Posted on 09/28/2008 12:41:10 PM PDT by Bush Revolution
I don’t answer my phone if I do not recognize the name or number on my caller ID. If they were to call me, they would get my answering machine.
I imagine there are lots of people that do the same.
Verizon wireless here (four lines), & never been called for a poll either.
I've had no land line for 3 yrs now [since Rita in 2005] and even when I did I wouldn't take polling questions. I think the pollsters are adept at factoring in/out these kind of anomalies.
The Gallup daily tracking poll includes cell-phone only registered voters. A few other polls do also.
Didn’t the polls show Bush behind during other elections?
My telephone is blocked for anonymous/Private callers. So, I’ve never been polled. Never, ever!
Yes.
The thing about national polls is that we don’t have a national popular vote on president. We have state votes, and a tally of electors. So if a really left-wing state (or states) such as NY, CA, IL, etc are over-represented in these ‘national’ polls, well, you could have the left-wing candidate seem pretty far behind in the national popular poll, and yet still lose.
This is why liberals are infuriated by the electoral college - along with the rest of the Constitution.
That’s what I thought. What I remember best about the 2004 election was, how bad we were going to get creamed. Unpopular war, too much spending etc. I wasn’t a FReeper then but that’s what the MSN keep telling me.
I think we have states with less population than Los Angeles.
We have a LOT of states with less population than Los Angeles:
Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, North & South Dakota, Kansas... the list is pretty long.
Oh, and Alaska.
Most of the US population lives within 100 miles of the east, west & gulf coasts. Another big chunk lives near the Great Lakes.
The interior of the US is pretty wide open if you’re happy living away from a large body of water.
I did get polled: once.
I told them I was voting for Bush. They asked a few questions and on was had I ever heard of an Anti-abortion group and their stance on abortion. I said I had never heard of the group.
After I hung up I realized the initials of the group spelled FAKE.
They never called back after that.
Do not have any special access to or knowledge of how each of these polls is conducted. Personal observation leads me to believe; every poll uses its own arcane technique loosely based on science, most polls are crafted to return desired results (push polls), most polling questions are purposely ambiguous, and the interpretations of poll question responses are infinitely malleable.
The only polls which I would trust are the ones which; specify up-front solid, unambiguous assumptions/conditions of the poll, only ask unambiguous questions, ask a complete range of questions based on the assumptions/conditions of the poll, provide a complete range of unambiguous responses to each question, poll a significant sample size (say 10,000+ for a Presidential election), spread that sample size over a population appropriate to the poll (i.e. for Presidential elections spread over all 50 states in proportion to their Electoral College votes and in a truly random fashion within each state), present all of the above at the conclusion of the poll, and engage in a minimum of analysis of the results.
In short, I trust no poll because none meet my conditions of a valid poll.
I believe the best we can derive from today's polls are very short term indicators. Other than that, as a good poker player plays the other players, we have to play the pollsters and be aware of their "tells".
Wish I had a better answer for you. Hope some Freeper statistician can pick up on your question.
I wonder if the no call list also makes a lot of difference or whether it applies. There are a lot of people on that list.
Thank you
Do polls exclude intelligent, politically savvy voters, who would tend to vote Republican, because they are WORKING and miss the calls made by pollsters during the middle of the WORK day?
Good point. It also can be compared to the leftist protests, we don’t protest as much because we are WORKING!
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