Now let me start off with the caveat that I'm no political expert, unlike the brilliant team at CNN. Nevertheless, I wanted to take a look at CNN's latest analysis of the state of the presidential race after the two parties' national conventions. According to CNN, Gallup has reported the race as a tie.
Under the headline
Did Obama get post-convention bounce?
CNN reports:
The Gallup daily tracking poll released Sunday showed Obama opening up his largest margin over Romney since early July -- 49% to 44%.
Maybe that doesn't sound like a tie to you or me, but CNN explains:
With a sampling error of plus-or-minus 4%, the poll amounts to a statistical tie.
Now, I'm no mathematician, but the difference between 49% and 44% seems to me to be 5%.
Next, although I'm no computer or internets expert, I decided to check Gallup's own website to see their data about the poll in question. There I read that:
Margin of error is ±2 percentage points
Now, I'm no journalist unlike the professionals at CNN, but this looks to my uninformed eye like serious journalistic malfeasance. Jus' sayin'.