victory for Alf Landon over incumbent President Franklin Roosevelt, which also was almost exactly wrong.

The reason people wonder is that the nation is undergoing a transition in terms of how we communicate, and how we are accessible. Polling relies on the ability to assemble a truly random sample. Until fairly recently, random telephone calls accomplished this nicely, as nearly everyone had a landline phone.

Today, a sizeable and growing segment of the population, mostly young, is accessible primarily through a cell phone or on social media. This Pew survey from 2007 found 49 percent of those in the 18-29 age group in this category back then, with the percentages thinning out quickly among older people.

This Scripps Howard News Service piece by Ben Boychuk argues that we’re being set up for a big polling fail. This, he says, is because “too many pollsters use outmoded turnout models and flawed samples.”

But a lot of other people are warning, “Not so fast.”

Pollsters today are using sophisticated methods and tools such as Census data to analyze information and account for discrepancies. This piece discusses some of this and notes pollsters are even counting negative and positive tweets on a candidate.

And the Atlantic piece I mentioned earlier notes that a close analysis of the 1936 Alf Landon fail shows the convention wisdom about it — that it relied too much on telephone respondents at a time when telephones were too new, rare and mostly owned by Republicans — is false. The culprit was a survey mailed out to millions, to which a disproportionate number of Republicans responded.

The Atlantic piece ends by saying, “Statistical and polling methods have improved dramatically since 1936, making the chance of an error of this magnitude — for reasons of technological penetration or any other — highly unlikely.”

Given the speculation this year about polling and shifting communication patterns, as well as the seeming witch's brew of methods to deal with it all, the only thing I can say with certainty is that time will tell, and that we will all know for sure in about a month.

Spring seems always to wither under the foot of the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

If anyone has the passion to move the United States and its allies to deal positively with Middle East’s most troubling nation, however, it is Semnani, a Salt Lake resident who came here from Iran virtually penniless in the late 1960s and has since amassed a fortune.

Semnani has several good reasons for his passion. For one, he still has siblings and other close relatives living in Tehran. For another, he has just authored a report that uses science and best evidence to put a human toll on what a military strike would mean.

Titled, “The Ayatollah’s Nuclear Gamble,” the report conservatively estimates that 70,000 people might be hurt or killed in one key site alone. And in a nation where “the historical record suggests poor disaster management and inadequate emergency preparation,” that casualty list could be magnified by a factor of 10.

These aren’t just numbers pulled out of a hat. As Semnani reminded me when we spoke about this, matters of radiation and nuclear fallout are right in his wheelhouse.

If you’ve heard of Semnani at all, chances are it is in connection with the radioactive waste repository he founded in Utah’s west desert many years ago. It was Envirocare when he owned it. Today it is EnergySolutions. Semnani himself has degrees in chemistry and physics, as well as an honorary Doctorate of Science degree from Southern Utah University.

He spent two years putting together the report, which was released at an opportune time. Only a few days ago, world leaders, including Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, met at the United Nations to argue over Iran, Israel, sanctions or worse. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a forceful plea for immediate action, calling for a “red line” beyond which Iran should not be allowed to go.

There is talk of a strategic military strike, similar to what Israel did against the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq in 1981. No one — not the Iranians, the Israelis or the United States — is talking about the human toll such a strike would take.

No one but Semnani, that is. His report says the thought of such a strike being similar to Osirak is a fantasy. He calculates strikes against four nuclear facilities, estimating shift workers of between 3,500 and 5,500 at any one time, and resulting toxic chemical plumes that reach tens of thousands of civilians or more.

Attacking a uranium conversion facility at Isfahan and an enrichment plant at Natanz would unleash hydrofluoric acid that, quoting a scientist in the study, would make people “drown in their lungs.”

The report already has made a mark. Time Magazine featured it, as did the French publication Le Point. A BBC broadcast about it reached Iran where, Semnani told me, the regime managed to quickly stop access to it. Other reports, however, also have reached Iran, where people are hungry for information about a situation that might affect them.

I’m guessing most Americans share Semnani’s goal, which is to see Iran become free and democratic. Then, as he told me, the government would be more worried about meeting its people’s everyday needs than preserving power at the expense of the economy and public safety.

But Americans, he believes, need to envision the end goal and understand how best to get there.

“This is a nation of 75 million people,” he said of Iran. “You don’t want to lose those people. You don’t want to make them rally around the people making the bombs.”

That would happen if the U.S. unleashed death and mayhem, he said. It’s a position that makes good sense, but the trick is getting Iranians to change before Iran itself does something desperate and destructive to the rest of the world.

it bring any clarity to an issue that seems dominated by nonsense on both sides.

