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CNN Poll: Unfavorable view of tea party on the rise

And you didn't "point out that the methodology is flawed" (except the aggregating of the data, which I'm addressing) you simply accused Nate Silver of being a hack - which is a fallacy, not a logical arguement.
When I claimed to have pointed out flawed methodology, that's precisely what I was referring to. I also went on to claim that the poll items he treats as equal are anything but. [Also, "Nate Silver is a hack" is no more a fallacy than "the sky is blue" or "Jennie is a girl" -- these are all simple propositions. A fallacy refers to an error in reasoning.]

So you make claims you didn't support, and you attacked the messenger - and you then claimed that anyone who doesn't agree with your premise (that the data is inaccurate) are partisan hacks - which is also another fallacy.
Haha, no I most certainly did NOT say that "anyone who doesn't agree that the data is inaccurate is a partisan hack." I said that anyone who recognizes that the methodology used is flawed but nonetheless assumes the data is accurate is a "blind partisan":
I've pointed out that the methodology is flawed. Knowing that, only a blind partisan would *assume* the data to be accurate.
The key words there are "knowing that" -- I am making no claims as to those who don't recognize that the methodology is flawed.

And you top all these fallacies by implying that you're right without having to prove your claim ("it's up to [me] to argue why" even though you claimed "they don't agree").
Again, there's no "fallacy" here. Whether or not I'm correct (again, a proposition) has very little to do with whether I've proved that to you or anyone else (another proposition). If you'd like to try to characterize an argument that I made that you think is fallacious, I'd be happy to go over that.
 
Ok thats about the fifth person in this thread saying that CNN is some horrible fox news type of entity (at least in terms of being trusted). Whats going on here?

Essentially, its just about impossible to be truly objective and literally not lean any direction with regards to news. What stories you cover, what angle of the story you cover, what your headline is, what your focus of the story is, the type of language you use, etc...all are affected consiously or subconsiously by your own views and opinions. Considering its highly unlikely that someone not mildly interested in politics is going to get into the business of writing about it, its reasonable to suggest that most of the writers, editors, etc have some kind of political view. Thus every media entity generally has some slant, albiet some less extreme or more constrained then otheres.

As such, you have people on both sides that essentially immedietely will condemn anything they view in any way slanted to the other side as if its all equally badly slanted. I've seen conservatives do it for PBS, CNN, MSNBC, and the HuffingtonPost. I've seen liberals do it for the Wall Street Journal, Rasmussen Reports, FoxNews, and WorldNetDaily. Even a little slant, when a story comes out that a partisan doesn't like they paint that group as if its just as amazingly slanted as the most biased of the bunch on that side.

CNN is left of center, but not extremely so. Less so than MSNBC is or less so than Fox News is on their respective side. But its still generally left leaning in its presentation, editorial decisions, and story focus. As such you're generally going to see hyper partisan conservatives latching onto it like its coming from the mouth of Ariana Huffington herself even though there is a sizable difference between the HuffPo and CNN.

Its one of those things not to spend too much time focusing on because there's little real answer for it with most of the people that do it, regardless of sides.
 
Essentially, its just about impossible to be truly objective and literally not lean any direction with regards to news. What stories you cover, what angle of the story you cover, what your headline is, what your focus of the story is, the type of language you use, etc...all are affected consiously or subconsiously by your own views and opinions. Considering its highly unlikely that someone not mildly interested in politics is going to get into the business of writing about it, its reasonable to suggest that most of the writers, editors, etc have some kind of political view. Thus every media entity generally has some slant, albiet some less extreme or more constrained then otheres.

As such, you have people on both sides that essentially immedietely will condemn anything they view in any way slanted to the other side as if its all equally badly slanted. I've seen conservatives do it for PBS, CNN, MSNBC, and the HuffingtonPost. I've seen liberals do it for the Wall Street Journal, Rasmussen Reports, FoxNews, and WorldNetDaily. Even a little slant, when a story comes out that a partisan doesn't like they paint that group as if its just as amazingly slanted as the most biased of the bunch on that side.

CNN is left of center, but not extremely so. Less so than MSNBC is or less so than Fox News is on their respective side. But its still generally left leaning in its presentation, editorial decisions, and story focus. As such you're generally going to see hyper partisan conservatives latching onto it like its coming from the mouth of Ariana Huffington herself even though there is a sizable difference between the HuffPo and CNN.

