How to Lie and Mislead With Polls

I remember my college statistics professor telling us how easy it is to lie using statistics. The same can be said for polls. The AP and The Washington Post/ABC News polls are perfect examples.

The AP’s reporting on their latest poll demonstrates how simple it is to mislead. They took the one finding that fits their agenda and used that as the headline. Of course, the many other findings that don’t fit their agenda were buried.

The Washington Post/ABC News poll is even more aggregious – at least if they report the results as “news” without telling their viewers or readers that their poll is heavily skewed towards Democrats. In fact, there is a 14 point partisan gap. (Oh – As I write this George Stephanopolous is telling us that Obama’s approval rating is a fairly high 56%! No mention of the 14 point gap in the sample.)

Moral of the story: Don’t believe everything you hear from White House approved media outlets.