Democrat favors return to draft! Er, better change that . . .

Okay, this one is not only media bias in that the AP has chosen a story to promote their own agenda, but this time they actually created the story to fit their agenda.

The story is "Poll Finds Most Oppose Return to Draft." Already you can probably tell how this is going to go. Even though there is no serious effort to return to the draft (in fact, the only effort at all comes from the Democrats, who got slaughtered when they tried to pass a bill that said as much), we have to take a poll and make all kinds of innuendo as to Bush's involvement in trying to reinstate the draft.

Let's start from the beginning:

Most Americans don't want to see the return of the military draft, although men, older Americans and Republicans were most likely to say it's a good idea, an AP-Ipsos poll found.

A majority of those polled also wouldn't encourage their own children to enlist — highlighting the problems faced by the military as recruiting is in a slump.

Okay, we've now used the incredibly vague words "most" and "majority" twice without defining them. I do not doubt the accuracy of it (I don't want the draft back, and I don't specifically know anyone who does), but are we talking 50.1% or 95%? That makes a big difference in how serious of a problem we have (if we have a problem at all, especially since no one but a few Democrats are trying to reinstate the draft). It's not until the seventh paragraph that we get a number that's a little better: "seven in 10." I've read the story several times now, and I have yet to see the actual numbers or the questions that were asked. Since the story is about the poll itself, these are things we should know.

I would also like to see the fact that it is Charles Rangel, not George W. Bush, who is trying to reinstate the draft. The story shifts the blame on Bush, even though Donald Rumsfeld has said, "There isn't a chance in the world that the draft will be brought back."

So here we have Democrats trying to reinstate the draft and the Republican administration opposing it. So why are there statements in the story such as these?

The shortfalls in military recruiting have led to speculation that the government might be forced to reinstitute the draft. [Really? What's your source on this?]

Jeremy Miller, a sales manager from Denver, said the Iraq war is "a situation the president has gotten us into and should be able to get us out of" without bringing back the draft. [No one has said that the President wants the draft back. In fact, he opposes it. But we get no correction from the reporter.]

The American public has strongly opposed reinstating the draft for the past few decades, according to polls. And decreasing support for the war in Iraq suggests that is unlikely to change anytime soon. [Why should it change? The very construction of the sentences suggests that someone — read: Bush — wants it changed.]

This is either an example of just terrible reporting or outright and blatant bias. Why else would you say four times that Republicans support the draft more than Democrats without once mentioning Rangel? Why even have the story? The draft is not being discussed in Washington, even by Rangel, right now, so why the poll? "Seven in 10" are probably opposed to the world suddenly plunging into the sun also, but we don't get polls about that.

I know that the comparison isn't completely analogous, but doing a poll on a subject that is not being discussed means that either you want it to be discussed or you are trying to flush out people with unpopular ideas.

Since Rangel's name is not in this article, I'm betting that they aren't trying to flush him out.

-Paul Lytle, Primum Mobile Magazine

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