But each and every member of that 6% has a blog!

by von

ANOTHER REASON WHY the blogosphere is a less-than-reliable political barometer:  Only 13% of Americans think that President Bush did the right thing in commuting Libby's sentence, and only 6% of think that the President should have pardoned him.  But every one of those folks has a blog!

As I've remarked before:

[T]he blogosphere isn't so much an "Army of Davids" as a bunch of David-bits that can assemble, Voltron-style, to slay a media Goliath.  On occasion.  Most of the time, however, .... we're individually empowered to the precise extent that a member of a crowd is empowered:  Not very much. ....

And, of course, there's the echo chamber and cliquish aspects of blogosphere, meaning that the mob has more opportunities to miss the boat than you can shake a stick at -- and many more chances to mix metaphors as well.

Popular in the blogoshere doesn't mean popular in real life; it doesn't even mean popular in Second Life. Popular in the blogoshere is a poor proxy for inerrancy, too -- whether you prefer the example of Howard Dean for President or the Iraq War. 

(On slightly related notes, see Belgravia here and here.)

Comments

[Joseph]

What about Gallup polls that find majorities of American(one found 66%) did not believe that Bush should have intervened at all in the Libby case?

But never mind, these Gallup only polls six polls small segments of the population that have blogs. It can't be trusted.

And besides which Gallup wants the terrorists to win what with all its reporting on how unpopular the Iraq War is. Clearly.

Gallup Poll+unfavorable views towards the Bush policies= supporting the terrorists.

Yep.

[Joseph]

I meant "But never mind, Gallup only polls small segments of the population that have blogs. It can't be trusted."

Yikes for bad grammar.