Is Medicare a Government Program?

[NCVol]

http://www.dailykos.com/statepoll/2009/8/13/US/346

QUESTION: Is Medicare a government program or not?

    YES   NO   NOT SURE
ALL   83   9   8
MEN   82   9   9
WOMEN   84   9   7
DEM   89   7   4
REP   76   14   10
IND   83   8   9
OTH/REF   80   9   11
NON VOTERS   82   8   10
WHITE   82   9   9
BLACK   86   8   6
LATINO   84   9   7
OTHER/REF   84   9   7
18-29   81   10   9
30-44   82   9   9
45-59   84   9   7
60+   85   8   7
NORTHEAST   86   8   6
SOUTH   80   10   10
MIDWEST   84   9   7
WEST   83   9   8



Interesting.... Non voters are more informed than republicans? 

Young, southern, a republican and ignorant is no way to go through life son! 

[Sasquatch]

The way you really don't want to go through life is posting the results of polls from a website that believes polls lie.

Polls lie

I had been meaning to post about this for some time, but Dick Morris beat me to it: polling sucks.

Which ultimately means that polls are becoming increasingly inaccurate.

So, whenever you look at the "Poll Watch" on the right column of the homepage, just remember, the numbers are all foma: they are lies.

http://www.dailykos.net/archives/000293.html

Oh the irony. 

[NCVol]

I see, republicans do the same thing democrats do - if a poll isn't flattering, ignore it.

But if it shows that 70 percent of the public just loves to death their healthcare plan, why it's PROOF that medicare for all is tyranny, like Dick Armey said over the weekend! 

Oh wait, Medicare is a private plan, how can that be tyranny?  Don't we LIKE private plans.... and if Obama touches Medicare, it's government takeover of healthcare in this country.  "You'll take my Medicare when you pry my cold dead fingers from around the policy!" 

Oh, the problems of being an uninformed voter.  How do you keep all the talking points straight! 

[Sasquatch]

I see, republicans do the same thing democrats do - if a poll isn't flattering, ignore it.

What in the world are you talking about? Who is ignoring it? I am just reporting what dailykos.com found: the numbers are all foma: they are lies.

Oh, the problems of being an uninformed voter.  How do you keep all the talking points straight!  

I believe you and dailykos.com are the ones who need to get your talking points straight!  

Are you ignoring what dailykos.com found: the numbers are all foma: they are lies.

Yet you are gobbling up the results that you like. Interesting. 

[NCVol]

Alright, you forced me to the source material

I've never taken polls as accurate measures of a race's final outcome. They are useful in other ways -- to gauge momentum, to get a feel of who is the frontrunner, to measure the effects of debates, speeches, gaffes, etc.

To measure the rank stupidity of a certain group, or alternatively their ignorance....   

And I was using the poll as "foma" defined as "a useful and harmless sort of horses**t"

As in it's useful to learn that a lot of the Town Hallers think medicare is private! 

See, a straightforward interpretation of the poll. 

BTW, you have seen the video of Congressfolk asking the protesters:  "How many of you are on Medicare?"  Answer, lots and lots.  "How many of you want to end Medicare?"  Not even Dick Armey will say a bad word about Medicare, other than it's a form of tyranny that he's forced to be in it. 

[Sasquatch]

So it is okay to use a poll from a source who says in 2002 that polls are "becoming increasingly inaccurate", and even calls them lies, to measure how stupid or ignorant certain groups are. We also use such polls to "learn" what certain people think so that we can disparage these people.

Tell me again who is ignorant or stupid?

While you are at it, why don't you and dailykos.com tell me again how judgemental southern, conservatives (or republicans) are (especially the white men)?.

[NCVol]

Here is what the poll tells us.  Of the number of people who were called and who answered a series of questions, about 24% of the people who self identified as republicans said they though Medicare was private or they weren't sure.  Of the people called on that day and who  answered the questions, that demographic (republicans) was the MOST uninformed about whether Medicare was a government program.  The second most uninformed were people who had phone numbers in the "south." 

I'm not a pollster, but that is I think a fair statement. 

And in the context of an election, the polls don't "lie" as in state a wrong percentage of the people who answered a question a certain way, the polls just are more or less generalizable to the 1) population (because of the sample, push polling, etc.) and 2) voting population and 3) voting population who will actually VOTE in the coming election, and those issues are why using polls to PREDICT AN OUTCOME is problematic.  Conservatives used the excuse that their voters have better things to do than answer stupid pollers aka work so were underrepresented...  Who knows..   

So substitute republicans in any comment with "stupid people contacted by the pollster who identified as republicans" and I think everything is OK. 

[native]

NCVOL, if you've noticed the leader of the GOP The Drugster used to not allow anything to do with the bible to be mentioned on his show. GW Bush came along and now he wraps himself in it. During Bush's time in office, polls didn't matter and now all he does is quote polls. Fortunately, now I'm able to pick up Big Ed Schultz's show out of Ashville so I don't have to listen to the Drugster anymore.