# New poll: Majority of Americans support impeachment **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 14, 2006, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978 "2006-01-14T17:17:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/1 "2006-01-14T17:17:58Z")
> [@](#): > > New Zogby Poll Shows Majority of Americans Support Impeaching Bush for Wiretapping > > By a margin of 52% to 43%, Americans want Congress to impeach President Bush if he wiretapped American citizens without a judge’s approval, according to a new poll commissioned by [AfterDowningStreet.org](http://AfterDowningStreet.org), a grassroots coalition that supports a Congressional investigation of President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003. > > The poll was conducted by Zogby International, the highly-regarded non-partisan polling company. The poll interviewed 1,216 U.S. adults from January 9-12. > > The poll found that 52% agreed with the statement: > > “If President Bush wiretapped American citizens without the approval of a judge, do you agree or disagree that Congress should consider holding him accountable through impeachment.” From [here](http://www.democrats.com/bush-impeachment-poll-2). Two questions for debate. First, is this a legitimate way to frame the question and then the result? If X did Y then Z should happen? And second, even if the poll means what it says it means, does it mean anything, I mean, really? (Sorry, couldn’t help myself.) What impact does a public opinion shift like this really have? ---
**Author:** ![Lochdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/edb3f5/32.png) [@Lochdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lochdale)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/2 "2006-01-14T17:26:02Z")
My first concern is that the suvery is linked through [Democrats.com](http://Democrats.com). Hardly an impartial website. I’m not sure it’s accurate to say that one poll is indicative of a shift in public perception. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/3 "2006-01-14T18:10:34Z")
> [@Lochdale](#): > > My first concern is that the suvery is linked through [Democrats.com](http://Democrats.com). Hardly an impartial website. Why would you question the accuracy of a poll based on who _linked_ to it? Zogby is a well respected polster who has demonstrated a higher accuracy rate than many other pollsters. Their methods are reputable, why not their results? ---
**Author:** ![borschevsky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/97f17d/32.png) [@borschevsky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/borschevsky)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/4 "2006-01-14T18:35:22Z")
I don’t think you can say that a “Majority of Americans Support Impeaching Bush for Wiretapping” based on the poll, as it only asked if “Congress should consider holding him accountable through impeachment.” I’m sure some people would want Congress to consider impeachment, without going so far as to say he actually should be impeached. ---
**Author:** ![Walter\_Windchill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Walter\_Windchill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walter_Windchill)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/5 "2006-01-14T18:57:40Z")
It doesn’t map to my assumptions about the American People, most of whom aren’t terribly interested in civil liberties. Stuff like this is generally considered to be done against bad people who deserve it, and good for national security, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/6 "2006-01-14T19:08:41Z")
I would have answered “Yes” to that question. And I don’t for a moment believe the President should be impeached. But Congress has a constitutional responsibility to _consider_ all its options, and those options certainly include impeachment. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/7 "2006-01-14T19:18:22Z")
To echo the sentiments already expressed, the poll just shows a small majority of Americans (probably within the margin of error) support the idea of Congress **considering** impeachment. Considering? That’s almost meaningless. Most people would probably also reply yes to a poll question that asked, “Would you consider vacationing in Europe?” but most Americans actually never do that. The title of this thread is highly misleading in light of all of this. I’ve also long questioned Zogby’s impartiality as a pollster. He reported that Bush was going to lose in an electoral landslide in 2004; and even made highly biased statements like, Americans will vote for any candidate who was not Bush, and that Bush had “lost the election months ago.” That’s not the kind of thing I like to hear from pollsters. ---
**Author:** ![Menocchio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@Menocchio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Menocchio)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/8 "2006-01-14T19:25:31Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I would have answered “Yes” to that question. > > And I don’t for a moment believe the President should be impeached. But Congress has a constitutional responsibility to _consider_ all its options, and those options certainly include impeachment. That seems a weird hair-splitting point to me. When I hear “Congress should consider impeachment”, I hear “Congress should have a serious debate, if not a full out attempt to impeach”, not “Congress should think about it briefly, then dismiss it”. I do agree that the question is oddly worded. “Should Congress impeach (or attempt to impeach) the president?” would more directly address the issue, I think. I’m very surprised and encouraged by this poll. I think these wiretaps are worthy of impeachment, and while I’m not demanding that result, it’s good to see that Americans aren’t buying this crap, and aren’t as afraid of the “I” word as I thought they’d be. I hope the Democrats are paying attention. Hell, I hope the Republicans are too. Even if the Dems never regain power, I’d be happy if the next GOP administration had more respect for civil liberties. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/9 "2006-01-14T19:29:20Z")
> [@Menocchio](#): > > That seems a weird hair-splitting point to me. When I hear “Congress should consider impeachment”, I hear “Congress should have a serious debate, if not a full out attempt to impeach”, not “Congress should think about it briefly, then dismiss it”. > > I do agree that the question is oddly worded. “Should Congress impeach (or attempt to impeach) the president?” would more directly address the issue, I think. > > I’m very surprised and encouraged by this poll. I think these wiretaps are worthy of impeachment, and while I’m not demanding that result, it’s good to see that Americans aren’t buying this crap, and aren’t as afraid of the “I” word as I thought they’d be. I hope the Democrats are paying attention. Hell, I hope the Republicans are too. Even if the Dems never regain power, I’d be happy if the next GOP administration had more respect for civil liberties. You seem to be unfamiliar with the definition of the word consider. . . Even if this poll clearly showed most Americans supported impeachment, it would just be a resoundingly obvious endorsement of the fact that in our system the common citizens can bitch and moan all they want, but they don’t get that kind of power because government can’t be properly ran with the peons meddling constantly. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/10 "2006-01-14T20:15:48Z")
