The censorship and propaganda of opinion polls

Having quite blatantly censored yesterday’s Barker Poll showing an 8-point lead for the Scottish Yes campaign, this morning the Maily Twinnograph Daily Telegraph trumpets a new one from its front page. This new Survation poll shows the No campaign “back in front” with a 6-point lead, suggesting that the Yessers “have peaked too early”. It was “Black Wednesday” for Slippery Salmond said the Sarkograph.

Utterly fantastic nonsense, all of it. Three days ago, I posted about opinion polls being used as propaganda. This is a classic example. Here’s the real story.

The Barker Poll published late Tuesday, and used what we call ‘forced choice’ – ‘don’t know’ was not on offer as an alternative. So what we see in this result is a “when push comes to shove” snapshot of, arguably, how people will probably vote in the end. It showed an 8% lead for Yes.

The Survation Poll gave respondents the option of ‘Don’t Know’, and a 6% lead for No. As the BBC puts it, ‘The Survation poll has suggested 47.6% of voters back “No”, 42.4% “Yes”, with 10% undecided.

The Barker Poll probably gives a more realistic view. That is to say – doing the maths simply – their ‘forced choice’ data suggests that, of the 10% undecideds, 80% were, as of last Tuesday, more likely to vote Yes.

The Survation Poll fieldwork ended roughly 36 hours after Barker’s. During that time, the media bombarded voters with scare stories, the Pound fell, and Westminster suddenly took an interest.

The bottom line is that the race is closer, but still just in favour of Yes – 50.4% to 49.6%. On a 5% margin of error (both samples asked 1000 respondents) that means “too close to call”. It is neck and neck, with a week to go to polling day.

That, my friends, is the real picture. But if you want bollocks, then carry on reading the Corporatocracy press…the content speaks for itself. It just doesn’t speak the Truth:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Globalist Neoliberalism 3 Scotland 0 (after extra time and penalties)

Yesterday at The Slog: Scottish nationalism and communitarianism