Its one of those things not to spend too much time focusing on because there's little real answer for it with most of the people that do it, regardless of sides.

I agree with all of this, people tend to have a point of view and that will bleed into any professional work they do. But, in this case, I have given the base data on page 2 where people can go look at the poll questions and response data themselves. Meaning that they can independently verify whether CNN's conclusions were in error nor not. What I don't understand is, armed with that data, why people are still dismissing CNN. Maybe they just didn't see the post on page 2.
 
Ok thats about the fifth person in this thread saying that CNN is some horrible fox news type of entity (at least in terms of being trusted). Whats going on here?

Ask Eason Jordan.

"CNN is some horrible fox news type of entity" ...... speaks volumes.
 
Ask Eason Jordan.

"CNN is some horrible fox news type of entity" ...... speaks volumes.

It was an attempt at humor and a nod to the bias in the media section of the forum. I knew exactly what I was doing. :mrgreen:
 
Are they sufficiently different? I read some of them and they are very similiar:
Having conducted a number of surveys, I can tell you first hand that the wording of the item can GREATLY impact the results. We’ve sometimes spent an hour or more quibbling over a single word. So what you describe as "very similar" may in fact be very similar but lead to very dissimilar results nonetheless.

That being said, I’m not as concerned about differences in the wording of that portion of each item - (I’d be willing to bet that order effects would play a more significant role) – a much bigger problem is that he’s combining data that was collected using different scales. Here a just a few illustrative examples:

ABC: Favorable, Unfavorable, or Unsure?
CBS: Favorable, Not favorable, Undecided, Haven’t heard enough or Refuse to answer?
NBC: Very positive, Somewhat positive, Neutral, Somewhat negative, Very negative, or Don’t know?
USA: Favorable, Unfavorable, Never heard of it, or Unsure?
AP: Favorable, Unfavorable, Neither, Unsure?

This is a huge problem for lots of reasons!

To illustrate a few by comparing the first two polls:

1) Respondents for ABC have almost a forced choice comparison between Favorable and Unfavorable – "Unsure" is included as a catch-all, but people can interpret that in a variety of ways which (I assume) is why a lot of the other polls break it out.

2) Respondents for CBS are asked to indicate their opinion on a *much* different scale. Whereas the ABC poll tries to push people into a simple dichotomy, the CBS poll allows people ample room for that gray area with “undecided” and “haven’t heard enough” options. That latter option is especially noteworthy in that it brings certainty into the equation, prompting a “favorable/not favorable” response only when you’re reasonably sure you won’t change your mind in the future.

They’re really two different questions. You would expect that someone with limited exposure (maybe they caught a few negative headlines) – would classify their opinion as “unfavorable” on the ABC poll, and maybe “haven’t heard enough” on the CBS poll.

Predictably, people are less willing to commit to a favorable/unfavorable opinion when they are given choices that more closely reflect their opinion. People consistently report "unfavorable" opinions at roughly twice the rate as those in the CBS poll:

ABC
36% Favorable
48% Unfavorable
16% Unsure

CBS
18% Favorable
25% Unfavorable
19% Undecided
36% Haven't heard enough to decide
2% Refused to answer

Going back to the trendline, hopefully the above is sufficient to show that his trendline doesn't have a consistent meaning - what it means to "unfavorable" changes depending on which polls are used to determine a given point on the curve. Further, it's not difficult to imagine that spurious trends could appear simply because of how the CBS poll and other "low predictors" are temporally distributed in relation to the ABC poll and other "high predictors."
 
This problem also plagues other forms of empirical reviews. So do you claim that this kind of statistical technique is not credible or that there is a problem just with this particular case - if the latter, you haven't shown us information regarding this particular case to show that the differences in sampling techniques is enough to make the result unreliable. You just made a generalised unsupported claim.
If by "other forms of empirical reviews" you are referring to something like a meta analysis, then yes, we should recognize that they can deal with some of these differences, but I don't think you will ever find a published review where the methodology involves divorcing the data from the parent studies, dumping it all into a common hopper, and deriving a conclusion from a single trendline with no indiction of goodness of fit. Of course, the standard for academic work is much higher than what you'll find in a typical blog post, so it's not really a good comparison.

