Polling

It’s easy enough, obviously, to skew polls.  Just oversample a population likely to support what you want to be supported.  Today, oversample Democrats in asking whether or not Trump’s election should be reversed through an abuse of the impeachment process.

There is a more subtle element, though, too, I think: Republicans do not think about, do not value, polls the same way Democrats do.  Personally, if I get asked to participate in a poll, I say fuck no.  Why?  Why would I want to give you my time? 

Many on the conservative side of the ninety degree political mark would, I think, agree with me.

But polling on the Left almost equals morality.  These people are taught that a popular position must be a just and moral position.  In my years on the internet, I have been told over and over and over and over again that X is popular, and that this constitutes a valid argument.

There is a large abyss between those who think rightness can be equated with popularity, and those like me who are very firm in their convictions that you can be right even if the whole world is against you; even if you are an army of one.

The eagerness with which Democrats and Republicans encounter polls, then, is I think quite different.  I do not become more right if I give you my opinions, and you do not become more right if you find a lot of people to agree with you.  Rightness is a philosophical question, an abstract question, a question open to debate.

But for most Democrats, it really is a question of who has the best polling numbers.  This vast gap has to be considered in evaluating any poll numbers.