Posted on 09/26/2012 4:29:55 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
I want to hear from commenters on this, as I think all bloggers are dealing with some variation of this problem right now. Standard practice on the site is for Ed and I to post any poll that we think you'll find interesting, whether the numbers are good or bad; normally the readers are fine with that, if only because they can use the thread to goof on me for being a dirty, dirty eeyore. But for two months every four years, the calculus changes for some and they start screeching that posting bad numbers is an act of treason that might actually damage the GOP nominee's chances. And in fairness to those readers, there's a wisp of truth in that, sort of. As pollster John McLaughlin said to Jim Geraghty:
What Obama and his allies are doing now: “The Democrats want to convince [these anti-Obama voters] falsely that Romney will lose to discourage them from voting. So they lobby the pollsters to weight their surveys to emulate the 2008 Democrat-heavy models. They are lobbying them now to affect early voting. IVR [Interactive Voice Response] polls are heavily weighted. You can weight to whatever result you want. Some polls have included sizable segments of voters who say they are ‘not enthusiastic’ to vote or non-voters to dilute Republicans. Major pollsters have samples with Republican affiliation in the 20 to 30 percent range, at such low levels not seen since the 1960s in states like Virginia, Florida, North Carolina and which then place Obama ahead. The intended effect is to suppress Republican turnout through media polling bias. We’ll see a lot more of this.
The “anti-Obama voters” whom McLaughlin has in mind are swing-state undecideds who either voted for Obama in 2008 or stayed home and are now persuadable by Romney due to their disgruntlement over Hopenchange. They’re low-motivated fence-sitters. People who read partisan blogs every day are not. My guess is that our readership consists of two groups: 99 percent of you would walk barefoot through a snowstorm to get to your polling place to vote for Romney even if I was following you in an Eeyore costume, rattling chains and moaning, “Dooooon’t vooooote.” (I won’t actually do that, except maybe to Ed.) The other one percent are media types and/or liberals who are curious about what righty bloggers are saying on a particular issue. Neither of those groups will be discouraged by poll news, whether good or bad for their guy. Nor should they be: In case there’s any ambiguity as to the point of posting these polls, needless to say it’s not to discourage anyone from voting for Romney. You must vote, and the worse the numbers are, the more determined you should be to get out there because the deficit will have to be made up in higher turnout. Ed and I have spent four years explaining why another four years of Hopenchange dreck would be terrible; why you’d suddenly lose your determination to vote O out now because of bad numbers from the NYT or wherever is utterly beyond me.
The point of posting polls is to track trends in the race and try to get a rough sense of which states will ultimately decide the election, which strategies are working or aren’t, whether one side or the other has momentum, etc. Sometimes, like today, you get some highly dubious samples and you toss them out. Sometimes you don’t. My question is, if for some reason you’re not convinced that partisan blog readerships are essentially immune from being discouraged by polls, what should the rule be on filtering them? There seem to be three schools:
1. The “give us everything” crowd. These are the people who want the good and the bad. They’ll decide for themselves whether a poll is credible or not, but they want the data so that they can make a judgment.
2. The “give us bad news too but make sure you debunk it” crowd. They’ll accept discouraging numbers if a case can be made against the partisan split in the pollster’s sample to debunk it. Ed and I oblige on that whenever we can, but I’m not sure what to do with a poll like, say, today’s Gallup tracker, which has Obama suddenly out to a 50/44 lead among registered voters. Five days ago we were high-fiving over Gallup when they had Romney tied. Is the poll suddenly less credible now than it was then? Rasmussen seems to be the gold standard in credibility on the right, but what should we do if Romney’s numbers tick down there too? And what are we to do with the fact that Romney’s own pollster recently told Guy Benson that he’s expecting a national turnout advantage on election day of something like D+3? Should we be demanding a more even sample from pollsters than even Team Mitt is?
