UPDATE: NBC to reinstate "choice" language in health care polling
August 19, 2009 6:27 pm ET by Jamison Foser
Yesterday, a variety of progressives -- from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Health Care for America Now to this blog -- criticized NBC and the Wall Street Journal for a change in the wording of their poll questions about the public plan for health care reform.
As I explained last night, the NBC/WSJ poll dropped the word "choice," and shifted the focus of the question from the impact a public plan would have on consumers to the impact it would have on insurance companies.
NBC's Chuck Todd claimed that the word "choice" made the original question "biased," but didn't explain how.
Feeling the heat, NBC released a statement last night from the pollsters who conduct their poll. But that statement did not explain what was wrong with the original wording, or address the change in focus of the question.
Now NBC says its next poll will include both wordings:
NBC's White House correspondent Chuck Todd told the Huffington Post on Wednesday afternoon that pollsters Bill McInturf and Peter Hart will ask respondents two questions regarding the public plan for their September study.
...
Todd's decision to put both questions in the mix also should placate a host of progressive health care proponents who were critical of the NBC pollsters.
On Wednesday, Todd defended the decision to drop "choice" from the survey, calling the word a "trigger" that sent a certain "message" to respondents. And while he argued that the revised way of asking the question was "very neutral" he admitted that the idea of putting both options side by side was "something we wanted to test."
So far as I've seen, neither Todd nor the pollsters nor anybody else connected with the poll has yet explained how describing a plan that gives people a choice as giving people a "choice" is "biased" -- or why the new wording was better.
Given the decision to reinstate the choice wording, it seems safe to assume we'll never see such an explanation.
Media Matters: The Palin chronicles
The Friday Rush: A series of conflicts
Contrary to media hype, Sarah Palin is very unpopular
Perhaps they're using the same thought process (sic) that Alicia Shepard (when she was busy defending the use of "enhanced interrogations" rather than "torture", and generally tripping over her shoe-level IQ) said might lead NPR to review their use of reform when reporting on healthcare reform legislation, as it might be seen as biased.
For sure restructuring a healthcare industry that doesn't provide insurance coverage to 47 million people, that refuses to insure the sickest of our countrymen and women, that continually raises rates faster than inflation, that accounts for the bulk of individual bankruptcies and all while generating obscene profits for the few who control that industry, shouldn't necessarily be considered "reform" as that may be seen as a tacit admission that something's wrong.
As an aside: Imagine something that actually never happens in a real profession; the inability of a professional to demonstrate a functional journeyman competency using the tools of his/her profession, such as, say, a baseball player who continually seems unfamiliar and discomforted when holding a baseball bat. That never happens.
Now marvel at our MSM and their relationship with words.
Speculation: I suspect Olbermann and some others had a complete meltdown about this slanted new question, behind the scenes, and that's why it was restored.
Comparative poll results over time also have to use the same question-- or else they are not the same question.