Showing posts with label Public opinion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Public opinion. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 12, 2017

The Left Is Trying To Use The #MeToo Movement As A Weapon To Destroy Donald Trump

This article was originally published by Michael Snyder at The Economic Collapse


trump


The left is willing to use any means necessary to get rid of Donald Trump, and so it should be no surprise that they are now using the #metoo movement as a weapon in their crusade against him. Personally, I have been a big fan of the #metoo movement, and I have been thrilled to see so many sexual predators exposed in recent months. I applauded the exposure of Hollywood giants such as Harvey Weinstein and Kevin Spacey, and I believe that the resignations of Al Franken and John Conyers will be followed by many others as the truth about what has been happening on Capitol Hill continues to come out.


But we need to be very careful, because this kind of a thing can become a feeding frenzy, and in this type of environment it can be way too easy for false accusers to seem like they are telling the truth.


Every claim of sexual misconduct should be taken extremely seriously, and we should also never jump to conclusions. A single false allegation can permanently ruin someone’s life, and those that are wealthy or famous are easy targets.


On Monday, Megyn Kelly interviewed three women that had formerly made allegations against President Trump. The following comes from CNN


On Monday morning, a trio of women — Rachel Crooks, Samantha Holvey and Jessica Leeds — went on Megyn Kelly’s NBC show to reiterate allegations of sexual misconduct against President Donald Trump that they first aired during the 2016 presidential campaign.


“We’re private citizens and for us to put ourselves out there to try to show America who this man is and especially how he views women and for them to say, we don’t care … it hurt,” Holvey told Kelly about how the allegations against Trump were handled during the 2016 campaign. “It’s just like, all right, let’s try round two. The environment’s different. Let’s try again.”


Millions of Americans are going to assume that since three women are all making allegations against Trump that they must be true.


But we already knew that the story that Jessica Leeds is telling is not accurate. It turns out that there is an eyewitness that was sitting directly across the aisle from Leeds and Trump on the plane ride where the misconduct allegedly took place, and he says that it never happened.


The eyewitness is a British man named Anthony Gilberthorpe, and according to People magazine, he says that Trump didn’t do any of the things that Leeds is claiming…


“I have only met this accuser once and frankly cannot imagine why she is seeking to make out that Trump made sexual advances on her. Not only did he not do so (and I was present at all times) but it was she that was the one being flirtatious,”claimed Gilberthorpe, who is British.


And during an extended interview with Breitbart, Gilberthorpe gave an account of the flight from beginning to end…


“It was back in the days. I’d only visited America one time previous to that. I’m not familiar, as I’m sure with respect to a lot of American listeners tonight wouldn’t be familiar with a lot of our British businessmen,” he explained. “But he was nice. We were talking, we were laughing, he was reading, I was reading, et cetera. She came on, and she hogged the limelight. She wanted to talk to him in a most animated, exaggerated way. About 45 minutes after she had taken her seat and we had taken off, he went to use the toilet.”


Gilberthorpe said that during Trump’s absence, Leeds told him who his fellow passenger was, excitedly explaining that he was “one of the richest men in the world.”


“And her quote, not mine: ‘Oh, I can’t believe that I’m sitting next to him. I can’t believe it! This is the man I want to marry!’ Okay, it was all said in jest and joke, but she was so excited about having the chance, the opportunity, of sitting next to this man. I attempted to talk over to Trump, but she wasn’t really having much of it. I was talking to her, to him, for the remaining two-and-a-half hours of the journey. We landed in New York. Having landed, he politely said, ‘Goodbye,’ shook my hand, and shook hers. He didn’t kiss her, didn’t kiss her. And she and I left the plane together. She and I exchanged kisses. I went for my luggage. She did not go for her luggage. That’s another marker I’m putting down tonight,” he said.


After examining the evidence, I have come to the conclusion that Leeds is simply lying. And that is a horrible thing to do, because she is discrediting the entire #metoo movement.


But the fact that Leeds is not telling the truth is not stopping Democratic lawmakers from using these allegations to hammer President Trump. In fact, on Monday Senator Kirsten Gillibrand called for Trump to resign.


