Paul: I agree with you for the most part. Most of the time trolls should just be ignored. But I felt I had to respond to his attack on the poll's integrity because it is at least a plausible sounding argument. I happen to have some expertise on polling so I know how it really works but most people don't, so I felt I had to respond so he wouldn't cloud other people's thinking.

I'm all for free speech and letting idiots say their idiotic piece, but when you have a guy like Shooter who is consistently dishonest on every single post, he should just be banned.

Jebbie:

What you're saying is largely true but Shooter's argument about oversamples was not obviously dog doo unless you know more about polling than most people do.

During the Libby trial she said, "They're going to try to really tamp this down and appeal to the polling which indicates that most people think, in fact, that he should be pardoned. Scooter Libby should be pardoned."

At the time she said that 18% thought Libby should be pardoned.

Shooter: oversamples are a commonplace polling technique. There is not the slightest chance that they didn't weight the oversample down. And, as you well know, there is no chance of a conspiracy here, precisely because they reported the fact that they had an oversample. If they were trying to "juice" the numbers they obviously wouldn't tell you that they were doing it.

You are a liar and a ridiculous conspiracy theorist, not to mention an idiot. If someone wants to lie about a poll, they're not going to go to the extra expense of "juicing" the numbers by doing extra interviews. They would just lie about the numbers.

Sound overstated? It's not. They don't do this kind of crap to Republican candidates.

AP may just as well have run a headline that read "Don't Vote For That Faggot John Edwards" because that's the message they're getting across and only an idiot would pretend not to know it.

George Bush spends something like $5000 dollars on each suit. Where were the articles in 1999-2000 that made jokes comparing him to Thurston Howell III or otherwise caricaturing him in a negative way? Instead Republicans get positive caricatures like Plain-talking Cowboy Toughguy or "Straight-talking Maverick or Great Communicator.

Mitt Romney's claim that he is a lifelong hunter when he's only been 2 or 3 times was a fat pitch right over the plate for any journalist that wanted to mock him. Where were all the stories that said he was a fake and a phony? Why didn't AP refer to "some people" who wonder if Romney is "comfortable in his own skin" (a phrase that makes my skin crawl - remember how much we heard about skin comfort re Gore and Kerry?).

Dear Lisa and Paul:

Its not just IF the media also covers stories that are embarrasing to Republicans, its also HOW. In the case of AP's Edwards story, its not just the fact that they had a story about the haircut. I think it's so trivial as to not be worth covering at all, but maybe you can construct a case that the haircut is newsworthy.

AP's sin is more the fact that they covered it from the point of view of a homophobic wingnut. They kept making not-so-subtle digs that Edwards is a pretty boy. To cut to the chase, they basically called him a faggot in their article. The article could have been written by that harpy, Ann Coulter.

If haircuts are important, then so is ALL attention to personal appearance. After all, there's nothing special about hair per se. if the idea is allegedly that Edwards worries too much about his personal appearance, then we have to look at all examples of attention to personal appearance.

As a dirty hippie, if you ask me, they ALL worry way too much about their personal appearance. They all wear expensive suits and shirts and ties. Buying an expensive suit is no different than buying an expensive haircut. Orren Hatch is known as something of a dandy with his fancy shirts and their french cuffs but they don't call him "pretty". Remember after the stolen 2000 election that picture of all the big Repubs at Bush's "ranch" with Trent Lott wearing that outlandish hat with the big feather in it? Did they call Lott a pretty boy?

And speaking of Bush's ranch, didn't he spend millions of dollars on it so he could work on his personal appearance and try to make himself look like a cowboy?

The fact is if you're running for president, looks matter. Hell they ALL wear makeup every time they go on tv! How girly is that? The whole thing is a non-issue and that's why they should have never run the story at all. But they certainly shouldn't have written it the same way Ann Coulter would have.

Lisa: the Giuliani example is not a good analogy unless they also called him a pretty boy. Hey if they wanted to just SHOW Edwards' haircut, that's fine with me. No one would care.

Also, Giuliani in a dress is relevant from a policy perspective. He's currently running around kissing right wing homophobic ass. For him to make light of something they consider a grave sin is quite puzzling. It would be like a Democrat appealing to the black vote but jokingly wearing a Klan hood to a Halloween party.

Anonymous:

Edwards supports universal healthcare financed by a rollback of upper-income tax cuts. It doesn't get any more populist than that. I don't care if he made a lot of money as a lawyer, if he supports populist policies.

You know who's really a fake populist? These Republican handjobs who pretend to be men of the people by pretending to like Nascar and country music and then vote for tax cuts for the rich.