I submit that the word “consider” means something different in the context of congress than it means in reference to an individual. For Congress to “consider” something, it means to take some sort of action on it (draft a bill, hold a hearing, etc.). If you google “congress+consider,” I think you’ll find that in the political jargon, it means something akin to this. To believe otherwise, I think, requires that you believe Zogby has an overt political agenda–since expertise in polling surely means carefully choosing your words. This doesn’t prove, of course, that the people polled appreciate this meaning of the word. ---
**Author:** ![Menocchio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@Menocchio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Menocchio)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/11 "2006-01-14T21:04:07Z")
> [@Richard Parker](#): > > I submit that the word “consider” means something different in the context of congress than it means in reference to an individual. For Congress to “consider” something, it means to take some sort of action on it (draft a bill, hold a hearing, etc.). If you google “congress+consider,” I think you’ll find that in the political jargon, it means something akin to this. That’s my point exactly. If you don’t think Congress should take steps towards impeachment, then supporting them “considering” impeachment is meaningless. If I didn’t want the president to be impeached, or at least thought that the possibility should be seriously debated, I _wouldn’t_ want Congress to consider it, in any sense. It’d be a step towards a result I didn’t want, and a waste of time. ---
**Author:** ![Lama\_Pacos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Lama\_Pacos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lama_Pacos)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/12 "2006-01-14T21:31:37Z")
Personally, I don’t imagine the majority of people answering a poll actually care much about the subtleties of the word “consider”. I’d guess people tend to answer poll questions based more on the spirit of the response than the letter. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/13 "2006-01-15T00:37:57Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > I’ve also long questioned Zogby’s impartiality as a pollster. He reported that Bush was going to lose in an electoral landslide in 2004; and even made highly biased statements like, Americans will vote for any candidate who was not Bush, and that Bush had “lost the election months ago.” Zogby’s polls were more accurate than his personal predictions. According to the calculations by [www.electoral-vote.com](http://www.electoral-vote.com/2004/pollsters/), Zogby’s polls were accurate 91% of the time, while Gallup managed only an 80% accuracy rate, and the GOP pollster Strategic Vision was right only 64% of the time. ---
**Author:** ![Jon\_the\_Geek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@Jon\_the\_Geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jon_the_Geek)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 9:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/14 "2006-01-15T09:00:16Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I would have answered “Yes” to that question. > > And I don’t for a moment believe the President should be impeached. But Congress has a constitutional responsibility to _consider_ all its options, and those options certainly include impeachment. Darnit, **Bricker**. As far as I can recall (I’ve had a long hiatus from SDMB), we disagree on just about everything political, but this is very nearly exactly my response. I personally think maybe he _should_ actually be impeached (depending on the outcome of an investigatgion), but reading the poll I thought, “Duh, of COURSE Congress should _look into it_.” ---
**Author:** ![alaricthegoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4bbf92/32.png) [@alaricthegoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alaricthegoth)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/15 "2006-01-15T10:22:15Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I would have answered “Yes” to that question. > > And I don’t for a moment believe the President should be impeached. But Congress has a constitutional responsibility to _consider_ all its options, and those options certainly include impeachment. Jesus, Bricker, don’t be such a weasel. You know perfectly well that there is no “consideration” of ANYTHING going on in DC let along any thoughtful assessment of the constitutional issues we face. There is profound consideration of the vocational issues each house member and some senators face. For purposes of gauging the progression of impeachment from an idea of the \*scramingravingloonies, this wording is quite capable of returning valid results \*IMPEACHMENT EMERGENCY:January 20, '05 will be too late… [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/search.php?searchid=1391426&pp=25&page=2](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/search.php?searchid=1391426&pp=25&page=2) ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/16 "2006-01-15T11:44:40Z")
Any thoughts on the precedent value of an historically recent impeachment? **a the g** , **bricker**? ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2006, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/17 "2006-01-16T18:25:33Z")
Am I the only one who thinks that 1,216 people is not a large enough sample size to judge the opinion of a country of 280,000,000 people? Erek ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2006, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/18 "2006-01-16T18:32:07Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Am I the only one who thinks that 1,216 people is not a large enough sample size to judge the opinion of a country of 280,000,000 people? The only one? Probably not. But they likely don’t have a grasp of basic statistics, either. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2006, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/19 "2006-01-16T18:32:16Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Am I the only one who thinks that 1,216 people is not a large enough sample size to judge the opinion of a country of 280,000,000 people? > > Erek 😕 How many would be enough? And can you give any statistics-based reason for your figure? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2006, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978/20 "2006-01-16T18:46:32Z")
Ak! The size of the sample compared to the population sampled has no effect on accuracy. In other words, you don’t need a larger sample when your population is larger, or a smaller sample when your population is smaller. It CAN be harder to get a representative sample from a large population, but that says nothing about what size of sample you need. Getting a statistically significant result is entirely dependent on the size of the sample, INDEPENDENT OF THE SIZE OF THE POPULATION SAMPLED. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-poll-majority-of-americans-support-impeachment/339978.md?page=2)