Gallup Polls Internals [October 29-31]

Gallup News Service ^ | October 31, 2004

[RWR8189]

LATEST SNAPSHOT

% GEORGE W. BUSH	49
% JOHN KERRY	49
% RALPH NADER	1
Oct 29 - 31, 2004 Based on Likely Voters
View complete trend

[MMcC]

There is a link on the front page of www.georgewbush.com

It's on the right side called "Call Swing State Voters Today"

[snarkytart]

"No way Bush is up by only four among men."

I agree. That is the first clue a poll has bad sampling. When Bush and Kerry are within a few points of the male vote...NOWAY!

[ride the whirlwind]

Well good thing that the Bush team's own man, Matthew Dowd, was quoted as saying today that their campaign's own internal polling shows Bush up 3, which matches the latest CBS one.
The official blog http://www.georgewbush.com/blog/ also sounds upbeat. We're going to WIN - I am 100% sure of it! (Too many prayer warriors for kerry to overcome, imo)

[MMcC]

Ding Ding Ding Ding... WE HAVE A WINNER!!!!

You are correct.

[dvwjr]

I'm still trying, no convergence yet.

This usually indicates a large difference between the R/D/I splits, not good for a final poll. We will see.

I would be suprised to see the Independents as low as 24%, except if the final Gallup model/poll really pushed the hell out of leaners to get them out of the Independent category.

Hmmm... Excel still working.

dvwjr

[Rokke]

"I don't...but that doesn't mean you don't think about them."

I'll buy that. I pray for faith.

[Fabozz]

Nonsense. All Gallup has done is taken all the undecideds and handed them to Kerry. This poll is every bit as sauced (soused is more like it) as Zogby's.

Everyone: Go look at DalyThoughts.com from May 26^th. Way back then, he analyzed Gallup's results all the way from '36 to show that a) undecideds break for the incumbent, not the challenger, and b) in Gallup's last poll of each campaign, Gallup arbitrarily hands all the undecideds to one candidate or the other. The best, most honest Gallup poll of each campaign is the next-to-last one, before they monkey with the results—and that poll had Bush up by six points. We were winning then and we're winning now. Go volunteer and vote with supreme confidence that we're going to win on Tuesday too.

[WOSG]

It is the setup for massive voter fraud by the RATs in the swing states is what it means.

----

Sorry to say, but that's about right.

I do NOT want this to even be close...

[kesg]

I'm wondering if any of the national polling firms are actually any good at state by state polling, or vice versa. I'm not sure that states can be polled effectively the same way that voters are polled nationally. Zogby's national polling seems to be okay on the surface (although I don't trust Zogby further than I can throw him), but his state by state polling is a joke. Now Gallup, who I do trust for national polling, just put out a poll showing an 11 point swing in Florida in the space of a single week. This result simply doesn't make sense.

By contrast, Mason Dixon has put out two Florida polls in the space of two weeks that shows Bush up three and up four, respectively -- much more stable and more in line with what one would expect to find, both in the margin of the lead and the trend. The second of these two polls was taken between the first Gallup poll showing Bush up eight and the second Gallup poll showing Kerry up three. It doesn't seem likely that Kerry surged nationally in the last three days, because then Gallup would have shown a movement in Wisconsin to Kerry similar to what it showed in Florida. Instead, Bush actually gained two points from Gallup's previous poll from a week ago.

Grr....

[WOSG]

The last poll in 1996 had Dole down by 13 points - he lost by 7 points ...

I think we can outperform any poll by 5 points, JUST BY SHOWING UP AND GETTING OTHERS TO VOTE!!

[WOSG]

I'll tell you what is really nuts --- 25% of "conservatives" voting for Kerry .... that is totally and completely nuts.

[Lizavetta]

It means that no poll is going to come out with a poll showing Bush well ahead of the margin of error as not to surpress the Democrat turnout.

I concur. Keeping the numbers even or a razor's edge lead by Bush will get the loony libs rattled enough to vote in terror.

But wouldn't it have the same effect on Republicans?

