O'Reilly, the pollmeister...

I really don't often pay much heed to Mr. O'Reilly, but in looking at some recent polling data, I took note that he seems much more interested in polls than he did a mere six to ten months ago. Here's Bill's talking points memo from March 16th, entitled "Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy fires up."

Writing in The Wall Street Journal Friday, Scott Rasmussen — perhaps the most accurate pollster in America — reported that President Obama's job approval rating has now slipped below that of President Bush back in March 2001.

Perhaps the most accurate pollster, well maybe, but maybe not? (Nice attempt to build credibility, Bill). Also note, that O'Reilly doesn't mention the actual approval rating, because you would think he would then have to admit that a 62% approval rating during an economic recession isn't half bad. Or, one would think. But yesterday's talking points memo proves me wrong. Bill fires out that Obama's approval rating has slipped to 58%. He then postulates with such wisdom as to why Obama is suffering such declining ratings. What could it be? Left-wing, Eurocratic socialism fears, of course...

Writing in Thursday's Wall Street Journal, the former prime minister of Denmark says:

"In Europe, we have been protected from the worst effects of the [economic] crisis thanks to welfare states built up over the past 60 years to cushion citizens from the threats posed by the free market. We can all count on state health care, social housing, education, unemployment support and other universal, tax-funded services. The simplistic dictum of more markets and less government championed by Reagan, Thatcher and their ideological heirs has failed on a momentous scale. I am hopeful that the G20 will make progress. We must keep up the pressure by demanding a globalization that works for everyone and forge new alliances and new lines of communication across national boundaries. We must develop new, progressive ways to achieve global justice."

Well, Karl Marx could not have said it better.

Well, Bill, I have to agree that Marx likely couldn't have said it better. However, I'm not sure Marx would make any of those statements, sans perhaps a tangential reference to justice. The equating of a modern democratic welfare state to something Marx would endorse is quite assinine, as the last I checked Denmark still has a pretty thriving private enterprise, with a quite happy populace.

Under any circumstance, you know O'Reilly is working with some weak sauce when he tries to lambast the President for having a plus minus of 26 in approval ratings... Given the number of Glen Beck's, Lou Dobbs, and O'Reilly's out there preaching and fear-mongering against global governance, I'm quite pleasantly suprised in the ability of the American populace, at large, to realize many of our current problems will require global solutions and/or cooperation.

Now, I'm not a profesional pollster, but I believe when a President's polling data looks like this:


and the public's view of the economy looks like this:



Somebody must believe that we are heading in the right direction... Oh wait, here are some polls showing that's the case. I know that polls are everything, but by jesus, I get tired of someone using polling data as a weapon, when in fact, the polls are fundamentally juxtaposed against their ideological predispositions.