Your second point illustrates the dirty little secret of modern polling. In a day when the number of landline phones are dwindling rapidly (and those of us with cell phones screen our calls) it is extremely difficult for any polling outfit to get a reliable sample—and that assumes their turnout model is correct.
From what I’ve read, virtually all of the media pollsters are assuming that turnout in 2016 won’t be that far off 2012. That is a dangerous assumption; if Hillary believes that black voters and millenials will turn out at the same rate they did for Obama, she is sadly mistaken. Meanwhile, enthusiasm for Trump is off the charts, while HRC drew a large crowd for only one event, an on-campus rally at Ohio State. Obviously, rally attendance doesn’t equal turnout, but if your base isn’t very excited about the candidate, how do you get them to the polls on 8 November?
Then again, the Dims have an impressive ability to manufacture votes among the dead and achieve North Korean-like pluralities in minority neighborhoods. The election may be razor close, but I’m having a hard time buying predictions of a Clinton landslide with polls that consistently use a D+6-D+12 sample as a starting point.
The point about the diminishing landlines is very true.
NONE of the millenials in our congregation nor in my neighborhood have land lines.
And while I suspect there are stats out there, I’ve yet to see them. How they break out is anyone’s guess.