Polls like this are pretty much worthless. Pollsters can call and get people to say all sorts of things. When Bush was in office huge chunks of people (Democrats mostly) would respond to polls saying they think the government was behind 9-11. You can poll people and get them to say Obama is the anti-Christ. Half the country probably doesn’t even know who the Vice President is and 80%+ couldn’t name both their Senators.
29% of people (including apparently 18% of Democrats) may say they think armed rebellion “might soon be necessary”, but the reality is very few people are actually willing to do it. Yes, there is a lot of bluster on some internet sites from the keyboard commando community, but 99% of them aren’t going to do squat.
Usually the purpose of these polls is to make the American public look like unhinged, redneck nutters. PPP is usually behind these surveys, though it looks like Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind did this one.
Great post. You nailed it.