Letters to the Editor

This letter is associated with the following article:
Why are pilots and flight attendants paraded through metal detectors, but not cleaners and caterers? Plus: Phantom hijackers revisited, and ominous news for your summer travel plans.
  • On 5% responses to polls

    (5% of Muslims in America actually support al Qaeda, according to the poll!)

    5% of people taking a poll will agree that the polltaker is a Martian. You have to be very careful about drawing any conclusions at all about any poll numbers below 20% or so, and particularly poll numbers in the range of the margin of error. At 5% of the typical sampling size for this sort of poll, you're now putting weight on responses from people who want to shock the polltaker, who had a horrible day and want to let it out on someone, who are annoyed at being polled and want to sabotage the poll, who didn't even understand what was asked, etc.

    That statistic is essentially meaningless.

    The 25% number is more meaningful, and I could go into speculation about why Muslims may feel that way for reasons other than "they want to blow up our planes," but that's a topic for another article.