[Cableguy]

I don't trust Gallup's state polls. There is too much volatility. I don't know how well they did in 2000 or 2002 in state polls. Since they don't do much state polling, their LV screens are probably not as good as others.

Mason-Dixon has been tested and performed. Only got 1 wrong in 2002. I trust their state results over anyone else. Plus theirs were before the weekend started.

You also need to note that these new ones are weekend polls, which favors Dems. My quick and dirty calculation shows that Gallup had 5% more Dems than Reps. My other spreadsheet is still running.

[Nowhere Man]

Don't be swayed by the polls. If you like their results, fine, but if you don't, get your butts out there any vote! Show the Kerry-Ons some business. If we let pessimism rule the day all the time, we wouldn't have gotten President Bush in 2000 and ended up with that idiot Owlgore. If you feel miserible, don't wallow in it! VOTE!!!!! It is your American and Judeo-Christian duty! If FrankenKerry gets in, this could spell the end of our Republic. Think of that. Do we want FrankenKerry and his old bag lady in the White House, I sure don't, when I see them, I think that Senator Joseph McCarthy was right. I know Bill Clinton was like Boss Hogg, but FrankenKerry is like "Nikita Khruschev in a tye-dyed" shirt. Nothing would satisfy me more with a Bush victory than to see the hate-triots whine like a loose fanbelt.

The reason why FrankenKerry has so many supporters is because misguided people and their hate-triot handlers are just lining up to the government "Gravy Train" for handouts without working for them. That is Communism. Back to the "whining fanbelt analogy" above, my first car, a 1977 Pontiac Grand Prix had one, but at least the Pontiac did its job and worked, that's more than I can say for the FrankenKerry supporters and FrankenKerry himself.

I'm charged up, we need to get energized and do our part. I know I might be a little carried away here, but we need to charge and surge ahead.

[voteconstitutionparty]

The polls are more than in bed with the MSM. The MSM hires them,and pays them for these polls. It's where they get their income.

[kesg]

Thanks for your response. Meanwhile, check this out (I'll sleep a bit better tonight, and you will too):

http://jaycost.blogspot.com/2004/10/poll-update-103104.html

[MichelleWSC]

"Polls at this state of the game are worthless and getting emotionally up or down because of them is foolish. Nothing else that can be done. Just GOTV."

---I agree with that 100%. Bush has done well up to this point and without there being some MAJOR MAJOR hit piece his numbers are not going to go soft overnight not with the kind of support he has gotten this far.

Jay Cost has a great analysis which includes Gallup tonight I'll post some of it below
___________________________________________________________


NOTE: Several of you have written to point out that one cannot really reconcile these polls in a statistically perfect way. This is due to the different methodologies and weights that each poll uses. I agree with you, and actually have mentioned these problems before. When I started this project, I mentioned that this presumes that there are no such problems with this analysis. As this is not the case, I concluded that these figures should only be used to give the reader a sense of the state of the race. This method is better, much better, than the Realclearpolitics method, but it is not perfect.

With that said, there were a few new reputable polls that came out today. Here are the new averages.

Florida
Bush: 48.23%
Kerry: 46.70%
MOE: +/- 1.3%
(Respondents: 5,220; Polls Used: Gallup, Quinnipiac, LA Times, NY Times, Mason Dixon, Strategic Advantage, Insider Advantage)
Given these results, we can be 94.18% confident that Bush presently has a lead.

Ohio
Bush: 48.44%
Kerry: 48.55%
MOE: +/- 1.1%
(Respondents: 7,502; Polls Used: Gallup, Columbus Dispatch, Cleveland Plain-Dealer, LA Times, Strategic Vision, Mason Dixon)
Given these results, we can be 55.17% confident that Kerry presently has a lead.

Iowa
Bush: 47.90%
Kerry: 46.40%
MOE: +/- 1.5%
(Respondents: 3,481; Polls Used: Mason Dixon, Des Moines Register, Strategic Vision, Gallup, Research 2000)
Given these results, we can be 90.99% confident that Bush presently has a lead.

