Poll Rigging

In my politically active days, I could get supermarket go-ers to sign a petition that required them to sell their children into slavery.

Polls are a popular way of measuring ... and swaying ... public opinion. There are at least three ways that polls can be manipulated unfairly:

* Sampling — one generally finds when one can view the sampling profiles of a particular poll, that the left is disproportionally represented among the polling respondents.

* Question construction — Obviously the way a question is phrased can have a large impact on the results. Subtle biases can be introduced into any question through the clever use of adjectives and adverbs. “Do you approve of Trump’s tweeting?” is clearly different from “Does Trump’s persistent tweeting bother you?”

* Reporting — polling agencies usually do not provide access to all their polling data. Therefore, they can cherry-pick what cross tabs that they report. By rights news reporters should be able to request cross tabs of their own choosing.