But that isn’t going to happen, and the White House is fighting back hard against these false allegations


The White House released a fresh statement early Monday decrying the “false” claims of the women at the press conference.


“These false claims, totally disputed in most cases by eyewitness accounts, were addressed at length during last year’s campaign, and the American people voiced their judgment by delivering a decisive victory,” a White House spokesperson said in a statement. “The timing and absurdity of these false claims speaks volumes and the publicity tour that has begun only further confirms the political motives behind them.”


It is funny how the mainstream media never even wanted to address the very serious allegations of sexual misconduct against Bill and Hillary Clinton that kept arising, and yet anyone with any sort of a claim against Trump gets front page coverage.


Once again, every single allegation of sexual misconduct needs to be taken extremely seriously, and when there is a contested claim it is absolutely imperative that we take the time to figure out who is telling the truth and who is lying.


In our legal system, everyone is innocent until proven guilty, and we should apply the same approach in the court of public opinion as well.


Michael Snyder is a Republican candidate for Congress in Idaho’s First Congressional District, and you can learn how you can get involved in the campaign on his official website. His new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.



GetPreparedNow-MichaelSnyderBarbaraFixMichael T. Snyder is a graduate of the University of Florida law school and he worked as an attorney in the heart of Washington D.C. for a number of years.Today, Michael is best known for his work as the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog and The American Dream


If you want to know what is coming and what you can do to prepare, read his latest book Get Prepared Now!: Why A Great Crisis Is Coming.


Thursday, November 16, 2017

49% Favor Mandatory Military Service For US Youth

Nearly half of Americans favor mandatory military service for the country’s youthaccording to a recent poll from Gallup.



As TheAntiMedia"s Carey Wedler details, the polling organization surveyed 1,006 Americans over the age of 18 between November 3 and November 4, and 49% of those questioned expressed support for compulsory service.


Further, “a majority of Republicans, including independents who lean Republican, favor it (57%), as do men (57%) and those 65 or older (66%),” Gallup summarized.



Gallup noted that efforts to actually impose such a policy - such House Rep. Charles Rangel’s repeated attempts between 2003 and 2015 to mandate it through legislation - have fallen flat.


Americans’ preferences for a traditional draft have fluctuated over the decades. Gallup explained:


A majority of Americans (54%) in 1977 favored sticking to a volunteer force, but two 1980 surveys showed a majority wanting to return to a military draft. Eventually, most Americans endorsed the all-volunteer concept, with five polls conducted between 1998 and 2007 showing majorities from 69% to 85% rejecting a return to the draft.”



The draft was a powerful point of contention during the divisive Vietnam War, prompting many of those selected to fight to burn their draft cards in protest.


In Gallup’s poll idea of forcing young people to serve a mandatory year in the armed forces - as opposed to a draft - was unsurprisingly least popular among young people.


Four in ten favored the proposition, however, marking a significant portion of those who would potentially be affected but still wanted to see it enacted.


While Americans today are not overwhelmingly in favor of it, neither are they overwhelmingly opposed,Gallup observed.



Militarism has long been a core element of American identity, as evidenced by millions of Americans’ stalwart devotion to and respect for soldiers. Though it currently remains unlikely that mandatory service will be implemented, that half the country would support it reflects this value system.


Countries that require mandatory service include Israel, North Korea, China, Russia, Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, Egypt, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates.









Tuesday, August 8, 2017

US Is "The Greatest Threat To Peace In The World Today," New Poll Finds

Authored by Eric Zuesse via The Strategic Culture Foundation,


It has happened again: yet another international poll finds that the US is viewed by peoples around the world to be the biggest threat to world peace.



But, to start, let’s summarize the first-ever poll that had been done on this, back in 2013, which was the only prior poll on this entire issue, and it was the best-performed such poll: «An end-of-the-year WIN/Gallup International survey found that people in 65 countries believe the United States is the greatest threat to world peace», as the N.Y. Post reported on 5 January 2014. 


