According to a poll performed by Frank Luntz, described in the Washington Times, Ivy League professors are even more left/liberal than previously suspected. Actually, I'll bet that there are more than 3% Republicans. The rest are simply afraid to admit it--they don't want to be hauled before the Committee For Un-Ivy-League Activities...

[Wednesday morning update]

As can be seen in the comments section, reader and fellow blogger Paul Orwin takes issue with the poll methodology:

I didn't want to get into it in the comment section, but actually, 150 is not a very large sample size. Sampling error is not a function of relative sample size, but of absolute sample size. If the total population is 10, then 10% of the population is not an appropriate sample (i.e. 1). The margin of error in the poll is 8%, which makes any # of their analyses dubious at best.

Well, I hadn't looked at the poll in any detail, so I'll take your word for it. Certainly a 3% estimate of Republicans with an 8% error is meaningless.

Additionally, look at the distribution of responses, almost entirely from the liberal arts faculty, not from the sciences. No science is even mentioned as a response, all of them left to "other". I am referring to hard science, biology, chemistry, physics, engineering and math, not social science.

While that may be true, I find it disturbing that even when one excludes the hard sciences, that the humanities professoriate is that far over. Not surprising, but disturbing. These are the people that indoctrinate many of our kids. I do agree that if this is the case, however, the reporting should have been describing humanities departments, rather than the universities as a whole.

In any event, the pollers tilt at least as far right as the pollees tilt left. By the way, I would guess that, depending on how you define "Ivy League Faculty", this sample could be severely misrepresentative. Are med school, law school, business school faculty excluded?? It strikes me as a case of "We know that the Ivy League is a haven for wacko liberals, so lets eliminate from consideration anyone that might be moderate to conservative, and then trumpet our results as proof of the premise." Typical hack job.

I'm not sure what you mean by the pollers "tilting right." The poll was done by Frank Luntz, who is an admitted Republican, but he, like all pollsters, has a reputation to protect, and I've never gotten the impression from listening to him or seeing him on television (e.g., MSNBC during last years campaign) that he was particularly "right wing." I don't think that there's a problem with the poll so much as with the reporting of it. Certainly, it's no secret that the WaTimes is a conservative paper.

I took a look at this "poll" about a week ago in my blog, and didn't find much that stood up to scrutiny. I won't rehash it, but suffice to say that there are probably more than 150 professors at the 8 Ivy league schools

While I haven't looked at the poll in detail, your specific criticism here isn't valid. Polls always take a sample of the population. That doesn't, in itself, invalidate them. If it's a bad poll, it will have to be for some reason other than that, particularly since 150 is a pretty large sample size, considering the total population size.

I didn't want to get into it in the comment section, but actually, 150 is not a very large sample size. Sampling error is not a function of relative sample size, but of absolute sample size. If the total population is 10, then 10% of the population is not an appropriate sample (i.e. 1). The margin of error in the poll is 8%, which makes any # of their analyses dubious at best. Additionally, look at the distribution of responses, almost entirely from the liberal arts faculty, not from the sciences. No science is even mentioned as a response, all of them left to "other". I am referring to hard science, biology, chemistry, physics, engineering and math, not social science. In any event, the pollers tilt at least as far right as the pollees tilt left. By the way, I would guess that, depending on how you define "Ivy League Faculty", this sample could be severely misrepresentative. Are med school, law school, business school faculty excluded?? It strikes me as a case of "We know that the Ivy League is a haven for wacko liberals, so lets eliminate from consideration anyone that might be moderate to conservative, and then trumpet our results as proof of the premise." Typical hack job.

As an addendum to my last post, don't you want to change your post to "Republican pollster Frank Luntz" and "the conservative Washington Times" owned by well-known journalist Rev. Sun Yung Moon (sp?). You don't want to get accused of conservative media bias, do you??