Minnesota
Bush: 44.79%
Kerry: 48.15%
MOE: +/- 1.6%
(Respondents: 3,850; Polls Used: Minneapolis Star-Tribune; St. Paul Pioneer Press; St. Cloud State University; Humphrey Institute; Strategic Vision)
Given these results, we can be 99.88% confident that Kerry presently has a lead.

Michigan
Bush: 44.51%
Kerry: 47.49%
MOE: +/- 1.9%
(Respondents: 2,425; Polls Used: Mason Dixon, Detroit News, Research 2000, Strategic Vision)
Based on these results, we can be 98.12% confident that Kerry presently has a lead.

Pennsylvania
Bush: 47.68%
Kerry: 47.85%
MOE: +/- 1.4%
(Respondents: 5,373; Polls Used: West Chester University; Gallup; Quinnipiac; LA Times; Temple University; Mason Dixon)
Based on these results, we can be 57.53% confident that Kerry presently has a lead.

Wisconsin
Bush: 49.30%
Kerry: 45.50%
MOE: +/- 1.8%
(Respondents: 3,090; Polls Used: Strategic Vision, Badger Poll, Mason Dixon, Gallup)
Based on these results, we can be 99.86% confident that Bush presently has a lead.

New Mexico
Bush: 49.17%
Kerry: 47.00%
MOE: +/- 2.4%
(Respondents: 1,625; Polls Used: Albuquerque Journal, Mason Dixon)
Based on these results, we can be 97.32% confident that Bush has a lead.

Nationwide
Bush: 49.17%
Kerry: 47.00%
MOE: +/- 0.9%
(Respondents: 11,532; Polls Used: Gallup, NBC News, CBS News, Battleground, Fox News, ABC News, Pew, Newsweek, LA Times)
Based on these results, we can be 99.9997% confident that Bush presently has a lead.

Analysis: I know that many of you were undoubtedly distressed by Gallup's numbers tonight. However, it is important to view them in context. Even with Gallup's results, Bush still definitely has a lead nationwide, according to my method. His average is also at the point at which it would be impossible for Kerry to beat him in the popular vote.

As for the states, Mason Dixon and Gallup gave us almost unanimously different results (they only agreed on IA). I am honestly quite surprised by this. As Gallup has larger samples, each statistic skews toward Gallup. What we can say with at least 90% confidence is that Bush is winning in Florida, New Mexico, Iowa and Wisconsin. Winning those states and losing OH and NH would put him at 276 EVs.

It is also important to note how close Pennsylvania has become. Kerry's numbers have definitely trended down in the last seven days.

As for OH, let me just say that it is a virtual tie right now. I would be more than willing to take a virtual tie into Ohio -- I like BC04's odds in that situation. It is a solidly Republican state, and BC04 is definitely ready to do battle on the ground.

Generally, given Bush's strong position in IA, WI and NM -- Kerry would have to run the gamut of the big states. He'd have to win OH, PA and FL. If Bush wins any of these, the game is over. Given these polls, Kerry has a 1.85% chance of doing that -- which is to say, he has virtually no chance.

All of this strikes me as very consistent with a difference between the candidates of 2%-3%. If Bush wins the election by 2.17%, which is what my average currently shows, we would expect him to get between 276-300 Electoral Votes. In other words, we would expect Bush to win 2 of the 3 "Big 3" states. Right now, that looks likely to happen.

http://www.jaycost.blogspot.com/

[San Jacinto]

Your right that there will be massive vote fraud in the swing states and that when we call attention to it, we will be accussed of voter suppression. The message from the press will be: Big Dem turnout; Reublicans efforts to suppress the vote fall short.

Having said that, I think it really is 50-50% right now, making it hard to overcome the fraud as it happens. In a way I'm surprised that anyone who has taken the 3 yr beating Bush has from the lying press can still get 50%

[San Jacinto]

9 point drop in job approval in swing states in last month is very toubling. None of the polls I've seen have good numbers for an incumbant. If the normal rules apply to the votes that break this late, trouble is afoot. Frankly, I think the last 24 hours better contain something that boosts Bush turn out in 4 or 6 key states.

[babydubya1981]

WOW! Thanks, I like those chances, let's hope that holds true. Anyways, it makes me feel alot better going into Tuesday.