On 30 December 2013, the BBC had reported of that poll: «This year, first [meaning here, ‘for’] the first time, Win/Gallup agreed to include three questions submitted by listeners to [BBC’s] Radio 4"s Today programme». And, one of those three listener-asked questions was phrased there by the BBC, as having been «Which country is the biggest threat to peace?» The way that WIN/Gallup International itself had actually asked this open-ended question, to 67,806 respondents from 65 countries, was: «Which country do you think is the greatest threat to peace in the world today?» #1, 24% of respondents, worldwide, volunteered that the US was «the greatest threat». #2 (the second-most-frequently volunteered ‘greatest threat’) was Pakistan, volunteered by 8%. #3 was China, with 6%. #s 4-7 were a four-way tie, at 5% each, for: Afghanistan, Iran, Israel, and North Korea. #s 8-10 were a three-way tie, at 4% each, for: India, Iraq, and Japan. #11 was Syria, with 3%. #12 was Russia, with 2%. #s 13-20 were a seven-way tie, at 1% each, for: Australia, Germany, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, South Korea, and UK.


The way that W/G itself had phrased this matter, in their highly uninformative press release for their year-end survey (which included but barely mentioned this finding, in it — as though this particular finding in their annual year-end poll, hardly even deserved to be mentioned), was: «The US was the overwhelming choice (24% of respondents) for the country that represents the greatest threat to peace in the world today. This was followed by Pakistan (8%), China (6%), North Korea, Israel and Iran (5%). Respondents in Russia (54%), China (49%) and Bosnia (49%) were the most fearful of the US as a threat». That’s all there was of it — W/G never devoted a press-release to the stunning subject of this particular finding, and they even buried this finding when mentioning it in their year-end press-release.


I had hoped that they would repeat this excellent global survey question every year (so that a trendline could be shown, in the global answers over time), but the question was unfortunately never repeated.


However, now, on August 1st of 2017, Pew Research Center has issued results of their polling of 30 nations in which they had surveyed, first in 2013, and then again in 2017, posing a less-clear but similar question (vague perhaps because they were fearing a similar type of finding — embarrassing to their own country, the US), in which respondents had been asked «Do you think that the United States’ power and influence is a major threat, a minor threat, or not a threat to (survey country)?» and which also asked this same question but regarding «China,» and then again but regarding «Russia,» as a possible threat instead of «United States». (This wasn’t an open-ended question; only those three nations were named as possible responses.)


On page 3 of their 32-page pdf is shown that the «major threat» category was selected by 35% of respondents worldwide for «US power and influence», 31% worldwide selected that for «Russia’s power and influence,» and also 31% worldwide said it for «China’s power and influence». However, on pages 23 and 24 of the pdf is shown the 30 countries that had been surveyed in this poll, in both 2013 and 2017, and most of these 30 nations were US allies; only Venezuela clearly was not. None of the 30 countries was an ally of either Russia or China (the other two countries offered as possibly being «a major threat»). And, yet, nonetheless, more respondents among the 30 sampled countries saw the US as «a major threat», than saw either Russia or China that way.


Furthermore, the trend, in those 30 countries, throughout that four-year period, was generally in the direction of an increase in fear of the US — increase in fear of the country that had been overwhelmingly cited in 2013 by people in 65 countries in WIN/Gallup’s poll, as constituting, in 2013, «the greatest threat to peace in the world today».


Consequently: though WIN/Gallup never repeated its question, the evidence in this newly released poll, from Pew, clearly suggests that the percentage of people in the 65 nations that WIN/Gallup had polled in 2013 who saw the US as being «the greatest threat to peace in the world today» would be even higher today than it was in 2013, when 24% of respondents worldwide volunteered the US as being the world’s most frightening country.


Perhaps people around the world are noticing that, at least since 2001, the US is wrecking one country after another: Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, and Ukraine. Which is next? Maybe Iran? Maybe Russia? Maybe Venezuela? Who knows?


And this country has just increased its ‘defense’ spending, which already is three times China’s, and nine times higher than Russia’s. Do the owners of America’s military-industrial complex own the US government, and own the US ‘news’media, to permit this rabid military to control the government’s budget, in a ‘democracy’?

