"Snow Polling" by YAHOO ??

I noticed this little headline on YAHOO this morning: *

• Poll: Obama leads McCain among people who don't have pets

When you click on the link, you will find the actual title of the article is:

Pet owners prefer McCain over Obama

This left me wondering: Did someone at YAHOO want to create the impression "yet another poll" favored Obama ?

Before I go any further,let me make one thing perfectly clear: I do not support either Obama or Mc Cain - and haven't seen anybody else worth wasting a vote on in November.

What I want to comment on is something I call " Snow Polling " : a technique of promoting certain political views by suggesting to the public "this is what Americans believe".

The method used is quite simple: one starts by polling a carefully selected group (one you are pretty sure will agree with you) ,and then publishing the results as vigorously as possible. You then follow up with additional polls-widening the group gradually,and trumpeting the results every time they are to your liking.

The more you do this,the more people will agree with you. Folks may not be able to recall the details of your earlier polls, but they "know" more and more people are accepting the proposed viewpoint;and they conclude "all those people must know something !"

Little by little, as the poll is rolled around,it picks up additional layers of this "snow".

Eventually,people are no longer able to recognize it as a "snow job" ; for it has become a thundering avalanche .

*   I'm inclined to suspect the "pet owners poll" was instigated by someone who favors John McCain ; and that someone on YAHOO decided to "turn the tables" by writing a headline suggesting the poll favored Obama.

I'm also inclined to suspect I'm not the only one who noticed the discrepancy, because the headline on YAHOO now reads as follows:

 Which presidential candidate do dog and cat owners prefer?

 

 

 

 

Comments

[KansasGirl]

Unbelievable.