Judging the Polls

The Media Research Center is complaining about "biased" polls on the Republican effort to shut down filibusters, but what it's calling for to correct it is not fairness but more bias.

The MRC got on this current kick on April 26, when a CyberAlert claimed that "the language of the question" in an ABC News poll led to what Brent Baker called "the media's desired answer" opposing the plan by Senate Republicans to pull the "nuclear option" to kill filibusters of judicial nominees. Among the questions, as quoted by Baker:

"The Senate has confirmed 35 federal appeals court judges nominated by Bush, while Senate Democrats have blocked 10 others. Do you think the Senate Democrats are right or wrong to block these nominations?" Right: 48 percent; wrong: 36 percent.

"The Senate has confirmed 35 federal appeals court judges nominated by Bush, while Senate Democrats have blocked 10 others. Do you think the Senate Democrats are right or wrong to block these nominations?" Right: 48 percent; wrong: 36 percent.

Those questions seem to accurately reflect the filibuster situation in a nutshell. So what does the MRC find wrong with them? They weren't slanted against Democrats, that's what. As Baker wrote:

Now, imagine how the results would likely have been quite different if the questions were worded a bit differently to include other information:

-- "In a change from long Senate tradition, Democrats have employed the threat of filibusters to block the confirmations of ten federal appeals court judges who would win majority support in an up or down vote. Do you think the Senate Democrats are right or wrong to use such tactics?"

-- "Would you support or oppose restoring the Senate's traditional procedures which provide for a majority vote of Senators to confirm judicial nominees?"

Well, if we're going to include other relevant information in poll questions, as Baker suggests, shouldn't pollsters also be telling folks that Republicans blocked more than 60 (or, depending how you count, at least 100) Clinton judicial nominees from even getting out of the Senate Judiciary Committee and that Republicans changed the rules to keep Democrats from using those same procedures to block nominees in committee?

CyberAlerts on April 28, May 2 and May 3 lament similar alleged poll biases.

Additionally, an April 27 CyberAlert cites Fox News' Brit Hume citing a poll from Rasmussen Reports that asks similar questions as those Baker proposed and gets the answers Baker wants; 56 percent say that "Senate rules should be changed to give every nominee a vote." But it fails to note that Republicans failed to "give every nominee a vote" when they were nominated by Clinton. (WorldNetDaily cited this poll, too.) It also fails to note, as ConWebWatch has previously noted, that Rasmussen is a conservative-leaning polling firm.

* * *

* * *

On a related subject, conservatives continue to distort the truth about Democrats and the "nuclear option." Star Parker rushed to the defense of Bush judicial nominee Janice Rogers Brown in a May 10 WorldNetDaily commentary, claiming that "There is no conceivable argument that can be made that she is not an eminently qualified candidate for a seat on a federal court."

Actually, there is, but Parker won't tell you. Brown twice received an "Unqualified" rating from the California judicial evaluation committee because was "prone to inserting conservative personal views into her appellate opinions."

Isn't the insertion of personal views into legal opinions what conservatives are supposed to be fighting?