Thursday, June 22, 2017

Democrats, Stop With The Poll Rigging...It's Getting Embarrassing

Last fall, in the months/weeks leading up to the presidential election, we spent a fair amount time talking about how Democratic pollsters were setting themselves up for a massive embarrassment on election day with their obviously rigged polling data that consistently suggested Hillary had a commanding lead.  In fact, just weeks before the election, the Washington Post published a poll showing that Hillary was well on her way to a "blowout" 12-point victory (we wrote about it here:  This Is How WaPo"s Latest Poll Gave Hillary A 12 Point Advantage Over Trump).  Needless to say, that never happened and those pollsters suffered the humiliating consequences of their biased "math."


Unfortunately, as last night"s special election in Georgia makes all too clear, no one on the left seems to have learned any lessons from their presidential poll rigging debacle last November.


In fact, one prominent pollster even declared just 6 days before the election that if Ossoff failed to win it would mean that "MATH IS DEAD AND DATA IS BROKEN."




Of course, the problem isn"t that "math is dead" or "data is broken"...the problem is that rather than using data to arrive at a solution pollsters have resorted to starting out with a solution and then solving for the data.


Which is exactly what appears to have happened in Georgia.  As the following chart points out, with just 9 days left until election day, pollsters were predicting a fairly easy win for Democratic candidate Jon Ossoff in Georgia"s 6th district runoff...shocking, we know.  But, just over a week later, the Republican candidate ended up easily walking away with the win, and served up another embarrassment for pollsters in the process as actual results swung 8.6 points from predictions peddled to the public just a week earlier.



So how does this keep happening?  Well, it"s not that surprising in light of the fact that Democrats literally wrote a playbook on how to rig polling data through "oversamples."  As we noted last October in a post entitled "New Podesta Email Exposes Playbook For Rigging Polls Through "Oversamples"", it all apparently has a lot to do with "oversampling" various minority groups.


The email even includes a handy, 37-page guide with the following poll-rigging recommendations.  In Arizona, over sampling of Hispanics and Native Americans is highly recommended:





Research, microtargeting & polling projects
Over-sample Hispanics
-  Use Spanish language interviewing. (Monolingual Spanish-speaking voters are among the lowest turnout Democratic targets)
Over-sample the Native American population



For Florida, the report recommends "consistently monitoring" samples to makes sure they"re "not too old" and "has enough African American and Hispanic voters."  Meanwhile, "independent" voters in Tampa and Orlando are apparently more dem friendly so the report suggests filling up independent quotas in those cities first.





Consistently monitor the sample to ensure it is not too old, and that it has enough African American and Hispanic voters to reflect the state.
-  On Independents: Tampa and Orlando are better persuasion targets than north or south Florida (check your polls before concluding this). If there are budget questions or oversamples, make sure that Tampa and Orlando are included first.



Of course, the intent of publishing these ridiculous polls is presumably to "chill" the Republican vote...afterall, why go through the hassle of long lines at a polling station if your candidate has no shot at winning? 


That said, the strategy only worked BEFORE the media and pollsters lost all credibility...so, why bother keeping up the charade?  As we mentioned above, it"s just getting embarrassing at this point.

Sunday, April 23, 2017

50,000 Police Monitor As 47 Million French Voters Decide The Fate Of Europe

After months of anticipatory build up, voting is underway in France on Sunday in the first round of a bitterly fought presidential election that is seen as crucial to the future of the Eurozone, and a closely-watched test of voters" anger with the political establishment.


Local polling stations opened at 0600 GMT and will close at 1800 GMT, with about 47 million voters expected to cast their ballots in around 67,000 polling stations amid a high terror alert.


Voters, on edge after Thursday"s latest ISIS terrorist attack, will be monitored by more than 50,000 police officers backed by elite units of the French security services patrolled the streets less than three days after a suspected Islamist gunman shot dead a policeman and wounded two others on the central Champs Elysees avenue.






By noon (6.00 a.m. ET), turnout amid perfect weather conditions across much of France was 28.54%, according to official figures, roughly the same as in the 2012 first round, in which almost 80% eventually took part.



Some polls had been predicting a much lower turnout, closer to the 70% that took the then National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen into the second round in 2002. Pollsters are unclear about what a low or high turnout could mean in 2017.