I really have no idea why this guy gets away with such junk. I guess he's had some successes that lead people to overlook his faults, or maybe he's popular among his circle of readers and nobody wants to face an angry mob. Zogby called him on some of the same stuff I took issue with in another thread, but was kind of half kissing his ass at the same time.
 
Oh my goodness...what will we do?

Our "unfavorability" is going up amongst that watch CNN.....we aren't worriedabout it kids.
 
lets do this one at a time. show me how the tea party is against an "equal and just society".... :roll:

How about you learn to read properly and we'll just need to do it just one time?


So lets pretend this is ALL true and not part of the democrat hit machine obama re-election need an enemy mission...

Are you saying folks no longer want smaller government, more accountable reps, reduced spending, and lower taxes? I don't think so, call it the Tea party or whatever, its the ideals of the tea party folks want, not so much a tea "P"arty.


This is who we are.



Why does anyone have to pretend to anything?



Is there anyone who is not for better access to education, equal and just society, reducing poverty etc...? What the hell does all that means? How do you make government small - by attacking the Unions? How to get Representatives to be more accountable - by gerrymandering? How do you reduce spending - by cutting Planned Parenthood but ask for tax credit for corporations? How do you cut taxes - at the expense of what and whom? Some people feel reducing the deficit is more important than cutting taxes right now.

Political rhetoric is all fine and dandy but the devil is in the details.
 
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How about you learn to read properly and we'll just need to do it just one time?


So you have no answer as expected.


You can not explain how the tea party is against "equal and just society" as you claimed. Noted.
 
When I claimed to have pointed out flawed methodology, that's precisely what I was referring to.

Maybe that's what you think, but since you only offer one legitimate possible problem (aggregation) - you are inflating your claim to the "flawed methodology".

I also went on to claim that the poll items he treats as equal are anything but.

Where did you claim this?

[Also, "Nate Silver is a hack" is no more a fallacy than "the sky is blue" or "Jennie is a girl" -- these are all simple propositions. A fallacy refers to an error in reasoning.]

Thanks for showing your error in reasoning. First of all, your attack on Nate Silver was an ad hominem. Second, how do you know the sky is blue? The sky is black where I currently am. Third, Jennie doesn't have to be a girl.

Haha, no I most certainly did NOT say that "anyone who doesn't agree that the data is inaccurate is a partisan hack."

I had to paraphrase. You said:

I don't, but I really don't need one. I've pointed out that the methodology is flawed. Knowing that, only a blind partisan would *assume* the data to be accurate. If you think there's merit despite the problems I've outlined, it's up to you to argue why.


I said that anyone who recognizes that the methodology used is flawed but nonetheless assumes the data is accurate is a "blind partisan":

The key words there are "knowing that" -- I am making no claims as to those who don't recognize that the methodology is flawed.

You are still doing the same thing. So now, those who disagree with you are either "partisan hacks" or "ignorant of the methology flaws". All without you having to demontrate how they are sufficiently flawed for the result to be invalid.

Again, there's no "fallacy" here.

This is just counter factual. I have documented the fallacies you used.

Whether or not I'm correct (again, a proposition) has very little to do with whether I've proved that to you or anyone else (another proposition). If you'd like to try to characterize an argument that I made that you think is fallacious, I'd be happy to go over that.

I already did: I asked if you have anything to show that the polls don't agree. To which you replied that "you don't, and you don't really need to".

I'm glad you asked. I looked at the data and therefore had all of the evidence I needed to make the claim. The data is readily available to anyone that wants to view it. If they want to take issue with my claim, I am happy to address the issue or rescind the claim as need be.

On the other hand, I have little patience for people who put no thought or effort into the discussion beyond linking to someone else's work, and who then assume that it is fact unless I or someone else expends actual thought and energy to prove it wrong. In that case, I could really care less whether such a person believes me or not - if they want to remain ignorant, so be it.

[just to clarify, I don't mean point fingers at specific people as if they approach every thread in this manner. I should have instead referred to "instances in which people..."]

I don't understand why this is so difficult, if you can clearly point out how the polls don't agree about the trend, why not just point it out since the first post so we don't have to go through this dance? :confused:
 
So you have no answer as expected.


You can not explain how the tea party is against "equal and just society" as you claimed. Noted.

Since I never said that the Tea Party is against "equal and just society", quite the opposite, I hope you note it and make more informed comment about my post next time.
 
