In a new Gallup Poll, we find that 78% of probable voters in California said that they take Schwarzenegger’s candidacy seriously, and 48% said that there is a good or very good chance they will vote for him.

There are a few little problems with these numbers, though.

First, nobody has the slightest clue of how Schwarzenegger plans to do a better job as governor, what his policies would be, or what actions he would take while in office (aside, of course, from delivering the steady stream of one-liners he is known to shoot out). It is pretty clear that his popularity has nothing to do with his politics–hardly an encouraging sign for California. We would be voting purely as a popularity contest, with few voting because they thought he would actually do a good job. When asked how he would deal with the budget crisis, Schwarzenegger replied that he would tell us later–a less-than-reassuring echo from the campaign of George W. Bush.

Second, the poll numbers come from questions people don’t often regard in detail. For example, people see that the poll says 78% of probable voters (73% of registered voters) feel he “should be taken seriously” (CNN quote), but few people indeed see that the whole question asked by pollsters was “Arnold Schwarzenegger as a candidate who deserves to be taken seriously, (or do you regard) Arnold Schwarzenegger’s candidacy as a joke?” The second option, “do you think it’s a joke?” makes a HUGE difference in the answer. Given those two options, I am amazed that 19% to 23% thought it was a joke–hell, I am against him and don’t think he should be taken too seriously as a politician, but I don’t think his candidacy is a joke, either. Given those two possible answers, I would have interpreted the question to be about Schwarzenegger’s seriousness, not whether he should be taken seriously.

If the question had simply been “Should he be taken seriously as a candidate, or do you feel he is not qualified for the job?” then the response would have been very different. It is a very poorly written question, and yet it is the most often quoted of all the numbers.

Gallup did ask if “Arnold Schwarzenegger would do a better job or a worse job than someone who had a career as an elected public official”; here we see a slightly more credible result, where 52% said he would do a better job.

A better question, however, would have been, “do you think that Arnold Schwarzenegger has the professional qualifications to serve in a government position.” But that question was not asked. I would bet you that those responding in the positive would fall well below 50% if it were.