March 9, 1985

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Your Mar. 8-14 issue, unlike previous ones, did not describe your survey as a random survey. I hope this marks a recognition that your responses, given the way they were gathered, did not meet the conditions under which a survey may be described as random.

Since the survey is not random and therefore not representative even of the population which you describe as "readers of the Mr. & Ms. special edition and those interested in the survey," the information provided by your 6,729 respondents can’t really tell you who the most popular politician in the country is.

But it can indicate the range of reasons presented by supporters of a given politician to justify their commitments.

What matters is that you and your readers recognize that the 697 votes received by Mr. Salvador Laurel can’t be interpreted very much further than "697 supporters of Mr. Laurel participated in the survey."

J. Pedrosa Ramas