Webloggin » CNN Plays Loose with Poll that Contends Most still think Iraq war a mistake

Fail Did anyone happen to notice that the sampling rate of error of many MSM opinion polls seems to be creeping up; now hovering at around 4.5%? Aparrently neither did CNN because they misstate their latest poll as having a sampling rate of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points rather than the actual 4.5% as stated in the poll results.

Not too much of a deal until you start applying those numbers to large populations; say something like the American population. An error of 4.5% can change the meaning of “most” to evenly divided in close poll samples; which is still most in CNN’s mind.

The latest CNN poll finds that 54% of Americans think that the Iraq War was a mistake. In the worst case sampling error this translates to 49.5% which then means that most Americans DO NOT think that the war in Iraq was a mistake. But then who is counting percentages?

Well, for one, AntiWar.com is. They reserve CNN’s interpretation of the poll for the AntiWar.com headline of the day. This is important because AntiWar.com is a source for Al-Jazeera who now claims that “The Haditha massacre is far worse than My Lai“. (Related - See Michelle Malkin on Al-Jazeera propaganda surrounding Haditha and the firing line photo that was originally attributed to the Marines as reported here).

The rest of the CNN article may as well have been written by Al-Jazeera themselves. For instance, how in the world does the following poll result translate to “the public is still split on whether to withdraw American troops”?

Monday’s poll suggests the public is still split on whether to withdraw American troops. Of those surveyed, 18 percent said they want U.S. forces brought home now, and 29 percent said they want to see them out of Iraq within a year.

But 42 percent said the troops should be withdrawn eventually, but take as many years as necessary to turn control over to the Iraqis

I find it a bit disconcerting that CNN translates such results to imply that most American’s are split. In fact I would content that most Americans have the resolve to see Iraq succeed. It is the MSM that wants to cut and run, both from Iraq and from honest professional journalistic standards.

The following bullet points actually appear in successive paragraphs at the bottom of the CNN article in an aparrent stream of consiousness from the unnamed CNN reporter. See if you can spot the bias in the article.

The United States invaded Iraq in March 2003
A U.S. investigation later concluded that Iraq had dismantled its weapons programs under U.N. supervision in the 1990s
About 130,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq more than three years after President Bush declared an end to “major combat” there.
More than two dozen people died — including two children — and dozens more were wounded in a string of attacks Monday in Iraq, officials said
Iraqis have elected a permanent government to replace Hussein, but the country has been wracked by a persistent insurgency and an increase in sectarian strife in recent months.
After allegations that U.S. Marines may have intentionally killed unarmed Iraqi civilians in two towns west of Baghdad, the number of poll respondents who said American actions in Iraq are “morally justified” dropped slightly, to 45 percent from 47 percent in a March poll.
And 27 percent said U.S. troops are very likely to have committed war crimes in Iraq, while 30 percent consider the prospect fairly likely and 37 percent call that unlikely.
The military is conducting investigations into reports that Marines deliberately killed Iraqis in two separate incidents

I would like to extend a hand of thanks to CNN on behalf of Al-Jazeera. With reporting like this they may as well shut down shop and strike up a syndication deal to let CNN do the reporting for them.

Others Reporting on the Media Bias Surrounding Iraq