Should Bush be Impeached? 87% Say Yes...

tadpole256 · 07-29-2006, 11:23 PM

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10562904

Live Poll conducted by MSNBC. Very telling...

Katczinsky · 07-29-2006, 11:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tadpole256

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10562904

Live Poll conducted by MSNBC. Very telling...

Wow, that's fabulous. But I'm going to have to disagree with 87% of America: I don't want to impeach him, I want him indicted for all of his offenses, and put on a war crimes trial. And not just Bush, in fact, I believe Bush is much more innocent than Cheney and Rumsfeld.

tadpole256 · 07-30-2006, 12:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Katczinsky

Wow, that's fabulous. But I'm going to have to disagree with 87% of America: I don't want to impeach him, I want him indicted for all of his offenses, and put on a war crimes trial. And not just Bush, in fact, I believe Bush is much more innocent than Cheney and Rumsfeld.

Agreed. All war profiteers should be prosecuted for the deaths of thousands of soldiers from which they profit.

Jefferson · 07-30-2006, 07:23 AM

You might as well believe that pigs fly.

Quote:

About our Live Votes and surveys
How 1,000 people can be more representative than 200,000

One week in the middle of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, more than 200,000 people took part in an MSNBC Live Vote that asked whether President Clinton should leave office. Seventy-three percent said yes. That same week, an NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll found that only 34 percent of about 2,000 people who were surveyed thought so.
To explain the vast gap in the numbers in this and other similar cases, it is necessary to look at the difference in the two kinds of surveys.

POLLS
Journalists use polls to gauge what the public is thinking. The most statistically accurate picture is captured by using a randomly selected sample of individuals within the group that is being targeted, typically adult Americans.

While a poll of 100 people will be more accurate than a poll of 10, studies have shown that accuracy begins to improve less at about 500 people and increases only a minor amount beyond 1,000 people.

So, in the case of that NBC-WSJ poll, only 2,005 adults were surveyed by the polling organizations of Peter D. Hart and Robert M. Teeter. The poll was conducted by telephone and had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.2 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level. The confidence level means that if the same poll were conducted 100 times, each one randomly selecting the people polled, only five of the polls would be expected to yield results outside the margin of error.

Random selection of those polled is necessary to ensure a broad representation of the population at large. For example, a nationwide poll asking which NBA team is the best would likely yield a far different answer in Philadelphia than in Los Angeles. (And neither one would be a good sample of the population at large.)

In the NBC-WSJ survey, pollsters first randomly selected a number of geographic areas and then telephone numbers were generated in a way that allowed all numbers in those areas (both listed and unlisted) an equal chance to be called. Only one adult in each household was then selected to answer the poll.

While variation can occur depending on what questions are asked and how they are asked, similar questions tend to yield similar answers. One way to account for variation, however, is to ask the same question over a period of time.

ONLINE SURVEYS
In contrast, MSNBC's online surveys (Live Votes) may reflect the views of far more individuals, but they are not necessarily representative of the general population.

To begin with, the people who respond choose to do so — they are not randomly selected and asked to participate, but instead make the choice to read a story about a certain topic and then vote on a related question. There is thus no guarantee that the votes would reflect anything close to a statistical sample, even of MSNBC.com users: The participants in a Sports Live Vote and a Politics Live Vote may overlap, but each group is likely to be dominated by people with an interest in each particular area. In addition, while MSNBC.com’s Live Votes are designed to allow only one vote per user, someone who wants to vote more than once could simply use another computer or another Internet account.

According to Nielsen//NetRatings, nearly 75 percent or 204.3 million Americans had access to the Internet from home in early 2004. In contrast, more than 90 percent of Americans live in homes with a telephone.

This does not mean that Internet polling cannot be scientific. Harris Interactive, for example, has set up a system with checks and balances that allow it to use the Internet to obtain survey results comparable with more traditional methods.

But MSNBC’s Live Votes are not intended to be a scientific sample of national opinion. Instead, they are part of the same interactive dialogue that takes place in our online chat sessions: a way to share your views on the news with MSNBC writers and editors and with your fellow users. Let us know what you think.

alias · 07-30-2006, 11:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tadpole256

Agreed. All war profiteers should be prosecuted for the deaths of thousands of soldiers from which they profit.

Who is your commander in chief?

Jaxian · 07-30-2006, 05:01 PM

I disagree with Bush's political actions, but I don't know that this is justification for impeachment. I don't think it's reasonable to try to impeach someone just because his political opinions are wrong. A president's job should not be in danger every time the majority of Congress comes from the opposite party.

If the majority of people now want to impeach Bush, so what? There's a good reason that the president can't be impeached by a majority vote. I mean, who put Bush in charge in the first place? The majority. Who supported the Iraq War in the first place? The majority. Who elected our current Congress? The majority. Yet now the majority supports impeaching Bush, so certainly the majority must often be wrong.

So instead of using majority opinion as a declaration of impeachment, I wonder what specific reasons for impeachment we have.

Nebraskaboy · 07-30-2006, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tadpole256

Agreed. All war profiteers should be prosecuted for the deaths of thousands of soldiers from which they profit.

I agree.

However, you would have to prove it. These polls may show a wide flow of public opinion, but not much will be done from it.

Nothing will happen to Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc... All we can do from here is work to make sure that we get the right people in public office.

Jefferson · 07-31-2006, 10:11 AM

Again I will remind you that THIS POLL MEANS NOTHING.

Read what I posted - from the site - above.

As an example: What kind of "scientific and accurate" results do you suppose you'd find if you took a poll - on MTV - concerning the best course of action to take with Kim Jong Il of North Korea? Would it actually represent the will of the American people, or just the opinions of the 35-and under crowd who don't even know where North Korea is?

Again, THIS POLL MEANS NOTHING - NO MORE THAN IF IT SHOWED THAT BUSH HAD AN 87% APPROVAL RATING.

hevusa · 07-31-2006, 12:44 PM

There is little debate over whether the world and America are against Bush and his actions.

And there is little debate over Bush's lies that led us into war. That along with illegal wire tapping should be enough to throw the worst two term president out (don't let the door hit you in the ass).

Jefferson · 07-31-2006, 12:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hevusa

There is little debate over whether the world and America are against Bush and his actions.

And there is little debate over Bush's lies that led us into war. That along with illegal wire tapping should be enough to throw the worst two term president out (don't let the door hit you in the ass).

Unfortunately for you, your personal feelings toward the President do NOT make legal grounds for anything.

It's no different than the people who hated President Clinton.

Too bad, so sad.