3. The “give us only good news” crowd. They think that posting bad numbers legitimizes those numbers and gives them wider reach, even if there’s an effort to debunk the sample. Essentially, they want a total blackout on downers until election day in the interest of leaving nothing to chance. Question: Does it mitigate the problem if we post a downer poll and post thoughtful analyses like Jay Cost’s and Brandon Gaylord’s that challenge the assumptions of the downer polls lately? If it doesn’t mitigate it, what are we to make of the fact that conservative warriors like Newt Gingrich, Erick Erickson, and Michael Walsh all seem to think that Romney’s campaign is underperforming and that the polls are a reflection of that? (Read Walsh’s conclusion, especially.) Is that higher or lower treason than posting a bad poll in the first place?
Those three schools broadly represent the spectrum of opinion on whether a partisan news site should be more newsy or more partisan. Group one wants to know what’s driving the news, even if it doesn’t trust the underlying data; group three wants victory above all else, even if that means suspending normal operations and ignoring bad news entirely. Group two wants a compromise. I prefer group one, especially since I think the fears of influencing the race by posting glum polls is baseless, but I have a lot of sympathy for group three even though they tend to be the nastiest with their criticism. We all want to win (even Eeyore!), and if you’re a sports fan, you know the special agony of being heavily invested in a contest whose outcome you’re helpless to influence. You’re not helpless in this one, of course — you can vote, and should — but the idea that merely mentioning bad news might sink Romney’s chances when we have fully seven weeks and four debates still to go is like sincerely believing that the Yankees lost because you forgot to wear your rally cap.
Like I say, I’m interested in reading your comments. I’ll leave you with this, from senior Romney advisor Ed Gillespie. Quote: “We have a no-whining rule in Boston about coverage in the media.” Click the image to watch.
If Obama wins, hopefully, the Senate and House will be Republican to have some checks and balances. Oh, I forgot, that many not work either.
RE: The average person probably doesn’t know who is running for election in local races.
To make matters worse, there are a lot of Americans ( even in the so called sophisticated city of New York, the financial capital of the world ) who don;t even know WHO is running against Romney, or even whether Paul Ryan is a Republican or Democrat.
Watch Howard Sterns recent — MAN ON THE STREET INTERVIEW.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYG6wDO3XVs
Remember back in 2008 when shock jock Howard Stern had his associates conduct “man on the street” interviews with Obama supporters? We’re sure you do. The results were both hilarious and depressing (depending on your political persuasion, of course).
Why were the results of the 2008 experiment hilarious/depressing? Because it became painfully clear that many of the people interviewed by Stern’s team had absolutely no idea what they were talking about or why they were supporting candidate Obama.
And if you thought it was funny (and/or depressing) in 2008, you’ll really enjoy the 2012 edition. Yes, Stern’s cohort once again descends on Harlem to ask a fistful of Obama supporters about the president, his accomplishments, and his GOP rival Mitt Romney.
What did the Stern crew learn? Well, among other things, they discover Osama Bin Laden isn’t dead, Romney is pro-choice, Obama is pro-life, and Paul Ryan is Obama’s running mate.
Now, it would unfair to say that the folks heard in the following video are representative of all Obama supporters. It’s a small group of very similar people. Even Stern admits they didn’t interview a diverse group. In addition, the interviewer does set up some of the questions in a leading way. So take the results with a grain of salt:
RE: Actually Rass with learners shows Romney +2 today.
What about the Battleground states? Does Rasmussen have similar polls on each of them?
The elections are not going to be decided at the national level but at the electoral college level.
OHIO, FLORIDA, VIRGINIA, COLORADO, IOWA, etc. What does Rasmussen show?
David Axelrod has in the last four years
Eliminated or shut up
Any media outfit on the US that got in his way or polling firm .
He tells the DC what to write and even previews columns .
These push polls are pure Goebbels propaganda dictated by Axelrod .
Fox has even canned Beck due to Axelrod pressure .
The USA media is a Obama media front group now and nothing more .
Allahpundit is a clueless idiot who
Thinks Nate Silver is fair pollster .
Yes the former Daily Koz employee is okay for this clown .
He is a useful idiot of the left .
None of them are to be believed. Tune them out.
““One thing for sure, If Obama wins, I will definitely drink more”!......i hope you live in a warm climate. vodka drinkers in the former soviet union, get a snoot full, pass out, & freeze to death.”
______________________________________________
Well, I live in a very warm climate.
If Obozo wins, it is unlikely that I would ever return to the USSA, not even to visit.
