House of Eratosthenes

I was just listening to Meet The Press with half-an-ear, and someone had commented on a poll that says a large majority of voters understand Barack Obama is a Christian, twenty-something percent don’t know what he is and eleven percent still say he’s a Muslim. Time for Tivo. I was disappointed in my ability to receive the television medium because I was specifically looking for some foundation to this argument they were having — Tim Russert was going into borderline hysterics about what a good Christian Barack Obama is. “Borderline hysterics” meaning…throwing out factoids that would be meaningful only to people who are trying to figure out what Obama’s religion is. A long string of ’em. Which is a little weird, because if he was trying to prove something, one or two would have sufficed.

My impression was that since the media is in the tank for Obama, they were trying to conjure up a boogeyman that doesn’t actually exist: The millions-strong mob of likely voters who have eliminated Obama on the unfair and false accusation that he’s a Muslim. I was skeptical that this mob exists. Having heard this eleven percent thing, I remain just as skeptical.

It isn’t that my Madd Googl Skilz have failed to wrap their virtual tendrils around this poll. I’m sure I’ll come across it later. I think eleven percent sounds about right.

And yeah, I believe every single anecdote about encounters with these people. I think they’re out there.

It’s just that I doubt they’re worth discussing. At all. I don’t think they matter, I don’t think they’re significant, and I certainly don’t think they’re going to affect the outcome of anything. Naturally, if I’m wrong, that would be a good thing because this is an exceptionally just-plain-bad presidential candidate.

But back to these eleven percenters who “still think he’s a Muslim.”

I think they’re worth talking about, only because when people talk about them, all present feel a strengthening of their loyalties to the Obamessiah…and they like this. Obama appeals to the “feelings” voter. And I can’t help noticing that “feelings” voters use their feelings as sort of a security blanket — they can’t drop ’em for too long or they get all antsy.

That, and of course, they don’t think. One of the persistent myths of our time, one accepted by far more than eleven percent, is that a single person can throw both his feelings and thoughts into a single decision. Not so. You have to choose which master you serve. To a thinking voter, “He Isn’t A Muslim After All!” is a pretty poor qualification for President. I’m not a Muslim, and I don’t know if I’m up to the job…although I’d be better than him, because I have the capacity to mix in an occasional wise decision in with my long train of stupid ones. That, and when I don’t know something, I think I’m pretty good at figuring out what it is I don’t know. Besides, isn’t being a Muslim supposed to be more-or-less okay?

I challenge the idea that eleven percent of anything means very much. Good heavens, what would happen if George Bush’s approval rating was suddenly eleven percent? World War Three could break out that very same morning and you’d probably hear nothing of it. The networks would rush to give us instructions to believe that eleven percent is statistically the same as zero…and they’d be right about that.

Because the elephant in the room that they’re trying to ignore, is that eleven percent, which is one out of nine, is a fraction descending far into the heavy fog of “statistical nobody.” You can come up with any cockeyed idea you want to — and it will find acceptance in one out of nine people, and probably more, with no trouble at all. One out of nine…you’ll probably find exuberant, enthusiastic acceptance of whatever-it-is among that many.

Obama should be pleased as punch. One out of nine means this canard is effectively dead.

Now, the real question, as far as I’m concerned, is how many likely voters think Obama wants the radical Muslim whack-jobs we’re fighting to come out of this thing whole, so they can stir up some more trouble later on. Seems to me this is far more pertinent to our decision than Obama’s personal faith, which is constitutionally barred as a litmus test for his candidacy anyway. The only thing I took away from all that stuff about his church is that he has a history of making friends with America-hating dickheads, and I already knew that. I’m concerned not with his personal creed, but with his sympathies.

And you know what? I’ll bet that’s true of the people who were questioned in whatever that poll was. In fact, I’ll bet it’s true of the eleven-percenters.

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Eleven PercentSunday, May 25th, 2008

Eleven Percent
Sunday, May 25th, 2008