While we have previewed today"s event extensively (most recently here), Reuters summarized it best: today "voters will decide whether to back a pro-EU centrist newcomer [and a former Rothschild banker], a scandal-ridden veteran conservative who wants to slash public spending, a far-left eurosceptic admirer of Fidel Castro or to appoint France"s first woman president who would shut borders and ditch the euro."


The outcome of today"s election will show whether the populist tide that led to Brexit and Donald Trump"s victory is still rising, or starting to ebb.


The biggest wildcard ahead of today"s outcome is the high level of indecision among the population, with nearly a third of potential voters undecided until the last minute. Hanan Fanidi, a 33-year-old financial project manager, was still unsure as she arrived at a polling station in Paris" 18th arrondissement.


"I don"t believe in anyone, actually. I haven"t arrived at a candidate in particular who could advance things. I"m very, very pessimistic," she said.


Looking at the outcome of today"s vote, while the possibility of a Le Pen-Melenchon run-off is not the most likely scenario, it is the one which alarms bankers and investors.



Putting the performance of Marin Le Pen - as well as that of her father Jean-Marie - in election context:


  • Jean-Marie Le Pen, 2002: 16.8%

  • Jean-Marie Le Pen, 2007: 10.4%

  • Marine Le Pen, 2012: 17.9%

Le Pen has told supporters "the EU will die", while Macron, 39, a former Rothschild banker wants to further beef up the euro zone. Le Pen further wants to return to the Franc, re-denominate the country"s debt stock, tax imports and reject international treaties. Melenchon also wants to radically overhaul the European Union and hold a referendum on whether to leave the bloc.


Le Pen or Melenchon would struggle, in parliamentary elections in June, to win a majority to carry out such radical moves, but their growing popularity also worries France"s EU partners.


Germany"s position on today"s election is hardly a surprise: "It is no secret that we will not be cheering madly should Sunday"s result produce a second round between Le Pen and Melenchon," German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said. If either Macron or Fillon were victorious, each would face challenges. For Macron, a big question would be whether he could win a majority in parliament in June. Fillon, though likely to struggle less to get a majority, would likely be dogged by an embezzlement scandal, in which he denies wrongdoing.


Meanwhile, polls opened on Saturday in France’s overseas territories, allowing citizens to cast their ballots a day ahead of voters on the French mainland. According to unconfirmed twitter reports, based on preliminary offshore results, support for Melenchon is far greater than for any of his competitors.




Occasional live feed from Paris courtesy of Reuters:

Sunday, February 5, 2017

The Delphi Technique: Let’s Stop Being Manipulated!



The Delphi Technique: Let’s Stop Being Manipulated!





More and more, we are seeing citizens being invited to “participate” in various forms of meetings, councils, or boards to “help determine” public policy in one field or another. They are supposedly being included to get ”input” from the public to help officials make final decisions on taxes, education, community growth or whatever the particular subject matter might be.



Sounds great, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, surface appearances are often deceiving.


You, Mr. or Mrs. Citizen, decide to take part in one of these meetings.



Generally, you will find that there is already someone designated to lead or “facilitate” the meeting. Supposedly, the job of the facilitator is to be a neutral, non-directing helper to see that the meeting flows smoothly.




Actually, he or she is there for exactly the opposite reason: to see that the conclusions reached during the meeting are in accord with a plan already decided upon by those who called the meeting.



The process used to “facilitate” the meeting is called the Delphi Technique. This Delphi Technique was developed by the RAND Corporation for the U.S. Department of Defense back in the 1950s. It was originally intended for use as a psychological weapon during the cold war.


However, it was soon recognized that the steps of Delphi could be very valuable in manipulating ANY meeting toward a predetermined end.


How does the process take place? The techniques are well developed and well defined.


First, the person who will be leading the meeting, the facilitator or Change Agent must be a likable person with whom those participating in the meeting can agree or sympathize.


It is, therefore, the job of the facilitator to find a way to cause a split in the audience, to establish one or a few of the people as “bad guys” while the facilitator is perceived as the “good guy.”



Facilitators are trained to recognize potential opponents and how to make such people appear aggressive, foolish, extremist, etc. Once this is done, the facilitator establishes himself or herself as the “friend” of the rest of the audience.



