http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2015/10/27/can_we_believe_the_pollsCan We Believe the Polls?
October 27, 2015
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RUSH: This is Ron in Los Angeles. I'm glad you waited, sir. You're next. It's you your turn. Hello.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. I'm a liberal here in Lakewood, California, and I'm just wondering: Since we know that public opinion polling is meant to shape public opinion and not to measure it, why would you spend any time on it at all?
RUSH: Well, you know, that's a good question, and most of the time I don't. But when we're talking about presidential races and primary races, unfortunately that becomes the news. And you're exactly right. You are saying things I have myself said on this program, that polling is used to make public opinion -- shape it, rather than reflect it -- and that in and of itself has become a news story. And, as such, people need to be informed and educated about it so that they can keep it in context as they listen to it and as they digest it. To ignore it would not serve me any purpose because everybody else is talking about it, and I've gotta be able to shape it and form it in my own way to try to counter the impact of it.
CALLER: Awesome. That's an excellent answer, sir. I appreciate that.
RUSH: Well, you're more than welcome. I'm flattered you're out there listening. This is an avowed liberal from Los Angeles with a legitimate question. Ron, I have to tell you, this doesn't happen on this program. This just doesn't happen. A liberal with a legitimate question who, when he hears the answer says, "Okay, I appreciate it." He even said "thank you," and it was an awesome answer. I wouldn't have cared if he thought it was a bogus answer, but we were able to have a conversation. Like, he crossed the aisle. He came here, he crossed the aisle, he cooperated, and we worked together. See, that's how it's done.
Anyway, Ron, I appreciate it. I really do.
Here's John in Louisville. Great to have you on the EIB Network. You're next. Hello, sir.
CALLER: Hey, Rush, Mr. Mega Dittos himself. Thank you for having me on.
RUSH: You bet, sir.
CALLER: My question, or comment, is Trump has been in the lead for so long, and the elites, more so than the Democrats, have thrown everything at this guy to get him down off his pedestal or what. I don't agree with everything he says, I don't agree with everything he does, but I'm telling you he's lit a fire underneath a lot of people. There's no way Ben Carson is leading right now. They're skewing these polls to try to trip him up, get him down, whatever they can do. Ben Carson, I think he's a brilliant man.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: He might be a God-fearing man.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: I think he'll be really great doing some other position, but you sit and listen to that guy, I mean, he's smart, he's intelligent, a lot of it goes over my head. A lot of it goes over a lot of people's head. Put you to sleep. You know, I don't know if -- I'm not sold on Trump --
RUSH: Look --
CALLER: -- but a lot of what he says --
RUSH: Let me just tell you. He does not put a certain group of Americans to sleep; he energizes them. They are a group of Americans the Republican Party routinely takes for granted and sometimes even publicly criticizes and mocks.
CALLER: True.
RUSH: They are religious conservatives.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: And Carson is being heard. And they are stopping what they are doing to listen to him, and he is getting through to them.
CALLER: Well, I just have a hard time myself. I mean, you know, I would love to have a God-fearing man in the office to bring back what the office is really about.
RUSH: No, I understand. I know what you're saying. You're having trouble -- on the one hand, here you've got Trump, who is Mr. Energy, Mr. Passion, he's everywhere, he's not buying a lot of ads and so forth. Over here you got Ben Carson, who is not Mr. Energy. He does have passion in his own way, but it's not outwardly expressed here. He is really smart, there's been no question about it. He's not over the heads of the people that dig him. He's right in their wheelhouse. The question becomes, then, beyond the core group of voters and supporters that he has, when you get out beyond that, is it gonna be enough to attract them?
Now, your point about you don't believe the polls, look, I've been there and done that, and I, frankly, have, you know, it's gone both ways. There have been times I've been suspicious of polls and I was correct to be. Other times I doubted the polls and they were right. Now, one of those times was the 2012 presidential race. I didn't believe this stuff that Obama was up by eight. I just didn't believe it. I look at all the physical evidence, and I looked at the 2010 midterm turnout and the vote there, and I realized they weren't sampling the 2010 voters, they were sampling 2008, and I said they're missing a whole bunch, and it turned out they were exactly right.
Gallup got it so badly wrong that they are out of the presidential polling business. Gallup got it so wrong that they're now just polling cultural things, issue things, but they're not polling campaigns and elections 'cause they were so far off the beaten path. Now, the news about Ben Carson, this just cleared, from ABC News. Carson has put his campaign on hold to focus on fundraising events and stops to promote his new book. He's got a new book called A More Perfect Union. He is scheduled to hold book signings next week in Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, and Iowa. His last public event was a health care town hall meeting in Des Moines all the way back on October 2nd. That was the last public event Ben Carson had, October 2nd. Here we are October 27th and he's up by 14 over Trump in Iowa.
Look, I'm sure that our caller is not the only one doubting the polls and questioning them because so many in the Drive-Bys want this story. They want to be able to report Trump has peaked. They want to be able to report that it's over. They're not worried about Carson. They don't think Carson's gonna go anywhere. Even if he wins Iowa, he's not gonna go anywhere beyond that.
Now, polling, I tell you one interesting facet of polling, the consultants all believe it. It is their bread and butter. Many of them are in the polling business themselves, either directly or indirectly associated with it by extension or directly. And the donors, the donors believe polls before they believe anything else. Jeb Bush's poll numbers are why his donors are getting antsy. It's why the Bush family had to have a powwow and a get-together to figure out what to do because the donors believe these polls to a T.
If you're spending gazillions of dollars, you're putting money behind a candidate because you expect results and the results only happen if the guy gets elected, and you're seeing five or six points, you're not gonna tell yourself the polls are wrong. You've got a too much money on it. You can't throw it away. So the donors live and die by 'em.
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RUSH: Here's Susan in Flushing, Michigan. Great to have you on the program. Hi.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. How are you?
RUSH: Very, very well. Thank you.
CALLER: Good. So good to talk to you again. I wanted to call and comment about the polls that are out right there about Trump being behind Carson. I personally find it very interesting that a few days before the debate that they're now coming up with not one but two or three different polls that are showing Trump behind Carson.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: And I'm wondering, because the media, who tends to and loves to mislead and lie to us about things, if this is really... Can we put any, you know, leverage on these polls, or is this something that they're using to maybe try and trip Trump up at the debate --
RUSH: Well, if you --
CALLER: -- so that he will go after Carson and maybe he will drop in the polls, Rush?
RUSH: There's no way you know. You're gonna have to just form an opinion one way or the other. You're gonna have to tell yourself that the polls are jimmied and they're being rigged here for a reason, or trust them. Those are your two options. You're never gonna learn for sure the polls are rigged, so you're gonna have to use that on faith. Now, one thing you can do if you want to give yourself some sort of evidentiary backup... A little legal lingo there. My dad was a lawyer.
Remember when Trump said he would get out of the race if he was not leading in the polls? Now, he was widely misinterpreted there. He was talking about people at five or six percent or three percent. He'd say, "What the hell? Who would stay at five or six percent?" But it was reported Trump would leave the race if he lost the lead. Now, if you are happen to be a donor and pollster or whatever, "Hey, maybe let's have a poll where he loses the lead. Maybe he'll quit!" I'm just saying. I'm just saying. I don't know.
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