Back some time in the 80's, my friend and I were watching TV. During the commercial break, Dave McElhatton (the news anchor for I think from the Channel 5 news in San Francisco) came on and announced they were going to have a telephone poll for opinions on public execution. Needless to say my friend and I continued watching.

During the news, McElhatton announced the poll: Callers would call in and press '1' if they would be interested in watching a televised execution, and '2' if they would not watch. He then said they would announce the results of the poll at the end of the news program (about 30 minutes). Of course we called and pressed '1'. And we watched the rest of the news.

They never spoke about the poll again. So we watched every Channel 5 news program until midnight - AND THEY NEVER SPOKE OF THE POLL AGAIN.

Later learned from someone who asked a person who worked at the station the reason for dropping it: an overwhelming number of people indicated they WOULD WATCH A TELEVISED EXECUTION, and the media bosses found the result unpalatable. Boo hiss.

Go figure.