A friend of mine, for reasons he doesn’t know, has been on the email list of the Trump campaign for years now, and he sometimes forwards the emails to me for my edification/amusement.
The main takeaway from me is usually to wonder whether there is any level of transparent lying or talking down to your audience that would make some members of said audience feel so insulted that the missives would have the opposite of the desired effect, assuming that the desired effect is not to alienate your base.
I guess I’ll never know the answer to that, but sometimes the mailing strike me as so funny, in a sad way, that I feel like passing them on to MinnPost’s Black Ink readers. Here’s a “survey,” by the organization, which, at the moment, is calling itself “Save America/ President Donald J. Trump,” and the survey, in an slight giveaway that it’s not serious opinion research, is titled …
“OFFICIAL CORRUPT MEDIA SURVEY.”
In its entirety, it asked:
Do you agree the media hates President Trump?
- Yes
- No
Do you agree the media lies about President Trump?
- Yes
- No
Do you agree the media was willing to do whatever it took to make sure President Trump was not re-elected in 2020?
- Yes
- No
Do you agree we must hold the liberal media accountable?
- Yes
- No
Do you agree that CNN and MSNBC are FAKE NEWS?
- Yes
- No
How would you rate CNN?
- Very Fake
- Totally Fake
- 100% Fake
- All of the above
How would you rate MSNBC?
- Very Fake
- Totally Fake
- 100% Fake
- All of the above
Do you agree the media lies to protect Joe Biden?
- Yes
- No
To me, one of the most hilarious aspects of it as a violation of almost every norm of poll science is the “do you agree” gag. Not: The media lies to protect Biden. Agree/disagree. Although the four choices the “poll” offers on rating CNN and MSNBC, the most flattering possible being “very fake,” is also pretty great.