Democrats say requiring voters to show a picture I.D. before receiving a ballot would disenfranchise many poor and disabled voters, who tend to vote for Democrats. The Brennan Center For Justice estimates as many as 10 percent of the voting population lacks such identification.

Really? If I go out on the street anywhere in this country and look around, one of every 10 people I see is not going to be carrying a picture I.D.? And this would be someone who normally votes in elections but won’t be able to because of this?

Try functioning without identification and see how far you get. This is an age in which a photo I.D. is required for a long list of everyday activities from banking to buying some over-the-counter medications to hopping on an airplane. Much of the time, I can’t even make a credit card purchase without also showing a clerk my driver license.

Yes, there are people out there without I.D., who want to vote. But I think a more believable percentage came out of the recent Franklin & Marshall College poll in Pennsylvania. It found that only 2 percent of voters there say they lack proper identification.

Still, it is important that those 2 percent be allowed to vote. That’s why Pennsylvania’s voter I.D. law requires the state to issue a valid I.D. to any voter who requests one. This seems reasonable, provided they can easily get one in time.

But on the other side are Republicans who claim identification is necessary in order to stem voter fraud. They have a hard time demonstrating this is a real problem.

In Kansas, Secretary of State Kris W. Kobach says 221 such incidents occurred there between 1997 and 2010. That’s an awfully small number when spread out across 13 years.

However, Kobach makes the argument in a Washington Post op-ed that the number is not insignificant when applied to certain extremely close elections, where small numbers could change the outcome.

He also references evidence found in Minnesota that 341 felons illegally voted in the 2008 election.

Underlying all of this are opinion polls that show Americans clearly want voter I.D. laws and see them as useful. The Franklin Marshall College poll found that 87 percent of voters in Pennsylvania knew about that state’s requirement, and 59 percent of registered voters approved of it.

Kobach referenced a SurveyUSA poll in 2010 that found 85 percent of Kansans supported it.

As usual when it comes to politics, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle of all the arguments.

It would be naïve to think there aren’t people out there trying to affect election results through fraud. There are examples of this throughout history. However, widespread voter fraud is extremely difficult to carry out. The days of political voting machines that could organize bosses, get election judges appointed and stuff ballot boxes are probably over. There are too many eyes out there, including every cell phone camera in the nation, and electronic voting machines are difficult to hack.

But it also seems a stretch to say wide swaths of the country would be disenfranchised by requiring an I.D.

The bottom line is voter I.D. laws would be one more tool against minor fraud. But they have to come with some guarantee that every voter who needs one will have ready access to a card.

In most states, however, the issue simply doesn’t seem worth all the energy people are expending.

But the way things got out of hand, reportedly after Juab executed on onside kick despite leading the game, 30-6, may be evidence of a culture of retaliation that comes from a tone set at the highest levels of the game. Even if coaches were not involved, young players certainly know what happens in the pro ranks.

The Juab quarterback was hit hard enough that he had to leave the game. His replacement was hit so hard on the very next play that he, too, had to leave. It was a helmet-to-helmet hit that garnered a 15-yard penalty, although the head official said he didn’t believe it was deliberate.

After a subsequent meeting between officials and coaches, the original quarterback re-entered the game and then was “laid flat” by a hit. Officials then called the game.

Before completely dismissing a connection between the bounty scandal and youth football, consider this story out of California, where a Pop Warner league president and a coach have been suspended amid allegations players were offered up to $50 for knocking opponents out of a game.

Watch a report of this incident below.

Football always has gone hand-in-hand with violence, and the line between acceptable and unacceptable always has been pretty thin. Generally, though, in the old days the problems in youth football had to do with fist fights among fans or players. There was some violence surrounding college football and racial integration.

But for an interesting perspective on the bounty scandal, the Chicago Tribune published a piece in 1957 titled, “Is pro football dirty?” It was written by Jerry Groom, a former lineman for the Chicago Cardinals (now the Arizona Cardinals).

Groom describes the tactics he would use to beat an opponent, including hitting him in the head with a  cast he had on his arm.

But he adds, “During my professional career, I never went at a rival with  malicious intent. I tried to jolt some of the opposing quarterbacks, certainly; I tried to shake up many an opposing quarterback so that the next time he saw me barreling in at him he would be in a hurry to get rid of that football. But I never once was guilty of any act that the jolted quarterback would construe as dirty!”

NFL players, he insisted, would police themselves. “We knew how to take care of any fellow who experimented with dirty play.”

That was in 1957, and I question whether he was giving an accurate description of the game. But, in any event, the culture of the day was that fair play and sportsmanship were the most important virtues. I’m not sure the same culture prevails today, and even the youngest players understand this.