Not to mention the Rezko ad is blatantly misleading at best and an outright lies at worst.

Rec'd and one note about "details"... that is a continuing media meme... despite the fact that more detail exists about his plans beginning from Day One of THIS campaign, Feb 07. That has to be tramped down.

Oh, and did I mention he's a POW too??? Prisoner of Whitey! (Please, JUST KIDDING!!!)

Those comments by the focus group are pure boilerplate GOP talking points. Those people aren't paying attention to anything other than the GOP and its flying monkeys Hannity and Limbaugh.

Not just A Republican operative, the one who came up with Death Tax (for the estate tax) and other key black-is-white, up-is-down, war-is-peace kind of bullshit phrases.

This isn't just SOME operative. He is a key one who relies on words.

And to that I say, FUCK YOU, Joe Klein.

It is soooo good to find TPM and read real news
and comments from real people who use their heads for more than a "hat-rack." I am a life-long democrat, a baby-boomer and have the memory of an
elephant. In other words, I read, pay attention,
research and understand what I read. In short, I am old enough to recognize BS when I see and hear it! John McCain and his crew are doing their BEST to make the American electorate scared to death of the democrats in general, and Obama, in particular...and I hope that most "right-thinking"
Americans will not buy into these blatant lies they're telling. This administration has made a
career out of playing the Fear Card; and they've
held the Constitution hostage as a result! Bush,
Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice and their entire crew should be held accountable for the lies, and high
crimes they've committed against this nation! Now
we've got McCain, who has served his country, yes,
but who has displayed the worst in "family values"
and morals, period! As I've told any and everyone
who'll listen, being a war hero is one thing, but it doesn't give him credentials to be Commander-In-Cheif! He is not the one I want taking that 3
A.M. call in the Whitehouse! I don't know if he's as dumb as his GPA indicates, but he is nothing more than a "pawn" for all those lobbyists, and right-wing conservative racists that are masterminding his campaign!

They had a story on Huffington Post about the same focus group. Of the 17 participants who were willing to say who they voted for in 2004, twelve had voted for Bush and 5 had voted for Kerry.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/25/denver-voters-obama-needs_n_121070.html

Something tells me this group wasn't all that undecided.

The media is trying desperately to continue the drama/soap opera/smackdown that began in the primaries. The closeness of the primaries when they were actually pretty much decided. The PUMAs, whos numbers in reality are quite underwhelming. The excessive focus on the negative commercials, particularly from the McCain camp and the constant drumbeat of fight! fight! fight! when ever Obama says classy for too long.

I tried to write to Klein, but I got that same error message, that his email is not authorized.

Well, here's what I wrote to him. Anyone know any other way the contact him?

Mr. Klein,

I have to say I am utterly disgusted by your lack of journalistic integrity. In your recent blog entry titled, "Focused," you speak about a focus group headed by a known Republican hack.

Let me just show you the integrity of the man you seem to have such trust in for neutrality. From Wikipedia's article on him (all information is cited, so go check it yourself if you'd like):

'In 1997, he was reprimanded by the American Association for Public Opinion Research for refusing to release poll data to support his claimed results "because of client confidentiality". Diane Colasanto, who was president of the AAPOR when it reprimanded Luntz, said, "It is simply wanting to know, How many people did you question? What were the questions? We understand the need for confidentiality, but once a pollster makes results public, the information needs to be public. People need to be able to evaluate whether it was sound research." In 2000 he was censured by the National Council on Public Polls "for allegedly mischaracterizing on MSNBC the results of focus groups he conducted during the [2000] Republican Convention." In September 2004, MSNBC dropped Luntz from its planned coverage of that year's presidential debate, following a letter from Media Matters that outlined Luntz's GOP ties and questionable polling methodology. In a video piece, entertainers and libertarians Penn & Teller lambasted Luntz for his comment that the key to survey polling is "to ask a question in the way that you get the right answer".'

He is KNOWN for mischaracterizing information from focus groups. And you trust the guy? How pathetic. The alarm should have gone off in your head when someone actually compared Obama's rally in Berlin to a Nazi rally.

But fine, you're just reporting what took place there, right? So why not mention Luntz' past transgressions? Why not raise doubt on the focus group he conducted, as a true journalist would? It makes sense that, given Luntz' history, Obama would look worse from such a focus group. You don't tell your readers any of this, and frankly, you should be ashamed of yourself for it.

Let me repeat:

Focus groups are UNSCIENTIFIC!!!!

FG prove nothing. They are interesting to get a feel, but the main reason people use them (mostly govt actually) is they are CHEAP. Real polling is expensive and difficult.

Here's Joe Klein's response within the post. It seems to me that the Frank Luntz / Peter Hart comparison is a humongous stretch — Hart appears to have nothing in his past on Luntz's level.

But, that being said, Klein has to find some person for comparison on the left, in order to be faux-bjective.

Update: Commenters seem far more obsessed with Frank Luntz than with the results of the focus group, which is silly. I've seen focus groups conducted by Luntz and by liberals like Peter Hart, and the process--when conducted well--is more or less the same. In this case, I had one gripe with Luntz: he didn't show Obama's or McCain's solutions to the issues he focused on--health care and social security (the group was sponsored by AARP, hence the issue focus). When I asked the group later how they'd feel about raising taxes on people with incomes over $250,000--Obama's solution to both problems--they split down the middle.

There was some doubt among commenters that these independents were actually...independent, especially since a majority of them voted for Bush last time--but that's how Independents broke in Colorado in 2004. Four years ago, I attended a Hart focus group of undecideds in Kansas City and it soon became apparent that they weren't really--they had decided against John Kerry, even if they weren't admitting it to themselves. By contrast, these folks seemed truly undecided--downright resentful when Luntz tried to push them for a final choice. They were adamant--and I should have included this above--that the debates will be crucial when it comes to making a decision.

Obviously, a focus group ain't an election. It can't gauge intensity of support--can't reflect the thousands of new voters who've been inspired by Obama and who may change the demographic shape of the electorate. There were only two African-Americans in the group--but that was an overrepresentation: blacks compose about 12% of the electorate and a miniscule number of them are undecided. Remember this was a focus group for undecided voters...so it was a snapshot of a sliver--a crucial sliver--of the electorate. I thought the results were credible, if a bit depressing...but you go to the polls with the electorate you have, not the electorate you'd like to have.