Q.H5 Overall, do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of Al Qaeda? [IF FAVORABLE,

FOLLOW WITH: And is that very favorable or only somewhat favorable? IF UNFAVORABLE, FOLLOW WITH: and is that very unfavorable or only somewhat unfavorable?]

1 Very favorable

4 Somewhat favorable

10 Somewhat unfavorable

58 Very unfavorable

27 Don’t know/Refused (VOL.)

The error rate for the survey was estimated at +/-5%. Pew reported that the survey had a high rate of refusal and of interview termination, which they believe they counteracted by doing re-contact interviews and using two sample groups to avoid the effects of random digit dialing. Also noted in the methodology:

Another issue confronted in the questionnaire design was the sensitivity of the population to being interviewed. The survey clearly shows that many Muslim Americans believe they are targeted by the government for surveillance. Many are also concerned about stereotyping and

prejudice directed toward them. These attitudes plausibly lead to greater reluctance to be interviewed and thus a potential nonresponse bias. Several aspects of the study were tailored to

deal with this.

I posted above about my Muslim friend being ticked off that the government had a file open on him. All men within a certain age bracket who were born in a long list of countries and former countries were asked to register with the INS in 2002/3, the INS opened files on them which are in form and filing location identical to those opened on international criminals. For my money, the respondents had good reason to believe they might be under surveillance. Not to mention that any of us who has answered a poll has probably, when confronted by a question we didn't like the implications of, told the pollster, in Zahed's words, to "piss off".

So here we have a survey that shows a figure close to or down in the noise who are some kind of favorable on Al Qaeda. We have a large percentage of "Don't know/Refused" with the polling firm believing there is substantial mistrust of surveillance -- to the point where they needed to use non-standard polling techniques to counteract it.

And we have a McCarthyite anti-Muslim Golden Bigot who infers phantom menaces from N/A responses, and claims that anyone who does not agree is in the thrall of investment in apologism.

Golden Boy,

1) Would you please tell us of a religious ideology that is tolerant and liberal, so we can understand what you mean?

2) Would you please specify what Islam you are talking about?

BTW, when something is "in the noise", like a 1% result inside a survey that has a 5% margin of error, it means you can't draw conclusions from it, it doesn't mean pick your favorite point inside the error bar to support your point of view. Similarly, when a respondent is listed DK/Refused, it means they didn't give an answer to the question, for their own reasons, not that you can assign any meaning you want to the lack of answer. Assigning meaning to either is an error. You could speculate on lack of responses, which the polling people do to try to alter their technique to maximize the number of completed survey questions, but you can't infer anything from a DK/Refused.

If you commit these errors, your statements are not validly transferred to the whole population. What you end up with, in the case of the Pew sample, is a conclusion valid for exactly 1050 people, not the whole Muslim population.

And guess what, Ondelette et al? I'm not a Christian. I had to smile at your challenge to name an open, tolerant religion; that doesn't really seem to come with the territory, does it? I won't defend Christianity - why would I, when I am unsympathetic to its doctrine and practice. But Islam - the violent, illiberal, expansionist ideology founded by a warlord in the seventh century - is the worst of the bunch. That's the Islam I'm talking about, Ondelette - is there another Islam, that I've been inadvertently slandering all day?

Well, I never assumed you were Christian, I'm not, I just wanted to hear the definition of a tolerant liberal religion. Apparently you don't have one. Christianity and Islam are not the only ones out there for consideration, but you may plead ignorance.

You may not plead ignorance on assuming Islam is a single integrated whole, or that it is violent and illiberal in it's totality. Would you please discuss Sufism? You are asserting you know all about all of Islam, so you may not plead ignorance. Especially since most of what you are calling expansionism was done by the Sufis.

Your ref was to a page on Wahhabism, the only link to Sufism was a "what is Sufism" that described it as being a sect that introduced changes while claiming to be mystical.

Wahhabism is very young (1720's). They didn't like the Sufis at all.

But I was really looking for expertise on Golden Boy's part. Without it, expecting the rest of us to believe that his claim that a billion people are violent intolerant illiberal expansionists, and we are some sort of enthralled subserviants is very thin. The Sufis brand of Islam was very syncretic, which doesn't fit with intolerance, and they weren't violent.