Since I never said that the Tea Party is against "equal and just society", quite the opposite, I hope you note it and make more informed comment about my post next time.



verywell, lets move to the next set.


you said:
What the hell does all that means? How do you make government small - by attacking the Unions?

The tea party has attacked unions? please show me where the tea party has attacked unions other than to suggest that government workers should pay about the same for thier pensions and what not as the private sector.


How to get Representatives to be more accountable - by gerrymandering?


Show me were the TeaParty "gerrymandered".



How do you reduce spending - by cutting Planned Parenthood but ask for tax credit for corporations


Show me where the tea party asked for a tax credit for corporations....
 
Having conducted a number of surveys, I can tell you first hand that the wording of the item can GREATLY impact the results. We’ve sometimes spent an hour or more quibbling over a single word. So what you describe as "very similar" may in fact be very similar but lead to very dissimilar results nonetheless.

That being said, I’m not as concerned about differences in the wording of that portion of each item - (I’d be willing to bet that order effects would play a more significant role) – a much bigger problem is that he’s combining data that was collected using different scales. Here a just a few illustrative examples:

ABC: Favorable, Unfavorable, or Unsure?
CBS: Favorable, Not favorable, Undecided, Haven’t heard enough or Refuse to answer?
NBC: Very positive, Somewhat positive, Neutral, Somewhat negative, Very negative, or Don’t know?
USA: Favorable, Unfavorable, Never heard of it, or Unsure?
AP: Favorable, Unfavorable, Neither, Unsure?

This is a huge problem for lots of reasons!

To illustrate a few by comparing the first two polls:

1) Respondents for ABC have almost a forced choice comparison between Favorable and Unfavorable – "Unsure" is included as a catch-all, but people can interpret that in a variety of ways which (I assume) is why a lot of the other polls break it out.

2) Respondents for CBS are asked to indicate their opinion on a *much* different scale. Whereas the ABC poll tries to push people into a simple dichotomy, the CBS poll allows people ample room for that gray area with “undecided” and “haven’t heard enough” options. That latter option is especially noteworthy in that it brings certainty into the equation, prompting a “favorable/not favorable” response only when you’re reasonably sure you won’t change your mind in the future.

They’re really two different questions. You would expect that someone with limited exposure (maybe they caught a few negative headlines) – would classify their opinion as “unfavorable” on the ABC poll, and maybe “haven’t heard enough” on the CBS poll.

Predictably, people are less willing to commit to a favorable/unfavorable opinion when they are given choices that more closely reflect their opinion. People consistently report "unfavorable" opinions at roughly twice the rate as those in the CBS poll:

ABC
36% Favorable
48% Unfavorable
16% Unsure

CBS
18% Favorable
25% Unfavorable
19% Undecided
36% Haven't heard enough to decide
2% Refused to answer

Going back to the trendline, hopefully the above is sufficient to show that his trendline doesn't have a consistent meaning - what it means to "unfavorable" changes depending on which polls are used to determine a given point on the curve. Further, it's not difficult to imagine that spurious trends could appear simply because of how the CBS poll and other "low predictors" are temporally distributed in relation to the ABC poll and other "high predictors."

Fair enough. So if we can't aggregate the polls, we can look at them individually as you suggested, and I did looked at them individually, and most of them do point to an increasing unfavourable views for the Tea Party, yet you claimed that they don't agree with that trend. So naturally, I need to ask: do you have evidence to support that claim?
 
verywell, lets move to the next set.

Next "set" of what? You wrongly accuse me of something, if you don't have the decency to admit to it, at least don't act as if you are in the right.






The tea party has attacked unions? please show me where the tea party has attacked unions other than to suggest that government workers should pay about the same for thier pensions and what not as the private sector.



Show me were the TeaParty "gerrymandered".




Show me where the tea party asked for a tax credit for corporations....

Do you really need to be "shown" the fact that the GOP (which the Tea Party is an extreme wing of) has taken actions that include going after the unions, gerrymandering (in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and more) and has asked for the Bush tax cuts to be continued (which includes cuts and credit for corporations) and that some GOP governor has instituted tax cuts despite claims of budget constrain too?


