Randi Kreiss

What’s for dinner? Tilapia is trending upward.

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Poll mania has rendered me unable to make an independent decision.

Three sweaters are folded on the bedroom chair: blue, green and black. How am I supposed to decide which to wear today? TV, print media and pre-election culture conspire to erode my self-confidence. So I poll my friends. It’s easy. I text 10 people and ask them which sweater they think would work best for me today. Seventy percent vote for blue, so blue it is. Easy. And I didn’t have to think. Not thinking is key when it comes to polling and elections.

The polls are ubiquitous and unrelenting. Trump has been trouncing his GOP opponents, and then, suddenly, last week, not so much. Carson is up; Carly is trending down. Christie enjoyed a bump after the last debate but has since settled back to unimpressive numbers.

Hillary is doing well after her recent multi-hour grilling by the Benghazi committee. But what exactly does doing well in the polls mean?

Until we are much closer to the election — say, a week away — the polls can be wildly misleading. And the behavior of candidates preaching to the polls creates a kind of political Disneyland. Everyone is saying what he or she thinks supporters want to hear, and it has very little to do with what the candidates really think or what they truly intend to do when they get into office. If you don’t believe me, go back to your high school yearbook, look up “most popular” and see how they’re trending now.

At the debate the other night, Chris Christie got an ovation for calling out the moderators who asked about fantasy football. His poll numbers spiked accordingly, but that has no real significance. Polls take a snapshot of a moment, and then the moment is gone.

What is lacking in every single candidate, aside from Bernie Sanders, who can’t win, is authenticity. And of course, the irony is that Sanders can’t win because he’s too honest about what he would do as president. Debate analysts speak of “performance.” Which, to me, means “acting.” And what has that to do with one’s skills and ideas and ability to lead?

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