PRESS PATTERNS
Poll Divergence [Stephen Spruiell]
There's a simple explanation for why this USA Today/Gallup poll is so different from this Washington Post/ABC News poll, and it has nothing to do with Americans learning more about the NSA from the media (watching the media's coverage of this issue is more like anti-learning). The Post/ABC poll, taken the day after the NSA data mining story broke, phrased the question this way:
45. It's been reported that the National Security Agency has been collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans. It then analyzes calling patterns in an effort to identify possible terrorism suspects, without listening to or recording the conversations. Would you consider this an acceptable or unacceptable way for the federal government to investigate terrorism? Do you feel that way strongly or somewhat?
That's the key information: "without listening to or recording the conversations." When respondents answered that question, 63 percent of them found the program to be acceptable.
This is how the USAT/Gallup poll phrased the same question:
2. As you may know, as part of its efforts to investigate terrorism, a federal government agency obtained records from three of the largest U.S. telephone companies in order to create a database of billions of telephone numbers dialed by Americans. How closely have you been following the news about this? [...]
3. Based on what you have heard or read about this program to collect phone records, would you say you approve or disapprove of this government program?
When respondents were not reminded that the NSA is not listening to or recording conversations as part of this program (important information, given that some in the media have
tried to conflate this database with the terrorist surveillance program), 51 percent disapproved.
Dan Riehl
took part in the USAT/Gallup poll and has much more analysis.
05/15 05:08 AM
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