It not what you say that counts...
Sometimes the most fascinating things about political polls aren’t reported, even if they are hiding in plain sight. That’s the case about the much maligned New York Times/Siena Collge poll that has Donald Trump expanding a lead over Joe Biden.
For example, check out the crosstabs of registered voters where respondents were asked: “What single news source do you turn to most often?” Unprompted, social media came in No. 1 at 17 percent with Fox News pulling down 10 percent. National television networks, like CBS, NBC or ABC came in at 13 percent, while national print or online news organizations, like The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal registered 6 percent.
Conservative news sites came in at 3 percent while Fox wannabe Newsmax pulled 1 percent.
In comparison, liberal news sites, such as Mother Jones and Occupy Democrats pulled in less than 1 percent, behind even the 2 percent who don’t consume ANY news.
Those numbers are only slightly different for likely voters.
Houston, we have a problem.
Poll construction relies on random sampling. The Times spells out how it constructed this poll:
The New York Times/Siena College poll of 980 registered voters nationwide, including 823 who completed the full survey, was conducted in English and Spanish on cellular and landline telephones from Feb. 25 to 28, 2024. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points for registered voters and plus or minus 3.8 percentage points for the likely electorate. Among those who completed the full survey, the margin of sampling error is plus or minus 4 percentage points for registered voters and plus or minus 4.2 percentage points for the likely electorate.
So how did more than one-quarter of the respondents say they got the their news from the two of the largest sources of disinformation and misinformation?
A Fox “News” viewer hears a constant stream of “stories” about how the economy is worse now than under Donald Trump, despite clear evidence to the contrary. Large numbers of respondents downplay the four indictments and 91 counts of criminal behavior by the 46th President.
On social media, particularly the hellhole formerly known as Twitter, there’s been a concerted effort to curtail disinformation research and promote the conspiracy theories of Chief Twit Elon Musk.
And the sins of Meta, nee Facebook in 2016 are well documented.
Of course there’s the cold, hard reality the Joe Biden is 81 and has a stiff gait and continues to fight a lifelong stutter. But when was the last time you saw video of Biden riding his bicycle? Apparently only when he falls off.
In contrast, how often do we hear, particularly in “news” sources favored by a quarter of Americans that Donald Trump is 77, obese and often delivers incomprehensible word salads. We certainly don’t see many images of him, riding around in a golf cart is clothes that accentuate old age spread.
Legacy media proclaims a devotion to “both sides” reporting while conservative outlets could care less. Good reporters should strive to provide background and context in every story, an aspiration usually honored in word but not deed.
Most of all, perhaps we should add the important context that our media environment is deeply polluted by lies, half-truths and distortions afflicting one-quarter of potential voters.
Journalists need to do better to break through the distortion field.