And, boy, does it ever apply today.

According to the major polls, the overwhelming majority of Americans don't want Clinton removed from office. That has been yet another rallying cry for the Clintonmongers. Everybody's happy with the job he's done as President, so it doesn't matter what else he's done. That is what the polls and the pollagandists would have you believe.

However (and there has been much comment on this particular issue on the Internet), practically every online poll you see says otherwise. In the recent past I have seen Internet polls saying the majority thought Clinton should resign, that he should be impeached and removed from office, that Clinton can't do an effective job as President, and that there should be a trial (probably the only point of agreement with the pollagandists' polls). Some of these polls had 50,000 or more respondents, far more than any polls that seem to be quoted on the evening news or in the daily paper.

So what does this say about the demographics of the Internet, and the difference between online polling results and those publicized in other media? Well, first off, there is very little chance for a pollster's bias to enter into an online poll, except in the way he writes the questions (assuming, of course, that he doesn't unethically alter the results of the poll). Next, there is a freedom of opinion inherent in the Internet which isn't there when dealing with another personality in real time and answering his questions over the phone.

One major difference between online polling and phone polling is that the pollster has no control over the field of respondents. If he conducts the poll correctly, he can get demographic information about his respondents and report it along with the poll results, such as the number of respondents that are of a particular political party, their general income level, etc., but he isn't the one making the contact. It's the respondents themselves who decide whether to take part in the poll, without the cajoling of some phone jockey who makes his next buck on their answering his poll questions. This is the way it should be, if you're really interested in accurate polling and not just manipulating the results to illustrate your political opinion.

This also says something about the field of respondents in Internet polling. It says that they have at least a modicum of interest in the issue; otherwise, they wouldn't have replied to the poll in the first place. It also says that they have access to an Internet connection in one way or another, and are Net-savvy enough to navigate and post their opinions. Now, these respondents have access to a plethora of information generally unavailable to those without an Internet connection without a lot more effort. For instance, there are places on the Net where every last piece of evidence made public in the Clinton impeachment proceedings can be viewed, and they can be reached by entering an Internet address into your browser. I have read many of them myself. So these respondents would tend to be a little better-informed about the issues than the average man on the street, as long as they had the interest and time to find out. This obviously tends to give more weight to the opinions of online respondents.

Now, as to the obvious argument that a Pollocrat (that's Democrat for the uninitiated) would make, that the Internet is a haven for conservativism and that the majority of Internet users are of a Republican bent, and so any online polls would be skewed, I would say, sorry, chum, you're wrong. With the affordability of computers these days, nearly anyone who wants to have a computer can have one, and Internet connections are cheap and plentiful. Or, for a couple of hundred bucks and a monthly fee that's a lot less than most cable bills, anyone can get WebTV or a similar service(I can't believe I'm even mentioning a Microsoft product, but there it is...) and be connected to the Net. There is a learning curve involved, though not much of one. Just look at the wide variety of opinions on every conceivable issue on the Net. At one time it may have been a haven for conservativism, but that day has passed.

The level of education on the issues that Internet users can get for so little effort only tends to strengthen the reliability of online polls over those used in and by other media.

So, finally, why is there such a wide gulf between polling results online and those reported in other media? Because the Pollocrats will search through every poll until they can find one which will support the Clintonus apologitis that they all seem to suffer from, and then they will transmit only those helpful polls to the obviously left-biased media. (See The Pen is Mightier than the Cigar ( 12-21-98 ), for my opinion of the media.)

Unfortunately, since the majority of the public doesn't have Internet access yet, these Pollocrat tactics seem to be having their effect.

- The Watcher (Which are you going to believe? The evidence or the polls?)