Posted on 10/15/2014 8:09:45 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Democrats are falling into the same trap as Freepers did in 2012.
They ignore the facts, cherry-pick polls to support their fantasies and they dismiss all the evidence that contradicts them.
Polls tell the truth. We learned that lesson two years ago and now its Democrats deep in denial turn to learn it as well.
Nate Silver is right here - the statistics don’t lie. But keep on looking for the silver lining in them.
Maybe the polls were right in 2012 but did not allow for voter fraud.
A Romney victory was in the never cards.
The Romney campaign was full of bluster and arrogance.
But the Democrats had a strong turnout and people blamed Bush - not him for the country’s continued malaise.
Yep. I fell into that trap of thinking the electorate was a near-even split, perhaps D+1 or D+2 in a presidential election year. Turned out it was closer to D+6, so the polls were about right, if not a bit skewed toward the GOP, considering the final 3.8% popular vote spread between Obama and Romney exceeded most polls by the end of that election cycle.
Because older, white voters tend to carry a more prominent share of turnout in off-year elections, the split will be more even, but I wouldn't be surprised to see it break open to D+8 in 2016, with Hillary at the top of the ticket for the dems and the Repubs having nobody (at least at this point) who can match her popularity.
Another important issue is that not everyone being polled is telling the truth about his intentions. They don’t want to look bad to the pollster, but then they find that in the voting booth, nobody is looking.
Or conservatives staying at home.
The difference in 2012 was the turnout model. The numbers amongst Ds, RS and Is were in line...it was the distribution of how many of each group showed up to vote that accounted for the difference...
Republicans usually fare better in off-year elections.
Whether the Democrats can win a third Obama term in 2016 depends on Obama’s popularity and whether they can nominate a strong candidate.
The GOP has lots of viable candidates running in an open election. Its easier to pick up a open seat than to defeat an incumbent.
Voter fraud no doubt occurred, but demographics are the far bigger factor. What has changed in the past 10 years is a significant national tilt to the present center-left orientation.
Agree...most polls tell the truth. There have been bad apples, though...can’t remember the name of one but it was discovered that a prominent firm was fabricating its presidential poll...but if 10 media polls show the presidents job approval between 39-44 percent...that’s probably a pretty good indication of where it stands.
This years outlier has consistently been Rasmussen. It skews about 5 to 7 points toward democrats compared to other polls...not sure what is going on there.
The question is not whether polls tell the truth. The question is whether this poll or that poll is telling the truth. Statistics don't lie, but statisticians lie all the time if the customer pays them to. He who pays the piper calls the tune!
A lot of us did. I couldn’t bring myself to pull the lever for Romney.
That’s true.
Purple states are turning Blue. Young people are more liberal than older voters.
Certainly, but Hillary has structural advantages (woman, popular, democrat) that, at least at this point, the GOP can't match. Yes, it sucks, but that's the reality. Not to say something unforeseen such as a medical event couldn't sideline her. The GOP has a more realistic chance if she's not in the mix.
Right here in Virginia, we're seeing that trend, as well as in Florida. Conservatism isn't popular in America anymore.
Nate is the silver lining?
Or the ‘Rats driving their extremists to the polls while the GOPers ignored their base and went for the “middle”.
It wasn’t voter fraud.
All polling based turnout models are based on past performance (exit polls, “likely voter” questions, etc) in some fashion or another. The Democrats in 2012 successfully exploited big data to maximize base and non-traditional voter turnout well beyond what anyone looking at the publically available polls could have predicted.
Read the PJMedia article on “Catalist”. It explains everything.
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