America will be destroyed if he gets anther term.
Fox was good just now. On O’Reilly Rove just broke down both polls released today for OH and FL and methodically (with the white board) revealed these polls as total BS.
Thanks for your work, SeekAndFind.
I have thought that polls showing us behind are helpful because people will be more motivated to vote. When we are ahead in the polls, it makes me nervous that folks will be lazy and stay home.
No sense in worrying, it is what it is. The more racket we make, the more we turn off the undecideds. I have a friend who is so conservative that she almost makes me want to vote the opposite. She yells at me when I take public transport.
I vote Republican. However, I’m thankful for many things that the liberals have done — e.g. they legislated use of car seats for infants and children, stopped smoking in restaurants, stopped burning of rice fields, have a heart for the alien amongst us as is commanded by our Lord, ..... But the liberals have done a bunch of bad stuff and they are stupidly proud of it and want to legislate more terrible stuff.
“Only elections are acurate.”
That’s right; how did those “registered Dem” voters do in MA and NJ in 2009? A lot of them voted for the Republicans (who went on to win).
How about during the mid-term “shellacking”? Same thing.
Elections are accurate, and Dems have been punished in almost all of them since The Sultan ascended the throne.
Swing state poll has Obama 46% to Romney 45%
Ohio: Obama 47 Romney 46 Poll from 09-13-12 at the height of the Obama bounce.
Fla 0 48, R 46 Poll from 09-13 at the height of the Obama bounce.
VA 0 49 R 48 Poll from 09-14 at the height of the Obama bounce.
CO: R 47, O 45 from 09-18-12
Iowa: R 47 O 44 from 09-20-12
So far from being a run away Obama win the race is very very very close. And that is bad news for an incumbent since the undecided usually swing 2-1 to the challenger.
Even Fox news is getting more difficult to watch. Maybe we all should just drink and watch a bunch of guys run around on a field, while someone yells in the background.
Agree. They are a buying into network polls as being accurate.
Particularly annoying today with AB Stoddard and Kirsten Powers spewing forth today.
Interesting that they never realize that they doubt Obama in their other segments but never stop to wonder why they think he is credible to the general voting population.
FY 2007 is the last year Bush/GOP Congress. Federal deficit $160 billion
FY 2011 Last year of Obama/Democrat Congress Federal Deficit 1.6 Trillion
There is utterly no way to sustain these kind of spending levels. Romney, for all his faults, at least sees this problem. The Obama team are completely blind to it even being a problem.
Polls, polls, POLLS - I am so damn (and I hardly ever swear) sick of hearing about these ten billion polls that are out...UGH!!! Especially when they have The ONE winning by a “substantial margin”...
Based on what you have been showing from Rasmussen’s Polls...
Here’s what is fascinating: over the past four years, Democrats have turned out more of their voters to the polls than Republicans by a 1% margin. You read that right - just 1%.
Yet, as the team at Breitbart.com just discovered, the polls being reported in the media showing Obama with this supposedly big lead do so only because they weighted the poll to have a 6%-10% Democrat turnout advantage.
Based on this, I think the truth is that the race in Ohio is a dead heat, and that’s why the media and the Obama campaign are working so hard to convince conservatives not to contribute, volunteer and vote.
This is all part of their psychological warfare...
This is easy. The polls we like are legitimate and the polls we don't like aren't.
Well yes in your case that is true.
For most people on this board a rational intellectually defensible polling sample is a good poll, an irrational, wild ass guess polling sample is a bad poll.
None of them.
RE: The polls we like are legitimate and the polls we don’t like aren’t.
Well, it looks like that’s another way of saying -— MY FEELINGS DETERMINE REALITY.
Hey, I feel like I can fly today... maybe I should do a Superman from the 30th floor...
Which rapes are legitimate?
RE: Which rapes are legitimate?
I think what Todd Akin is referring to are those sexual contacts that are FORCED on an unwilling woman. That can be legitimately called rape.
There are also those sexual contacts that are consensual where women later cry rape for the money ( especially if the man is rich ).
And then there is Whoopi Goldberg who says what Roman Polanski did to the then 13 year old girl isn’t “rape-rape” ( whatever that means ).
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