Why the Religion-Torture Poll Isn't that Significant

There are a lot of people who are very surprised at the latest poll that connects regular churchgoing to support of torture under certain circumstances.

As someone who understands the potential connection, and was awfully tempted to make it myself. The problem is that the survey's not really conclusive.

The sample size for regular churchgoing individuals is 336, and the number posted in the top two boxes is 54%.

Now, 54% is a majority, and a majority like that is a big thing in politics, especially when compared to the 42% of non-churchgoers (sample size of 168).

The problem is, people forget about the political component here.

Irreligious individuals (obviously, with exceptions, but I'm speaking in generalities) tend to be left leaning.

The heavily religious often sway towards the right, and have been pulled there more and more heavily over the last few decades.

Of course, these are generalities, but even a mild conservative pull among religious individuals could explain the trending towards support of torture.

Now, the liberal tendencies of non-churchgoers could also be used to explain the lack of support for torture, but I think that, in that respect, the off-put needs to be recognized as a little stronger.

Apart from the fact that I don't like polling data very much, especially when I look at the pool size, this trending doesn't seem surprising or significant.

If the number was 70%, I'd tilt my head and make a joke about the inquisition, but it's not. It's 52%, which means that almost half of the pews are filled with people who oppose torture. That's not surprising, and it's not significant.

49% of the U.S., according to this poll, falls into those top two boxes. Why is it shocking that there's a slight increase in the highly-religious population (and 3% is slight)?

It just seems like stretching nothing to me.