Blowing Down Gore's House of Straw Polls

Only in America can only thirty-five people gather in a living room to talk politics, cast a vote for their favorite candidates, and find the results of their tiny get-together linked to as a major story on the Drudge Report, a news site that attracts around 14.5 million hits per day. Matt Drudge is a master of titillating or misleading headlines, and Wednesday's story link "Gore Wins Democratic Straw Poll in Arizona" was a good example of Drudge's subtlety. Everything in the headline was technically true. Al Gore did in fact win a straw poll in Arizona. The Drudge headline, however, was apparently selected to create the impression among potential readers that Al Gore won a substantive political victory in a statewide Democratic straw poll in Arizona, when in reality his straw poll victory was neither statewide nor substantive. Forty Democrats from the Scottsdale area gathering in a living room to vote in a straw poll is hardly a sweeping political movement worthy of international media attention, nor can any credible political observer extrapolate from it the eventual outcome of the Arizona Democratic primaries. But don't tell that to Matt Drudge, whose headline gave Gore credibility where none was merited.

The epic tale of Gore's Lilliputian victory in a Scottsdale living room straw poll as championed by Drudge appeared in the Arizona Republic, and the Republic clearly made every effort to report the straw poll results as a genuine story with deep political ramifications not only for Arizona Democrats, but for the national race for the party's nomination as well. However, a careful reading of the article revealed that only thirty-five of the forty Democrats who showed up for the straw poll actually paid the $20 fee to obtain a ballot and vote. Votes for "first choice" and "popularity" were later tallied accurately (no hanging chads in the Southwest), and unannounced but quietly salivating at the prospect candidate Al Gore won the "first choice" vote with 51 percent followed in a distant second place by John Edwards with 17 percent of votes cast. These numbers may seem meaningless, but as they say in TV infomercials, "but wait, there's more!"

We rarely associate the words "Democratic votes" and "calculator" with the words "fun" or "interesting," yet the application of a calculator to the Scottsdale straw poll results generates more entertainment than one would initially think. For example, it was fascinating that Democrats, who have whined for 7 years that the popular vote should count more than electoral votes or percentages reported the Scottsdale straw poll results in, of course, percentages only. No raw vote count totals were provided in the Republic news report. Why? Perhaps because the media can take insignificant poll results and make them sound as if the participants in the poll represented a much larger segment of the overall population than they really did. A handy calculator helps illustrate how this is achieved.

The Arizona Republic reported the vote count as follows:

When tallying the votes, the local party leaders considered both the "first choice" of voters and the "popularity" of candidates.

The popularity vote was important because it showed who voters would chose if Gore does not run.

Gore won the first choice by 51 percent, followed by Edwards with 17 percent, national front-runner Sen. Hillary Clinton with 14 percent, Sen. Barack Obama by 9 percent, Sen. Joe Biden by 6 percent and Rep. Dennis Kucinich by 3 percent.

Edwards won the popularity vote by 29 percent, followed by Gore with 26 percent, Obama with 19 percent, Clinton with 14 percent, Kucinich with 6 percent, Biden with 4 percent and Richardson with 2 percent.

All those double-digit percentages certainly helped readers forget that only 35 people actually participated in this vote. Thus, Al Gore's 51 percent, which when converted to actual votes signified that he was the first choice of a whopping 17.85 actual voters in an Arizona living room, seems much less impressive than merely reporting that he garnered 50 percent of an Arizona straw poll. Perhaps if they find that hanging chad or a pregnant chad gives birth they will find the other 0.15 of a vote.

Likewise, Edwards' second place finish with 17 percent converts to only 5.95 actual votes. However, the big mystery was Bill Richardson, who as Governor of New Mexico and a fellow southwest Democrat, only polled 2 percent, which when converted is only 0.7 of a vote. By reporting Richardson's straw poll showing in percentages rather than vote count, the Arizona Republic performed a small act of sympathetic kindness. When your party holds a straw poll in a neighboring state and you receive only seven-tenths of a vote, it may be finally time to "redeploy" and wait for other career options than the presidency.

Despite a valiant reporting effort by the Arizona Republic and international recognition courtesy of a Drudge Report link, a community straw poll involving thirty-five votes simply could not be taken seriously, especially when compared to the well-organized statewide Republican straw poll held in Iowa and won by Mitt Romney. Romney's opponents and snide media pundits were quick to minimize the perceived importance of Romney's decisive victory in the Iowa straw poll, but perhaps the irrelevance of the Scottsdale Democratic straw poll will serve as a contrast that will bring Romney's success in a larger poll more sharply into focus.

The time fast approaches when Al Gore's performance in straw polls and primaries will signify something substantial and ominous in the realm of electoral politics. The Scottsdale straw poll was not the long-awaited sign of the Al Gore apocalypse upon us. The so-called "Democratic straw poll in Arizona" merely gave one homeowner and thirty-four members of her community a few moments to bask in the global warming of a media spotlight.

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