April 13, 2011 08:56 PM UTC

No Worries, There's a Poll For That

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• by: Colorado Pols

An interesting ex post facto story on last month’s defeat of civil unions legislationin a GOP-controlled House committee. As the Colorado Independent’s John Tomasic reports:

Reporting the story of recently defeated Colorado civil unions bill SB 172, National Catholic Register reporter Steve Weatherbe Monday called a poll showing popular support for civil unions in the state “specious.” But Weatherbe got the facts wrong on pro-civil unions polling in Colorado and he leans instead on an alleged “recent poll” conducted for Christian politics group Colorado Family Action by a company called Advantage Inc, which the Washington Post reportedly describes as a “Republican fundraising and marketing firm.” Colorado Family Action says it shared its polling results with Republican members of the state House Judicial Committee who voted to kill the bill at the end of March.

Neither Weatherbe nor Colorado Family Action- a Focus on the Family group- provide any links to the poll data or its methodology. Advantage Inc told the Colorado Independent it does not disclose work done for clients to members of the media…

Jessica Haverkate, executive director of Colorado Family Action, told Weatherbe she didn’t trust polling that showed a majority of Coloradans supporting civil unions.

But as Tomasic recounts in some detail, the poll from Colorado Family Action is at odds with pretty much every other poll recently conducted in Colorado on the issue of civil unions for same-sex couples. Although voters over four years ago had one view, most observers–including a growing number of Republicans–do believe that views have generationally shifted.

Fortunately for Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee looking for a salve for their guilty conscience (or an answer for angry constituents), you can make a poll say anything. Especially if pollsters don’t have to show their work. And you don’t care to see it.

Come to think of it, why bother with a real poll at all, assuming they even did?