In a message dated 8/8/02 2:46:06 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
<< Regarding the support of the public for farm subsidies etc. here is another example. The Washington Post reports in a poll that support for Amtrak subsidies is very strong - and it is strong regardless of Amtrak use. Here is the link and some key sentences. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43767-2002Aug4.html >> >From following politics, presidential politics, intensively I have become wary of any polls conducted on behalf of major American news media organization. I've noticed in contest after contest media polls fairly consistently overstate support for the candidate percieved to be more liberal by 5-15%, and I suspect the same polling biases that distort those polls support similar polls asking questions of government policy. Even if we were to accept the results of the poll on their face, it's not clear that they have much to say about support for agricultural subsidies. Urban dwellers and suburbanites often have strong anti-rural biases (the reverse applies as well) and in congressional politics the people who most support most of the welfare-regulatory state, urban Democrats, almost never demonstrate much if any support for agricultural subsidies. The main proponents of ag subsidies, typically rural Republicans, almost always demonstrate hostility toward non-agricultural welfare programs. It may well be that Americans, if they really so support Amtrak subsidies, do so even if they haven't used it because they can easily imagine using it, whereas most Americans don't imagine themselves receiving ag subsidies (not knowing about the likes of Sam Donaldson, whose mohair farms receive subsidies designed to provide World War I US Army uniforms). I'd like to see a poll, or a series of polls taken over a decade or two, conducted by Zogby the one pollster who consistently avoids the liberal bias contained in most American presidential polls, before I draw any conclusions about whether American voters support ag subsidies (or for that matter, Amtrak). Sincerely, David Levenstam
