Majority of Americans Support US Military Strike Against Iran! Let's get ready to RUUUMMBLE! [View All]

Scary, huh? Believable? Sure.

The latest Gallup poll, taken the first week in November, finds 18% of Americans favor military action against Iran to get them to shut down its nuclear program. However, the latest Zogby poll taken less than a week earlier, reveals that Gallup has severely underestimated America's resolve for another war in the Middle East. A majority of likely voters – 52% – would support a U.S. military strike to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon.

Which do you believe, Gallup or Zogby? Given the very low popularity of our current debacle in that region, our depleted military, our disgraced President, and the results of exit polling in the 2006 mid-term elections, I'd bet on Gallup having this one right. But, of course, Zogby is the preferred polling outfit for a lot of folks on DU.

Taegan D. Goddard, creator of the non-partisan Political Wire blog and author of YOU WON - NOW WHAT? How Americans Can Make Democracy Work From City Hall to the White House, is cautioning readers about the Zogby polls.

"the survey uses Zogby's controversial 'interactive' methodology and is not based on traditional telephone polling." He points to a new Gallup poll that again contradicts Zogby, this one showing Hillary Clinton beating all Republicans in general election match ups, not losing to them all as Zogby is suggesting.

In September, 2006, the Columbia Journalism Review featured an article about Zogby's polls. Taking information from Zogby's website, the article revealed those interactive polls tap a self-selected group of respondents who sign up for surveys online and then respond to specific questions via email.

Cliff Zukin, a political science professor and polling expert at Rutgers University, suggests that journalists should generally be wary of any Zogby interactive poll.

“The Zogby stuff, on scientific grounds, is quite questionable,” says Zukin. “Online, Internet, opt-in polling, where people volunteer to be respondents, doesn’t really have a basis in scientific validity. There are two kinds of samples in the world. There are probability samples, and there are non-probability samples.”

The Zogby interactive polls, says Zukin, clearly fall into the latter camp. “With probability samples, when everybody has a known chance of being selected, you can make pretty valid inferences about the population from which it is drawn,” says Zukin. “You can’t do that at all with self-selected surveys. That’s a problem.”

“It’s certainly not the gold standard,” says Zukin.

Political journalist Paul Burka of the Texas Monthly also finds issues with Zogby's methodology. “The poll’s Web site describes the process as ‘interactive’ — that is, it’s an Internet poll, based on a database of individuals who have signed up to participate. It is not a random sample; the polling organization solicits responses by e-mail. In addition, the poll takers make about 20 to 50 phone calls in the state where a race is taking place. The poll does not mention a screen for likely voters.”

“As I have written repeatedly, the poll that I think is the least credible is Zogby...” adds Burka. “I can’t believe the (Wall Street) Journal allows its name to be attached to this so-called poll.”

Exactly WHO sponsored the latest Zogby poll?

A few months back Zogby published a poll sponsored by the right wing rag NewsMax showing Hillary Clinton leading in Iowa beyond the margin of error. Many of DU discounted this poll because it was sponsored by Newsmax. The more valid argument against it was several other polls out in the same time period showed Clinton second or third, including one from Strategic Vision.

Now I freely admit I probably defended that Zogby poll. Clinton is my candidate and any good news is usually gospel to me. But having read more on Zogby's methodology, how his polls are often at odds with other polls in the same time period, and, yes, how they often favor conservatives, I've rethought my position on any poll that has results significantly different than other polls taken in the same time period.

However, the current Zogby poll is unique in that it doesn't reveal the sponsor. Political Aritmetik in their ridiculously meticulous analysis of this Zogby poll, says it was reported by Reuters' John Whitesides, who also reports on the Reuters sponsored polling Zogby does by conventional telephone methods... apparently these results are not part of the Reuters-Zogby polling partnership, but are independent work by Zogby Interactive. Likewise Zogby's website posts the results without mention of who sponsored the work, so presumably Reuters did not.

Remember - Zogby Poll: 52% Support US Military Strike Against Iran.

Who ya gonna believe?