Sometimes people wonder why I like to "Torture Wolf Blitzer." Well, in his case it's because he's drooling for war and he reads the poll every day on the air and it gets relative few respondents so its easy to influence.
But, more generally, no reputable news organization should report the results of online polls. I remember one morning that asswipe Jack Cafferty was slamming the Democrats based on the results of a CNN online poll. I forget what the issue was, but he basically said "given these results, how could the Demcorats even question the president?" or something similar.
I think it's fine for a more talk-show like show, such as Talk Back Live, to do it. It's a show (Well, was a show) organized around audience responses so it's okay for a bit of fun. But, no other time.
Along comes Dr. "Kitty Beware!" Frist with his online poll, which he took down after it was supposedly "hacked." Well, I'm sure it wasn't hacked - I and a few other liberal websites sent people over to answer the poll. These polls are meaningless, and no one should take them seriously. But, if Frist had gotten a 90% "pro-war" result he would have read it into the congressional record, declared George Bush the Moses of the Iraqi people, and the bombs would start dropping.
Punchline - stop with the goddamn online polls already.
(on that note - go torture wolf!)
