The time has come to stop following polls...

[brooklynite]

Either the poll spread is wide (MD-GOV) or the poll spread is narrow, which means it all boils down to turnout. Looking for trends at this point is meaningless.

[WeekiWater]

1. The polls helped to identify a major shift in the last two weeks of the Presidential campaign.

Not saying why the shift occurred but it did. With Trump being their figurehead I think they are worth looking into later in the game.

They are good for discussion.

Nothing beats what you mention. GOTV

[still_one]

4. The polls shifted because the ass Comey sent a letter to the republicans two weeks before the

election, and the media followed by parading ever right wing ass across the television screen saying that the email investigation was reopened. THAT WAS A LIE, but it didn't stop our illustrious media from propagating that lie.

A few days later, bret baier from fox news came out and said his sources at the FBI told him an imminent indictment was pending against the Clinton Foundation. That was also a lie, but a lot of media joined in to propagate that lie also.


A few days later baier came out and apologized that his information was incorrect, and the weekend, LATE FRIDAY, before the election Comey came out and said there was no evidence to reopen the email investigation


The damage was done by then, but I can tell you, one didn't need a poll to tell them that those two events would adversely affect the 4-5% lead that the Democratic nominee had

[WeekiWater]

6. And the Trump campaign flat out camped out in a couple of states...

In the final weeks. It was more regional though all those things you mention had an impact. Trump offered delusional promise after delusional promise directly at a handful of states, in the final weeks.

I hold Comey responsible for a large part of it. I only hold the media up as having more of an impact than Comey.

[still_one]

7. There was a direct link with comey's hatch act violation, and the poll numbers. Almost overnight

the polls became dead even because that

It wasn't rocket science, and that was Nate Silver's analysis also

The other influence was those self-identified progressives who refused to vote for the Democratic nominee, by either voting third party or not voting, and it didn't take much of them either. 1% to be exact. In every one of those critical swing states the Democratic nominee lost by less than 1%, and Stein received 1% of the vote in those states. They also were very adept through social media to convince the naïve or newly uninitiated voter of the false equivlency between the Democrats and republicans to follow-suit, which depressed the turnout. 47% of eligible voters didn't even bother to vote.

Every Democrat running for Senate in those critical swing states lost to the establishment, incumbent, republican, and I attribute a good part of that to the lies perpetrated through the social media outlets to depress turnout

[elleng]

2. I stopped poll-watching around 3 years ago.

[still_one]

5. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[GemDigger]

3. I get tons of poll calls and I stopped taking them this year. I also stopped believing in them.

[Blue_true]

8. I agree. We need to work on pushing everyone to vote.

Early voting will be starting in Florida next week. I have been talking to my large extended family about insuring that they vote. I will talk to them next week about early voting, then stay on ones that haven't voted through Election Day. To me, polls are meaningless.