David Moore - The Superpollsters: How They Measure and Manipulate Public Opinion in America

On the eve of the 1992 presidential election, The Superpollsters: How They Measure and Manipulate Public Opinion in America takes a look at the people who tell us what we think. A public opinion pollster for twenty years, author David W. Moore includes profiles of Shere Hite, author of The Hite Report, the groundbreaking and controversial work on sexuality; George Gallup, the man who broke polling practice with his 1936 prediction of Hoovers defeat and FDRs victory, the man who pioneered modern polling practices; Lou Harris, JFKs pollster, the first of the television pollsters; Pat Caddell, the man responsible first for George McGoverns, and then for Jimmy Carters, surprise capture of the Democratic presidential nomination; Robert Teeter, pollster for Nixon, Ford, and past and current pollster for President George Bush; Richard Wirthlin, pollster for Ronald Reagan; Mervin Field, head of the California Poll; and many others. Personal advisors to the candidates, pollsters often have tremendous influence on what the top politicians say, and how they say it. Here, too, is the lively history of polling. Its increasing sophistication parallels the growing complexity of our national political scene, from its rough origins to the present day, when the pollsters--and less frequently, the voters themselves--make or break a candidate.