Research 2000 Issues Cease & Desist Order to FiveThirtyEight

[MellowDem]

Source: FiveThirtyEight

About 15 minutes ago, I was sent a cease and desist demand by Howrey LLP, the lawfirm that Research 2000 has contracted with to defend it against Daily Kos, which is suing it for fraud based on evidence that its polling may have been fabricated.

The cease and desist letter, which is published below, attributes to FiveThrityEight statements that were made by others. It alleges that "you have engaged in a campaign to discredit and damage R2K by posting negative comments regarding Mr. Ali, the Company, and its work products on the "Daily Kos" blog. It further threatens a lawsuit, unless I "immediately cease and desist all such activities, and retract all previous publicly transmitted statements."

I emphatically stand behind any statements I have made about Research 2000, and will be constrained by nothing other than my common sense and my professional integrity in any comments I should elect to make about Research 2000 in the future.

Read more: http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2010/06/research-2000-issues-cease-desist.html

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I think Nate is starting to get at something that we really need. Some accountability for polling firms. He recently published some pollster ratings and got slammed by a bunch of pollsters for them. What's shocking is that there are no other pollster ratings out there and no real way to know if a pollster is faking data. There are ways that pollsters could "randomize" their data to make it impossible to tell if it was fraud. Strategic Visions LLC was another polling firm that Nate questioned earlier this year, and while its (Republican) clients never sued them, they have stopped doing any polling and look to have stopped while they were ahead.

You can read the letter in the link. I think it's maddening that pollsters can get away with such things so easily in this day and age. And polls do have real impacts on our politics.

[depakid]

1. I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiments

Though I would add that outright fraud and fabrication aren't necessary to manipulate polling results- and that it's become commonplace to commission- and for the media to use polls in America to influence public opinion NOT reflect it.

[Aaria]

2. In my honest opinion, polls are how politics are ran in this country.................

First you get a good statesman to run, then the Reich throws up some Puke to run against him. The polls come out and say that the Statesman is ahead by 20 points. The race gets closer towards the end of the race according to the polls. Now it's voting day and the Puke is ahead of the Statesman even though he hasn't done squat to really get elected. At voting time, the exit polls say that the Statesman has won hands down but the polls say that they were right and it goes to the Puke, and the guys in back have gotten their ata-boys for flipping the switch on the magic box cause the Puke has won by 1.75% of the vote and it just happens to match what the polls forecast and it happens to be .25% over the limit to get a recount taken. That is if there were a paper trail. So the polls rule cause that's how it's reported on the MSM, and we all know that their always Reich and our democracy works again the people have spoken.


SP edit

[McCamy Taylor]

3. Political polls are fixed all the time. Never read one without studying the methodology

and comparing it to other polls.

I remember during Selection 2008 there were a number of weird outliers which were obviously cooked up in order to skew the "average" poll results. Newsweek had one that they reported with a straight face that was like 20 points off from all the others (which were closely clumped). If the "average" poll numbers were compiled in a statistical way, theirs would have been tossed out. But it was averaged in as if it was 100% accurate (which it obviously was not).

Polling is supposed to be a science, but it has been turned into propaganda.

[MellowDem]

6. Many polls don't release their methodology...

or if they do, they don't release their raw data.

[nashville_brook]

9. most polls don't -- that's the nature of the biz; proprietary methodology.

it's how they distinguish themselves in the market. that's not to say that they couldn't do with some reform and make their research more transparent. that might actually improve the marketplace for polling.

[earcandle]

4. Thanks for your courage! Daily Kos! Keep up the good work!

[pam4water]

5. K & R

[GodlessBiker]

7. Ha! The lawyer didn't have the balls to sign his own letter. He had his secretary sign it. Loser.

Keep up the good work, Nate.

[Jefferson23]

8. Good on you Nate! n/t

[myrna minx]

10. K&R n/t