OK, I'm slightly picking a nit
here, but just to make a point:
A recent
CNN poll reports that "54% of Americans oppose" the Affordable Care
Act, otherwise known as Obamacare.
Trouble is,
the poll result is just about the opposite, apparently showing a majority
supporting it.
The ACA expands
health care coverage and will require almost all Americans to pay for health
insurance, you know. Or maybe you don't.
The fourth
paragraph of the story gives this detail: CNN's pollsters say 35% oppose the
health care program "because it's too liberal," and 16% oppose it
"because it's not liberal enough."
The poll
says 43% of Americans support ACA. But see, the 16% who reportedly think
"it's not liberal enough" obviously support the whole concept of the
law because they want its impact to be wider and more effective.
Combine those
two groups and the poll result is that 59% of Americans like the current law or
want it to have more impact.
Shame on
CNN and its polling organization, ORC International.
And let's
not even get into squabbling about why CNN would ask Americans if the health
care law is "too liberal" or "not liberal enough." What
does that mean? How do you define the "liberal" aspects of health care?
How does the other guy define them?
And anyway,
CNN didn't report how many of its poll participants could give any meaningful
confirmation that they understand the details of the ACA.
Most
Americans couldn't save their lives by describing the basic elements and
policies of the law.
But a
majority like it. CNN says so, even if CNN doesn't say so.
Reminder:
no polling organization in America is capable of reaching a true random sample
of persons for any survey, and all polling organizations "massage" their
data to "improve" the results, so all poll results should be viewed as
rough guesses about the truth.
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