| Bobo's cadre don't have to show up at a damn cold wet rally, all they've got to do is show up at the poll and push button, receive bacon. |
Posted on 11/06/2012 11:43:03 PM PST by Political Junkie Too
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Premier - July 4, 2012
Here is the latest update of my Rasmussen state-by-state presidential model.
The model begins with the final results of the 2008 election, and updates those results with current Rasmussen state polls as they are published.
Final 2008 Electoral College results were Obama 365, McCain 173. My model begins with Obama 364, McCain 174, due to not handling the few split-win states.
Furthermore, 2010 apportionment favored Republicans, leaving us with a starting point of Obama 358, Romney 180.
This Edition's Updates:
The Race for the White House
This will be a quick post mortem of the major misses in Rasmussen's swing-state polls. I understand that the actual results for all the states fell within each poll's margin of error, but one can convert the polling result and MOE into the probability of the leading candidate actually winning, and of the trailing candidate actually winning.
Probabilistically, Romney had an expected value of 266.9 Electoral Votes (P10 is 238, P90 is 292), and a 45.4% chance of winning. The actual result will be 306-206 for Obama. Romney performed at the P01 point on the curve. The P05 point was 231 EV.
The swing states that Rasmussen's polls missed are Colorado, Florida, Iowa, New Hampshire, and Virginia.
In Colorado, Rasmussen polled at 50%-47% for Romney. The odds of the trailing candidate winning is 19.5%. The actual result was 51%-47% for Obama, the reverse of Rasmussen's poll.
In Florida, Rasmussen polled at 50%-48% for Romney. The odds of the trailing candidate winning is 28.1%. The actual result was 50%-49% for Obama, the reverse of Rasmussen's poll.
In Iowa, Rasmussen polled at 49%-48% for Romney. The odds of the trailing candidate winning is 38.3%. The actual result was 52%-47% for Obama, the reverse of Rasmussen's poll, doubled.
In New Hampshire, Rasmussen polled at 50%-48% for Romney. The odds of the trailing candidate winning is 30.3%. The actual result was 52%-47% for Obama, the reverse of Rasmussen's poll.
In Virginia, Rasmussen polled at 50%-48% for Romney. The odds of the trailing candidate winning is 28.1%. The actual result was 50%-48% for Obama, the reverse of Rasmussen's poll.
The crux of the matter seems to be that far more Democrats voted than were to be expected --
a. According to Rasmussen's polls, which have been historically accurate (and just about every swing state poll besides).
b. According to guages of voter enthusiasm and expert evaluation -- by the likes of Barone.
c. According to actual observation -- 30,000 for Romney at Red Rocks...while Obama tours with Bruce Springsteen and can't draw flies. Hell, Romney drew several thousand at the Pittsburgh airport -- who were content to stand on a parking garage and watch his plane land.
d. Accurate measurements of the early vote revealed fewer Democrats had been marshalled in support of the campaign. So, all those extra votes had to be found on Voting Day.
So, what the hell happened? The Democrats turned out like it was 2008...and there was absolutely no hint that such would happen. Where did all these "unexpected" Democrat voters come from? And, if I'm not mistaken, the phenomenon was pretty much confined to these five states (plus, perhaps, Wisconsin).
Essentially, an event with a statistical liklihood of 0.2% actually occurred. That's one chance in 500 -- better odds than lightning striking -- but...still.
In any event, I'm suspicious...
And I've got to ask. Did SCYTL count any of these states?
I know what you mean, + 6 D turnout and all, but also remember O got 69 million votes last time and he wont come anywhere near that this time. So this wasnt exactly 2008. It seems Romney’s ground game was lacking.
The number one issue was the economy. D +6 turnout in swing states vs Ras historical conventional D +2. Ras failed to predict the Takers > Producers bias. In Ras defense he did move from an R +2 to D +2 number last week so there was data that appears he was trying to re-weight. On election day Ras even stated he could not predict who would win so he knew he had a problem. The Takers > Producers bias is a new variable. The ‘Rat polls that predicted this just got lucky ... The broken clock adage.
we were disenfranchised...
“Something bizarre happened at about midnight. GOP was catching up in Fla., winning Va and No. CArolina, and overtaking Ohio and Fox CALLS it for Zero? Are you kidding? WTF???”
The word is nuance. The first counties in Virginia to report are heavily GOP. The last to report out of Florida were heavily Dem. Everything needs to be looked at in context and, hopefully, with some understanding as to what is really going on. With the internet, it’s easier to get to such valuable information than ever before.
Yeah, when the bounce in Florida brought Romney to within 14000 votes, it was because the Pensacola area had just been counted. At that point, I knew it was over as I noted the results from south east florida were around 60% complete. Same for Virginia, all the GOP counties were done and Romney held a slight lead of about 30K votes. In came the big northern counties and the race was over.
Keep this in mind, it used to be a republic because no one wanted tyranny of the majority. Now we have it...the more we watered down the vote by extending it to the leeches, the closer we moved to tyranny of the majority. Call them moochers, takers, non producers whatever, the result is the same. Just like when a lawyer looks for a deep pocketed defendent to sue. The bad news for them though, is I have sewn my pockets closed and will set myself up to pay less, not more. The only thing left is to seize my property and I wish them good luck with that.
| Bobo's cadre don't have to show up at a damn cold wet rally, all they've got to do is show up at the poll and push button, receive bacon. |
There was no doubt rampant fraud, some easier to spot than other. And the military ballots were definately denied in various ways.
