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Mark Blumenthal points out that Mark Halperin is a miserable fucking excuse for a journalist.

Yesterday, I wrote about an aspect of the way the media has been covering the campaign that “makes me want to scream.” Today, we have a story about a new poll in New Hampshire that may turn me into Howard Beale.

Via The Page we learn of a new telephone survey of just 401 “likely primary voters” conducted November 1-4 by Boston/New Hampshire television station WBZ and Franklin Pierce University (story, results, tables). Given the small sample size (which includes likely voters for each primary), the initial intent may have been to focus on issues of interest to all primary voters rather than the usual trial-heat results. Issues were the focus of the poll story that WBZ broadcast last night. But that is not the way it worked out in their online article.

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The lead:

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and New York Senator Hillary Clinton continue to hold on to their lead in the latest WBZ/Franklin Pierce University New Hampshire Primary Poll.

The story also characterizes Hillary Clinton’s “lead” as “very strong.”

The problem? The WBZ/Franklin Pierce poll did not ask a question about vote preference (at least not that was referenced in the story or any of the materials posted online, and our calls to the number provided in the PDF were not answered). Here are the two questions they asked that were referenced in the story:

Mark Halperin is very serious though.