Polls: For the Love of GAWD!!!

[maseman]

Please please please take a look at this if you are a poll freak. I have been holding in this post for way too long. I have expertise in the polling and audience/population measurement field (didn't get me lucky very often in college...but hey) so I hope this resonates even a little.

I see a political poll release and it will reflect "Your Candidate" ahead by 12 points and the posts will go nuts with the open the champaign talk. Then another poll comes out and has the same "Your Candidate" down by two points and the posters are ready to jump off a bridge. OR, if the poster doesn't like the poll results it magically becomes a "Repuke poll" and is bullshit methods.

Keep some stuff in mind here. One poll isn't a trend. Great example is Rhode Island with Chafee and Whitehouse that came out yesterday. It has Chafee up by one percent point. The polls released just a few days prior had Whitehouse trending up nicely. So why is the new poll so different? There are dozens of variables that effect the outcome of these polls. What time are they conducted? How much sample size? Are they registered voters or likely voters? What day of the week are they conducted? What is the headlines in the news that day? How does the polling company weight the sample? How do they ask the questions? Do they use a computer voice or a real person? How long is the poll? Do they use hispanic interviewers and if so what type of Spanish speaking? Mexican, Puerto Rican? Cuban, etc. (Makes a very big difference.)

Polls are like clocks in your house measuring time. I am sure if you waltzed through your house you'd find your clocks with probably about a 6 or 7 minute spread for accuracy. Which one is right? You may have that oddball clock that is always way out of whack. Why? Because the components that make that clock work are all different from each other. Therefore they display slightly different results.

The best way to look at the polls is to aggregate them together. www.Realclearpolitics.com does a great job doing it for you. Now if you see the last 4 or 5 polls with a trend then it is probably real. If you see the polls all over the place look at some of the methods used to conduct them.

But don't get a stroke over reading these individual polls releasing.

[Beelzebud]

1. Agreed. It's not like watching a basketball game.

It's not like this is a real-time event, where sides are scoring points to see who wins.

It's almost cliche at this point, but the only poll that matters is the one on election day.

This is why I've been trying really hard to not get any outcome idea in my head. I celebrated before the 2004 election, and was severely let down with how that unfolded. I won't make that mistake again. In my mind, it's 50/50. We can win, or we can lose. I'm just hoping that we have more people voting than they do. Beyond that, I don't even bother trying to speculate.

[maseman]

4. Great point

Polls reflect (in this case) future behavior. How will you vote? Well although it is only two days away that person could have a number of things happen. How many of those polled never get to the booth through natural occurances? A death in the family, work emergency, sick kid or sick themselves, etc. In retrospect what about someone who thought they wouldn't vote? Maybe they end up going.

Like I originally posted, so many variables here folks.

GOTV!

[ChiciB1]

2. Thank You... I Check With Realclear All The Time!

Whitehouse was up 14 pts. only one or two days ago. I have decided NOT to listen to The Idiotic "talking boob-tube heads" and stay where I generally do. At the BLOGS!!

Don't want to go for the Klonopin right now!!!

[still_one]

3. Most of the articles on that site are by republicans

Rudy Giuliani
George Will
Fred Barnes

And a lot of implied dissing of the Democratic effort, with the editorials to go with it. In fact I would venture to say that URL probably has a republican bias

I prefer this place:

http://www.pollster.com/

[maseman]

5. Thanks

Another good site. Like I said...aggregating is good.

[still_one]

11. you are absolutely correct

[wakemeupwhenitsover]

6. Interesting site. From their home page.

7 RWers prominently displayed. The rest are indie or at best, quasi-indie.

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[Mr_Spock]

7. Thanks for adding some sanity to this topic

The "panic" posts are some of the least thoughtful posts DU has to offer.

[readmoreoften]

8. Thank you for posting! A question for you.

Is the spread great enough that election fraud can't possibly play a part in this election?

[maseman]

10. Pretty tough subjective question

No one has really been able to quantifiably measure election fraud so I don't think an answer exists. Has there been some election fraud in the past? Sure. How "off" were those elections? We'd have to answer that before figuring out if a narrow poll margin could tee up a stolen election.

The Repukes best chances for screwing an election is keeping people from the polls. (especially Dems.) But when an electorate is this pissed off how do they easily do that?

[Bobbie Jo]

9. Makes perfect sense....

the "new" polls in concert with the Saddam shocker, to rouse the base fence sitters at the last minute.

Seems THE math is being revealed.....damn that Rove is clever. :sarcasm:

[LWolf]

12. They don't have my candidates listed.

My governor isn't listed in the governor rankings, and my house district isn't listed in the house rankings.

:shrug:

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

13. I like TPM Poll Tracker

http://electioncentral.tpmcafe.com/polltracker

You have to sift through - everything's listed by most recent date, including Bush's approval ratings - but at least you can find your candidate.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

14. "Realclearpolitics" is a RW site n/t

[Spiffarino]

17. Very RW, but it does a decent job

LW polling sites like electoral-vote.com and MyDD can be a little too optimistic. In its commentary and it's spin RCP is overtly Republican but at least it's a check on complacency for us.

I just signed up to do phone banking with MoveOn. Thanks, RCP!

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

18. I didn't think electoral-vote.com was LW...

[Spiffarino]

19. It favors the Dem side...at least a little

From EV's welcome page:

I voted for John Kerry. I am open about that. Despite my political preference, I have bent over backwards to be scrupulously honest about all the numbers, and have carefully designed the main page to be strictly nonpartisan. Only the political humor page is partisan. If you are a Democrat, an independent, or a moderate Republican who is fed up with the President's fiscal and other policies or even a conservative Republican who feels betrayed and who has a sense of humor, you will probably enjoy the political cartoons there. If you want an election site that has a pro-Republican bias from beginning to end, including all over the main page, try electionprojection.com.

Edited to kill the RW link

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

20. Thanks..

[pat_k]

15. Polster.com graphs are helpful too

Just click on a race (see scrolling list mid-page). Can change the time frame etc.

House:
http://pollster.com/house.php

Senate:
http://pollster.com/senate.php

Gov:
http://pollster.com/governor.php

[Stardust]

16. Good advice. I'm going to try my best to avoid the polls. It's too depressing and manic.

[Clarkie1]

21. Realpolitics.com is a great site. I love their charts.

The charts will are helpful in seeing long-term trends and bringing some method to the madness. You are absolutely right, watching every individual poll is an unneeded emotional rollercoaster.

Thanks for posting.