I find it telling that you fail to grasp the main arguement I made which is that political rhetoric is just that - political rhetoric, it's the details of the proposal that is the problem and lead to disagreement. Democrats and Republicans often want the same thing, they just have different ideas of how to get it done and the priority with which they give it. As a result what you see as "competitive business environment" Democrats see as "tax cut for corporations and the rich". What Democrats see as "better access to education", you see as "student welfare". But of course you couldn't take off your partisanship long enough to understand that.
 
verywell, lets move to the next set.




The tea party has attacked unions? please show me where the tea party has attacked unions other than to suggest that government workers should pay about the same for thier pensions and what not as the private sector.





Show me were the TeaParty "gerrymandered".






Show me where the tea party asked for a tax credit for corporations....

Don't you just love how they spew nonsense to make us look bad? They don't have any proof of wrongdoing, so they try to discredit us with nonsense. Which brings me to one of my favorite quotes. "Annoy a liberal, use logice and fact."
 
No, I think when he complained about "platitudes" he double downed with his own learned misinformation, hence his departure from the thread when challenged.

You really do have an inflated opinion of yourself. Some of us have a life and work outside of this forum. This is a hobby I enjoy but I don't follow it every minute of my day nor is it that high a priority in my life. Sometimes, some comments are just not interesting enough for me to remember checking unless I have time to check my subscription page. Understood?
 
Don't you just love how they spew nonsense to make us look bad? They don't have any proof of wrongdoing, so they try to discredit us with nonsense. Which brings me to one of my favorite quotes. "Annoy a liberal, use logice and fact."

If you people actually use logic and fact, it would not be annoying. It's the hyper-partisanship coupled with lack of reading comprehension that really annoys.
 
Fair enough. So if we can't aggregate the polls, we can look at them individually as you suggested, and I did looked at them individually, and most of them do point to an increasing unfavourable views for the Tea Party, yet you claimed that they don't agree with that trend. So naturally, I need to ask: do you have evidence to support that claim?
My earlier comment was in reference to the thread topic and the Nate Silver trendline - both of which purport to show a recent and signficant rise in unfavorable views. Do you believe that sufficient evidence exists for a "definite trend" in recent months? If so, we can compare evidence.

If instead, your claim of "increasing unfavorable views" is (as I suspect) largely based on the early data, we can save ourselves the trouble. I certainly recognize that many polls show a significant rise in unfavorability in the early part of 2010. It appears that a good number of those who were still undecided as of late Jan developed unfavorable views of the tea party over the next month or two.

It's much harder to argue for a reliable trend after that point. From Summer 2010 forward, unfavorability is rather flat (the one notable exception of course being CNN).
 
Maybe that's what you think, but since you only offer one legitimate possible problem (aggregation) - you are inflating your claim to the "flawed methodology".
I don't understand the point you're trying to make. Are you claiming the methodology was sound? Why do you consider the issue I raised to only be a "possible" problem?

Thanks for showing your error in reasoning. First of all, your attack on Nate Silver was an ad hominem. Second, how do you know the sky is blue? The sky is black where I currently am. Third, Jennie doesn't have to be a girl.
  1. My "attack" on Nate was not an ad hominem. It was an insult and nothing more -- it never entered my line of reasoning.
  2. Uhh... yeah, both illustrations of why propositions are typically defined as statements that can be true or false. :prof
I mean, if you don't even know what a proposition is -- one of the most basic concepts in logic -- I can't see why anyone would seriously consider anything you have to say on the subject of fallacies.

Now THAT'S an ad hominem!:cool:
(and here's to hoping it comes across in the good-natured sort-of-way I intended -- note the smilies)

----

Hope to get to the rest tonight and before I leave for a four day trip to MiddleofKnowhere, Utah.
 
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My earlier comment was in reference to the thread topic and the Nate Silver trendline - both of which purport to show a recent and signficant rise in unfavorable views. Do you believe that sufficient evidence exists for a "definite trend" in recent months? If so, we can compare evidence.

If instead, your claim of "increasing unfavorable views" is (as I suspect) largely based on the early data, we can save ourselves the trouble. I certainly recognize that many polls show a significant rise in unfavorability in the early part of 2010. It appears that a good number of those who were still undecided as of late Jan developed unfavorable views of the tea party over the next month or two.

It's much harder to argue for a reliable trend after that point. From Summer 2010 forward, unfavorability is rather flat (the one notable exception of course being CNN).

Okay, so to be clear you are saying that there was an increase in unfavourable view but in 2010 and not recently.
 
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