Both the Post and the Sun ran the results of a poll commissioned by Center Maryland showing Governor Martin O’Malley leading former Governor Bob Ehrlich by six points. But what neither newspaper reported is that Center Maryland is a PR site founded and run by former O’Malley staffers.
In January, we tracked $54,802 in political contributions made by the founders, with $21,312 going to O’Malley and 92% of the money headed to Democrats. Since then, Center Maryland co-founder Martin Knott has given $500 to Lieutenant Governor Anthony Brown (6/4/10) and $5,500 to O’Malley in three contributions (an apparent violation of campaign finance law that limits individual donations to $4,000 per candidate); co-founder Howard Libit has given $1,333.33 to O’Malley (in two contributions on 6/18/10 and 8/10/10); and co-founder Tom Loveland has given $500 to O’Malley (8/7/10). None of them gave money to Ehrlich this year. And all of these contributions were made while they were supposedly running a “news site” that reported “straight down the middle.”
This poll is an outlier as almost all the others find O’Malley and Ehrlich neck-and-neck. Given that fact and the above connections, the Post and the Sun should have disclosed the background of those who commissioned it to their readers.
Update: The Post picked up on this almost five hours after this blog post but did not credit us for our research.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
MSM Falls for Poll by Former O'Malley Staffers (Updated)
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3 comments:
I agree that a disclosure would have been helpful, but the Post story did say the results were released by O'Malley. A poll is a poll, though, regardless of whom commissions it. There is this belief that FOX moves polls one way and CNN moves them another way, etc. I don't find that true. What matters are votes in November.
Adam -
The Sun reported CenterMaryland's ties to the O'Malley camp, but the Post did not.
I checked the contributions to Friends of O'Malley from "Martin Knott." They're from two different addresses, so I suspect they're from a father and a son.
Could you imagine our friends at Red Maryland challenging the validity of a poll showing a Republican ahead of a Democrat the way you questioned CenterMaryland's poll? They had the opportunity when a GOP consulting firm currently on the payroll of the Republican National Committee released a "poll" showing Bob Ehrlich ahead of O'Malley by three points, but they didn't rise to the occasion.
Remember the Cold War joke about the American boasting to his Russian friend that he's free to march up to the Capitol and scream at the top of his lungs,
The Russian says he is free to march up to the Kremlin and scream at the top of his lungs, "President Nixon and the whole Congress are no good, lying, cheating bums!" No wonder they call it Red Maryland.
- Steve Lebowitz, Annapolis
Naturally, what Steve doesn't say is that Center Maryland's ties to O'Malley are much stronger and substantive than he wishes those of Magellan are to Ehrlich.
The Magellan poll also reported results much closer to similar polls from Rassmussen and Gonzalez than did Center Maryland
Of course this is all a case of Steve rending his garments and gnashing his teeth anytime somone has the temerity to question O'Malley and his machine.
And while we're on Cold War analogies Steve, I never underestimate the power of Martin O'Malley to play play useful idiot
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