Project Polling

Of course, you are all watching Project Runway (and if not, start. Immediately.). It's the show where a bunch of designers compete to win the approval of Heidi Klum and Michael Kors by creating bizarre, ill-fitting, poorly made, and occasionally fabulous outfits. Recently, there was an incident on Project Runway that revealed to me a fundamental truth about American society and polling data. I will now share that revelation.

Remember the Jeffrey/Angela's mom kerfluffle? For the uninitiated, this was the episode where ex-junkie, belligerent, rock-star-wannabe Jeffrey had to design for a competitor's mom. The competitor in question was Angela, a ditsy woman from Ohio with a penchant for putting little rosettes all over the hideous poof skirts she insisted on "designing". Angela's mom said she didn't like the colors of Jeffrey's design for her -- which was ridiculous, because the colors were the least of the problems with that horrible outfit. And Jeffrey accused Angela's mom of trying to sabotage him, which was patently preposterous since Angela's mom was, like Angela, pathetically incapable of doing anything remotely strategic. Angela accused Jeffrey of being mean. Jeffrey invoked conspiracy theories.

With me so far?

Ok, so at the commercial, the show ran a real-time poll, and asked who viewers sided with, Jeffrey or Angela. Now, this was an interesting poll, because by all logic, 100% of people should have agreed that Angela's clueless, schlumpy mom had no greater thought than that she didn't think she'd look good in blue. And again, this should have been obvious precisely because the problem wasn't the blue, it was the glorified grocery sack Jeffrey chose to clothe her in. But fully 30% of viewers felt Jeffrey was right -- Angela's mom was a scheming bitch.

From this I developed the 30% rule.

The 30% rule holds as follows: in response to any question, 30% of Americans will choose the most ridiculous, dumb-ass, patently flat-out wrong, obviously retarded answer. And this applies to ANY question.

You're suspicious, I know. Which is why I provide the following substantiating evidence. I think you will agree that the 30% rule allows for a new understanding of American polling.

Try this: a couple of months ago, Bush was polling at 33% approval. Now he's polling around 44. These numbers are on their face incomprehensible -- how in the hell could just shy of half of Americans (and that's disregarding the frightening possibilities of the margin of error) believe that this guy is anything other than a total asshat? Well, because you have to disregard the Stupid 30. Which means that among real people -- people not predestined to be wrong on every question -- he is polling between 3 and 14 percent. Now, that's plausible.

Or try Cheney. In an excellent New Yorker piece after the infamous shooting incident, Hendrick Hertzberg pointed out that Cheney was polling at 18% -- an astoundingly low number. But why so astounding? Because -- and this is so true -- you had ALREADY internalized the truth of the 30% rule, and had assumed that nothing in an American poll could go below 30. To get to 18% approval is really to be polling at -12%, which is just so, so low. You knew this, you just didn't know how you knew it. Until I revealed it.

Here's another. Consider the 50% (roughly) of Americans who think the bible is literally true, the earth is 6,000 years old, Jonah lived in the whale, blah blah blah. Really, it's 20%. I agree -- that is still a horrifying number. But you and I and everyone (except the Stupid 30) know that 50% of the people in this country have never read the fucking bible. I have a PhD in stuff that means you're supposed to read the bible, and I've never read the bible. Parts, sure. A Genesis here, a Luke there; but the whole thing? Puh-lease. Puh-LEASE. No way. And -- and this is important -- I actually like to read. So if I didn't do it, you know there's no way 50% of Americans did it.

Of course, let's be honest, not even 20% of Americans have read the bible. Try it sometime and you'll see why not. This is why I am working on a further development in poll analysis called the Insane 10. Once I've done more research, I'll post on how when it comes to religious issues, there's a 10% inflation on the usual Stupid 30, just in honor of god.

By the way, I feel intuitively that it is the same 30 % who are always wrong -- the same people, every time. But that's probably optimistic.