Game Called on Account of Darkness / Daniel Greenfield -- http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2956339/posts
The momentum was CLEARLY with MITT...republicans must have sat out this election. All RINO Mitt had to do is just show up to win, and he couldn't pull it off. WHAT DOES THIS TELL YOU ABOUT RINOS?! FCOL, Mitt didn't even get the numbers McCain did in '08!! The rino record nationally is LOSE, LOSE, LOSE!!!!
It's mind boggling! Will the republican party ever wake up to this FACT???
Waiting for the HUGE exodus from the STUPID PARTY...
The fix was in, and I do not believe in whacko theories, but this.. this was well planed. Freaking MSM was calling it for Obama even before the voting began! We need to read up on George Orwell’s 1984.
The lesson is that the RCP average was more accurate than any individual pollster. And even though the RCP average, on the final day, was giving us bad news (this time around), we need to look at things as they are, not as we wish them to be.
I was on board with the whole “Dems were oversampled” mantra, but, in the end, the skewed polls approach of dissembling samples was way off. Sometimes one has to go where the numbers take one. In two years I expect major Republican gains and I suspect the polls leading into the elections will show that. And in four years I expect a GOP win for the presidency and I suspect the polls will show that as well. So we can sit back, smile, and watch the lefty sites try to explain away the polling numbers.
If I had one guess (sans numbers) about what happened, it was that the Obama turnout machine was remarkably effective given the drop in enthusiasm for his presidency. That allowed for a higher Dem turnout than one would have expected given all the exogenous indicators.
Rasmussen has a pretty good track record, but minor methodological issues can skew a series of polls one way, so hopefully he’ll examine his methods and revise them.
Amen, amen, and AMEN!
Deep down, I want to believe something nefarious, but the first logical thought to a 0.6% chance of running the table actually happening is that the polls were wrong, not that they were right and shenanigans happened.
I think that several campaign factors may have been at play:
1. Romney went passive in the last few weeks instead of staying aggressive. He tried to coast to the finish instead of engaging Obama directly.
2. The MSM became a news suppression profession. Reporting has become distorting, breaking news has become blocking news. Romney's passivity didn't make the MSM report the news they didn't want to report.
3. Hurricane Sandy gave the MSM the opportunity to suck the oxygen out of the room in the last weeks. News about Romney disappeared from the national dialog, while Obama was made large. Chris Christie was just the cherry on top, but it would have happened anyway. Even Chris Matthews was happy that the storm happened.
4. Romney never built a team. He offered a vision, but he didn't build a tangible way to get there. The GOP House and Senate are still operating in silos, with each chamber undermining the other instead of unifying on a coordinated message and strategy the way the Democrats do. Romney should have demonstrated his CEO skills on the stump by appearing with GOP leadership repeatedly. Boehner, Cantor, McConnell, and DeMint were absent during the campaign, while Obama had Bill Clinton stumping for him.
I'm not suggesting that Boehner and McConnell could fill the role that Clinton did, but they would at least show the people how an integrated Romney administration would operate. I fear that Congress will still be fractured, with Boehner and McConnell marching to the beat of different drummers.
I'd go to these four points (and others) before assuming that the Rasmussen polls were right and something else happened.
-PJ
Look, even Peggy Noonan got it last night - as Dan Gainor just tweeted, "Early voting gave Dems weeks to ship low info voters to polls."
These are the people that would formerly slip through the cracks when elections were held on Election Day.
There are only two ways to combat that -- severely restrict early voting, or switch to a national database where it can be instantly ascertained that you only voted once. I prefer the former.
Let’s be careful in seeing patterns where there aren’t any. There are two possibilities as to why Romney lost:
1. Vote fraud.
2. The models where off.
FR gives us a certain confirmation bias. We can be an echo chamber, but is the election of 2012 that strikingly different from 2010 or 2008? We might miss the shift, but the entire GOP election machine? Did Romney’s campaign team have polling models that didn’t give them the correct feedback?
Take a look here: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1112/83422.html#ixzz2BXwhMxeN
Only 24% felt their families were better off than 4 years ago and 50% blame George Bush. Wow, we’re up against it. The results seem counterintuitive and I’d like to see it all laid out.
I live in the heart of Obamacountry and I didn’t see any enthusiasm for Obama. That he caught all the breaks is awefully suspicious and very Chicagoesque. There was a lot at stake in this election and those that are against us will do anything to wound our country.
Perhaps Obama’s arrogancy and petulance come not just from a narcissistic personality, but were exacerbated because he knew something we didn’t. That no matter what he’d win.
On the contrary I have some anecdotal evidence that undecideds split for Obama. My attorney who likes Romney and up until two weeks ago was voting Romney based on finances and economics voted Obama in the voting booth. Akin, Mourdock and Sandy all contributed to his decision, particularly the Akin/Mourdock comments as reported in the press. He voted Republican on every other race downticket.
If not fraud, then we know that the electroate theories espoused here didn’t fit the experiment/election/reality. We need good models to win.
Once the dust settles and the analysis comes in hopefully we’ll know better for 2014. Of course, once the dust settles it’s settled.
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