To health with all of you

National Review is getting worse than the New Heritage Foundation (tastes like a breath mint! works like a Jimde Mint!). A recent post tells us about a devastating survey result:

as Forbes contributor Merrill Matthews has noted, a recent survey of some 2,500 federal employees discovered that 92.3 percent of them want to keep their existing coverage and avoid Obamacare.

“Leave our healtcare program alone NO Obamacare!!!” commented one participant (unedited, like all those quoted here) in this study, conducted by FedSmith.com, which tracks federal affairs. Another respondent said, “The only federal employees that should go into the exchanges are the ones the voted for this president. I saw through his smoke screen and mirrors.” A third federal employee remarked: “Obama care disgusts me! The exchanges are fraud with inept, incompetent morons set to access my personal information! Repeal NOW!!!!!”

What they don't explain, although it's easy enough to follow the link and find out for yourself, is the survey methodology. This was done by an online publication for federal workers called FedSmith inviting their readers to tell them how they felt. So it's not any kind of valid sample of anything. And it was administered on August 8, before the idiocy surrounding the Grassley Amendment was resolved, when the workers might well have feared they were going to have to pony up personally for their premiums, now clearly not the case. These numbers say nothing whatever about anybody but the people who read this rag. Which given the existence of real newspapers like Federal Daily and Gannett's Federal Times cannot be very many people.

Still and all, last October they only supported Romney 56% to 40%, so maybe they're not as biased as they look. Or maybe they just have fewer readers, week by famished week.

Smoke and Mirrors. Austin School of Film.