If you begin to read an article that’s based primarily on poll results, my advice is to stop reading and go on to something else. My reasoning is based on the now irrefutable evidence that political public opinion polls in competitive or controversial contests in virtually all major Western nations, particularly in the U.S. and Great Britain, have been chronically wrong for some time. Dramatic poll numbers in the U.S. presidential primaries, and now in the match-up between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, flip-flop in a matter of days or a few weeks, and that’s assuming the dubious premise that these results are in any way accurate at the time they are taken.  Even exit polls have been wrong. Public polling has been an honorable profession when the pollsters have maintained high standards, as many have.  But the rise of the use of the cell phone, internet, and social media has introduced a new level, if...(Read Full Post)