The stage is now set for the rest of the agenda to take place.


At this point, the audience is generally broken up into “discussion—or ‘breakout’—groups” of seven or eight people each. Each of these groups is to be led by a subordinate facilitator.


Within each group, discussion takes place of issues, already decided upon by the leadership of the meeting. Here, too, the facilitator manipulates the discussion in the desired direction, isolating and demeaning opposing viewpoints.



Generally, participants are asked to write down their ideas and disagreements with the papers to be turned in and “compiled” for general discussion after the general meeting is reconvened.


This is the weak link in the chain, which you are not supposed to recognize. Who compiles the various notes into the final agenda for discussion? Ahhhh! Well, it is those who are running the meeting.



How do you know that the ideas on your notes were included in the final result? You Don’t! You may realize that your idea was not included and come to the conclusion that you were probably in the minority. Recognize that every other citizen member of this meeting has written his or her likes or dislikes on a similar sheet of paper and they, too, have no idea whether their ideas were “compiled” into the final result! You don’t even know if anyone’s ideas are part of the final “conclusions” presented to the reassembled group as the “consensus” of public opinion.



Rarely does anyone challenge the process, since each concludes that he or she was in the minority and different from all the others.




So, now, those who organized the meeting in the first place are able to tell the participants and the rest of the community that the conclusions, reached at the meeting, are the result of public participation.




Actually, the desired conclusions had been established, in the back room, long before the meeting ever took place. There are variations in the technique to fit special situations but, in general, the procedure outlined above takes place.




The natural question to ask here is: If the outcome was preordained before the meeting took place, why have the meeting? Herein lies the genius of this Delphi Technique.




It is imperative that the general public believe that this program is theirs! They thought it up! They took part in its development! Their input was recognized!




If people believe that the program is theirs, they will support it.




If they get the slightest hint that the program is being imposed upon them, they will resist.



This very effective technique is being used, over and over and over, to change our form of government from the representative republic, intended by the Founding Fathers, into a “participatory democracy.” Now, citizens chosen at large are manipulated into accepting preset outcomes while they believe that the input they provided produced the outcomes which are now theirs! The reality is that the final outcome was already determined long before any public meetings took place, determined by individuals unknown to the public. Can you say “Conspiracy?”


These “Change Agents” or “Facilitators” can be beaten! They may be beaten using their own methods against them.


Because it is so important, I will repeat the suggestions I gave in the last previous column.


One: Never, never lose your temper! Lose your temper and lose the battle, it is that simple! Smile, if it kills you to do so. Be courteous at all times. Speak in a normal tone of voice.


Two: Stay focused! Always write your question or statement down in advance to help you remember the exact manner in which your question or statement was made.


These agents are trained to twist things to make anyone not acceding to their agenda look silly or aggressive. Smile, wait till the change agent gets done speaking and then bring them back to your question. If they distort what you said, simply remind those in the group that what he or she is saying is not what you asked or said and then repeat, verbatim, from your notes the original objection.


Three: Be persistent! Wait through any harangues and then repeat the original question. (Go back and reread the previous column.)


Four: (I wish to thank a reader of the previous column for some EXCELLENT suggestions.) Don’t go alone! Get as many friends or relatives who think as you do, to go along with you to the meeting. Have each person ”armed” with questions or statements which all generally support your central viewpoint. Don’t sit together as a group! Spread out through the audience so that your group does not seem to be a group.


When the facilitator or change agent avoids answering your question and insists that he must move on so everyone may have a chance to speak, your own agents in the audience can then ask questions, worded differently, but still with the same meaning as yours. They can bring the discussion back to your original point.


They could even point out, in a friendly manner, that the agent did not really answer your question. The more the agent avoids your question, and the more your friends bring that to the attention of the group, the more the audience will shift in your favor.



To quote my informant: “Turn the technique back on them and isolate the change agent as the kook. I’ve done it and seen steam come out of the ears of those power brokers in the wings who are trying to shove something down the citizen’s throats. And it’s so much fun to watch the moderator squirm and lose his cool, all while trying to keep a smile on his face.”



Now that you understand how meetings are manipulated, let’s show them up for the charlatans which they are.