving you a lower payment thereby making it easier to honor you commitment.
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