The folks at Public Policy Polling are at it again, slipping a phony question into a poll and proving
that public opinion does not equate to informed opinion.

In their newest survey they found that 30 percent of Republican primary voters say the national
security threat posed by the nation of Agrabah demands U.S. military
intervention and a bombing campaign.

Here’s the problem:
Argabah is a fictional country in the 1992 Disney animated film “Aladdin.”

Public Policy Polling, a left-leaning firm but
one known for its accuracy, also found that supporters of GOP presidential
frontrunner Donald Trump were more likely to favor bombing the made-up Arabian
nation from the film.

Sensing a dramatic flip-flop by GOP voters on the Syrian civil war and ISIS terrorism, Trump has

been receiving rousing ovations at campaign rallies by declaring that he will “bomb the sh–” out of ISIS.

According to The Hill, the PPP poll released on Thursday found that the Republican primary front-runner won 45 percent support among those
who advocated the bombing of Agrabah, compared to just 22 percent support from
those who opposed it.

Overall, 13 percent of Republicans said they opposed bombing the country. A plurality of Democratic
voters, 36-19 percent, also opposed the move.

PPP has made this type of punked-polling a running gag, including the time when
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder was the butt of the joke.

In May, when Snyder was still toying with the idea of running for president, PPP pollster Tom
Jensen told a Detroit Free Press journalist that he, political reporter Paul
Egan, could poll as high as Snyder on favorability in a state where the
governor was an unknown.
Jensen decided to test his theory and was proven correct when Arizona voters
participating in a PPP poll gave Snyder a 5/11 percent favorable-unfavorable
rating. Egan stood at a 6/7 percent favorable-unfavorable status. The rest of
the respondents admitted that they knew nothing about the two men.

In August, another PPP prank went viral when nearly one in 10 voters in North Carolina – home of the
sun-swallowing solar panels – said they support a candidate by the name of Deez Nuts for president. Deez Nuts was a name officially registered as a presidential
candidate by Brady Olson, a 15-year-old farm boy from Iowa. On a lark, PPP
honored the boy’s request to participate in his experiment and include Nuts in
their polling.

Recent Posts: