Don't ask them about Sasquatch
According to a new Zogby poll, half of all New Yorkers believe that "some leaders in the U.S. government knew in advance that attacks were planned on or around September 11, 2001, and that they consciously failed to take action."
Jeepers. I know some people think that way, but so many? My guess is that poll respondents simply didn't interpret the question the way the folks who commissioned it did. While it was clearly meant to guage opinions about a deliberate conspiracy -- Al Qaida plans to fly planes into the World Trade Center; let's let it happen so we can reap the benefits -- it's certainly possible to hear it less radically -- Al Qaida plans to attack the US sooner or later but we have other things to worry about so let's not do anything. That fits a broad definition of consciously failed to take action and is vastly more defensible.
But to the extent there are many more people than you probably thought who do believe in the more extreme interpretation of the question, a good deal of the blame for that lies with the Bush administration. Obviously everyone is ultimately responsible for their own beliefs, but secrecy and deception breeds rumor and suspicion. Bush more than earned his wacko opposition.
I had a lot more to say about this, and had already done so, but my fucking computer (not mine, but the crappy old iMac they give me at the office) crashed and I lost the entire post, and don't have time to reconstruct it. Suffice to say I had some very interesting observations about why you won't read about this poll in the mainstream press and about how, even if you don't buy the conspiracy, the poll proves that that the 9/11 commission, widely lauded as a complete success in explaining what went wrong, actually failed dismally.
Comments
Damn your spinning wheels, Radosh, why can't you just admit you're getting more conservative as you grow older! Maybe half of NY is just turned on enough to consider what you refuse to look at, namely that the fascists running this country are the ones who gained the most from 9/11 and therefore should be investigated for possible complicity. This poll is just the tip of the iceberg of what hasn't been examined by the main stream, but you're instant reinterpretation of the numbers does nothing but further obscure the issue. Next you'll be telling us W. won the 2000 election. Tsk, tsk, tsk.
http://www.copvcia.com/
Posted by: jake | August 31, 2004 12:57 PM
If the results (and the word conservative) mean what you think they do, why did 33.6 % of people who identify as conservatives and 38.1% of people who say they are very conservative answer the question affirmatively? Are they all in on the conspiracy and just willing to admit it to pollsters?
Posted by: dlr | August 31, 2004 2:05 PM
Almost every political poll question except "For whom will you be voting" is irrelevant for the reasons of interpretation you state. "Do you believe Iraq had weapons of mass destruction?" (the answer is yes, at least as late as 1998); "Do you believe there were contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda (the answer is yes although there's no evidence of any Iraqi connection to 9/11); etc.
I've sat in on enough focus groups to know that a questioner can get half of any group to respond any way he likes. Many media outlets perpetuate polls like these without applying any critical thinking to them at all. They are completely useless for monitoring the pulse of anything.
Posted by: Kevin G | August 31, 2004 3:24 PM
The Loose Change video at http://loosechange911.com exposes the truth behind the official conspiracy theory about 9/11.
But in order to watch it you have to be brave enough to have your preconceived ideas shattered.
Posted by: Dances With Fascists | March 16, 2007 3:09 PM