Why do you believe ANY poll when you do not know the process, description of sample, or area polled?

Marcia Cheathan: Slightly off-topic, but:A sample of, say, thousand in a population even as big as USA is a decent sample to get probabilities/statistics from - assuming you have a proper linearly random sample.Everyone and anyone who's done basic statistics will agree I think - it's all about the critical values or the p-value, looking at it the other way around....Show more

Geraldo Mccalla: What sumabitch told you that? All you have to do is examine the results of past polls to determine their accuracy. While past results do not equal future performance they are generally a good indication of the accuracy of the poll. Real Clear Politics use a combination of polls with Gallop having the best results and Rasmussen not so much.

Garry Ohmen: All polls, surveys, and such on ANY media outlet should be scrutinized. More often than not, they will coincide with the political agenda of whatever media outlet that they come from.

Toshiko Reimers: I don't, there! is no way that a poll of 1,000 people is going to reflect the majority of the thoughts/beliefs of people across the whole country. Hell, even polling 5k isn't going to do it.

Tomi Vauters: You can get that info if you wish. Each poll published will have its method, sample. statictics published with the poll. Any polling organization that does not publish its process should be ignored.Here is an example: http://www.gallup.com/poll/106915/Gallup-Daily-US-...Note the size of the sample and its character, 500 adults. Note interviews are daily over the phone from a national random sample within the USA.Understanding the Role of Polls in Politics: http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/understandin......Show more

Cortez Badolato: All of that information is published with every formal poll, it's in the methodology section.

Paul Maymi: No poll is valid unless you have all the details. You can spin any poll the way you want to spin it by stacking data.

Be! nny Stehno: True but if it's thee LA Times they poll twice as ! a many libs as conservatives so you can pretty well adjust the numbers.But take a poll on Obama's half BROTHER being the money man* for the muslim brotherhood and no one seems to know that or that while conservative groups were waiting up to two years to get approval for tax exempt status his half brother got his in less than a month* and it was retroactive. Pays to know people, LOL. But the IRS scandal is just another Republican deal to slander our Prez, LMAO. live long and prosper.*http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/funderProfile.a......Show more