The new Quinnipiac poll has Obama leading McCain in Pennsylvania, Florida, and Ohio. If those numbers are accurate and hold up, it would obviously indicate that Senator Obama is in great shape, picking up 47 electoral votes to add to his position. However, I noticed that Quinnipiac hid a bit of its methodology. In opinion polls, the demographc weighting is an important element in their accuracy. The gist of the Quinnipiac polls was not really anything new; young voters prefer Obama and older ones prefer McCain, women lean towards Obama while men lean towards McCain, and so on.
It's also important to notice that Quinnipiac never defined what they mean by "likely voter"". A respondent who voted in the primaries, for example, is far more significant as an indicator of true voter mood than someone who just says he thinks he will vote in the fall, still months away from the mid-June poll.
I also noticed clear discrepancies in the Quinnipiac poll. Quinnipiac, for example, says President Bush has a 22% Job Approval rating in Ohio, against 29 percent from a University of Cincinnati poll.
I was also preplexed by Quinnipac's announcement that President Bush enjoys only 60% from Republicans, when the polls I have seen show around 80% from Republicans. The stated numbers demonstrate a lean to the Left, from what I see. How much of lean depends on how you account for the discrepancies. The problem is while the skewing is evident, it appears to be a result of the methodology rather than simply the weighting. Therefore, the numbers may be taken to reflect the situation only in a general manner and with the normal caveats that Quinnpiac is a good poll, but hardly the most reliable.
A poll which misses by an average of 7 points is not where I would look for an election barometer.
Permalink | Send To A Friend | Linking Blogs | Digg this!
Filed under:
2008 Presidential Race
Comments (5)
I think it's best to never ... (Below threshold)1. Posted by COgirl | June 19, 2008 4:39 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
I think it's best to never believe any polls these days. Everyone is pulling for Obama so nothing will be objective. Am I the only one who has noticed that AP has a new "Obama picture of the day" in the headlines each day? My husband and I laugh about it all the time. I rarely see McCain's photo. And only on rare occasions are there pictures of the flooding in the Midwest.
1. Posted by COgirl | June 19, 2008 4:39 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on June 19, 2008 16:39
2. Posted by Corky Boyd | June 19, 2008 11:25 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
This is a terrible time to conduct a poll in Florida. We have a high number of folks with dual residences, but are legal residents of and vote in Florida. They choose to make it their legal residence mainly because of our pleasant tax environment.
In my community, fully 65% of these folks are at their "up north" homes. How do I tell? I check the trash on trash days.
Most of them are retired. So if you do a survey and fail to reweight, you will skew more heavily to younger voters. They are more likely to vote Democrat.
In reality I simply don't believe the polls, other than their final tally immediately prior to the election. The pattern has been too consistent in prior elections. D leads during fund raising time. A little bump for the R here and there when there is a major gaffe buy the D, but never enough to threaten the lead of the D. On the final weekend R starts to close the gap and on Monday is within the margin of error. This will repeat this year, mark my words.
You may ask why? I'll be cynical, but realistic. When you have a couple of million dollar contract with a media outlet for either research or providing bagels for the executive dining room, you tend to provide what you perceive to be what your client wants. You don't want to get out of step with your client's tastes. There is no collusion, it's just the way it works.
2. Posted by Corky Boyd | June 19, 2008 11:25 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on June 19, 2008 23:25
3. Posted by Scrapiron | June 21, 2008 1:45 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Polls are like the question requiring a yes/no answer. Have you stopped beating your wife?
All polls show the answer the poolster wants. Ask me a question in an exit poll and I'll lie to you just for spite.
3. Posted by Scrapiron | June 21, 2008 1:45 AM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on June 21, 2008 01:45
4. Posted by Scrapiron | June 21, 2008 1:49 AM | Score: -1 (1 votes cast)
Everyone isn't pulling for O'dumbo. Only those with the mentality to watch 'Days of Our Lives' for 30 years and fight you if you say it's not based on real life. Someone should tell O'dumbo he'll go to hell for lying same as stealing. Guess he can't go twice for doing both.
4. Posted by Scrapiron | June 21, 2008 1:49 AM |
Score: -1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on June 21, 2008 01:49
5. Posted by bryanD | June 21, 2008 3:56 PM | Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
I believe the polls about Florida. Something strange is happening there because certain media personalities are downsizing themselves to the Oklahoma media market from such hives as Orlando.
From Fox remote feeds to Tulsa morning drive: Oy!
I speak of Pat Campbell: rather muscle-bound Bushbot, pointed head, no ears, reduced to calling third persons "gay" (which means he's bisexual, of course).
Anyway: McCain-locked states:
TX, OK, SD, ND, UT, NE, WY, AZ, that's it.
(Notice absence of KS: Sibelius factor)
(Notice absence of SC: Obama factor)
Battleground states:
NV, ID, MT, CO, KS, KY, TN, FL, SC, NH, AK
"PA" and "OH" will go Obama. Pollsters are just thinking out loud otherwise and pressing Publish. It's how they drum up business.
Signed, Bob Dole.
5. Posted by bryanD | June 21, 2008 3:56 PM |
Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on June 21, 2008 15:56