In the comment thread this evening, Serial Conservative asked me to comment on this:
Suffolk University pollster David Paleologos, whose polls are aggregated into mainstream averages to show where the presidential race stands in the swing states, said he’s finished polling in Florida, North Carolina and Virginia because President Obama has no shot of winning those states.
“I think in places like North Carolina, Virginia and Florida, we’ve already painted those red, we’re not polling any of those states again,” Paleologos said Tuesday night on Fox’s “The O’Reilly Factor.” “We’re focusing on the remaining states.”
It pains me to have to admit…I’m with Bill O’Reilly on this one:
Fox News anchor Bill O’Reilly seemed perplexed, and asked Paleologos if he was certain those three states were already in the bag for Romney.
Here’s Mr. Paleologos’ reasoning:
“That’s right, and here’s why. Before the debate, the Suffolk poll had Obama ahead 46 to 43 [in Florida] in the head-to-head number,” Paleologos responded.
“A poor place to be for a couple of reasons. Number one, his ballot test, his head-to-head number was below 47 percent before the debate, and it’s very, very difficult when you have the known quantity, the incumbent, to claw your way up to 50. So that was a very, very poor place for him to be.“So we’re looking at this polling data not only in Florida but in Virginia and North Carolina and it’s overwhelming,” Paleologos concluded.
Whoa…hold on there a sec, Bucky! This poll?
Obama was LEADING in Florida. Not behind. Not tied. But leading by +3%.
A straightforward reading of that evidence suggests Obama was in the stronger position. But, Paleologos felt it was bad that Obama didn’t have 50%.
Two problems. First, 46% to 43% Obama lead did not include leaners. The poll actually did assessed leaners, though, and when you include them Obama is at 48%.
On top of that, the poll included 10 additional 3rd party or independent candidates! Those candidates got 2.5% of the “votes.” So…in a close state, where the scale for the two major party candidates goes from 0% to 97.5%, the middle of the scale is 48.75%, and Obama got 48%. That’s pretty fucking close to half the available votes.
Moreover, in this poll, Obama beat Romney in favorability 51% to 45%.
Really…this “theory” by Paleologos seem pretty fucking far fetched to me.
The story is not too dissimilar in Virginia. The last Suffolk poll had Obama leading Romney, 46% to 44%. With leaners, it was a 46.5% to 44.8% race. There were three third-party candidates on the ballot that took 2.2% of the “votes” away. And, again, Obama beat Romney in favorability, 52% to 42%.
Once again, it is pretty fucking bizarre to use this poll to argue that Obama will lose the state.
And here’s the bizarre thing about North Carolina: Suffolk hasn’t done any North Carolina polling. I don’t find them in my database, RCP doesn’t have ’em either. I’ve checked with a few online polling aggregation sites, and find no evidence that Suffolk has done any polling in the state. I guess this means he is relying on other people’s polls (OPP, as we say in the biz).
So let’s look at OPP in Florida for the past two months:
A plain reading of this graph suggests that Obama took the lead from Romney by mid-September and held a pretty solid lead until the post-debate period. And then it looks pretty much like a tie. My most recent analysis gives Obama a 54.9% chance of winning the state now, based on the last six polls in the state.
And now for some OPP from Virginia over the past two months:
Really, Virginia shows an identical pattern. Indeed, my Monte Carlo analysis puts the race in Virginia at a tie right at the moment.
And North Carolina with two months of OPP:
It looks like Obama led from mid-September to late September. The two October polls give Romney the lead, for sure, but a “certain win”? Well…Romney would have a 95% probability of winning the state in an election held now, according to my analysis of this polling evidence.
I can buy an argument the Romney is likely to take North Carolina. But he has a bit of work to do before it is a “sure thing.” For Florida and Virginia, only a fool could look at this collection of evidence objectively and find a “certain” win for either candidate. These two states are very close right now. More polling is needed, not less!
So I don’t know what the hell David Paleologos was babbling about. It seems illogical. You know…an opinion that is free from being encumbered by evidence.
The worst part: I’m still creeped out by finding myself in agreement with Bill O’Reilly. I mean, what the fuck?!?
Darryl,
Bill O’Reilly debated Jon Stewart the other night. With humor. Stewart even sat on O’Reilly’s lap. So, your agreement with him once does not consign you to eternal damnation. It’s okay. You’ll be alright.
proud leftist,
Thanks. I still think I’ll take a long, hot shower.
Thank you. I had trouble with it. Glad it was for good reason.
Sabato et al. have a bit to say as well:
http://www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/
They also say this:
So we’re moving Florida to Leans Republican, even though the polling there still indicates it is a toss-up. We’re also moving Virginia back from leans Democratic to toss-up. We know that the Obama campaign has long fretted about Virginia, understanding that the 2008 Obama vote was no predictor of 2012 success in the Old Dominion. There’s no longer any compelling justification that Obama has the advantage here.
I’m getting pretty tired of this gamesmanship regarding the polls.
In the primaries, they are useful in sorting out the serious candidates (hard to say that regarding the Republicans with a straight face) from the chaff who have no chance at all of winning the primary, much less the election. Politicians try as much as possible to remain “relevant” by spinning the polls in the primaries to make it appear that they have a good shot at becoming the nominee. At stake is whether others will drop out, the amount of media coverage they will receive, and the donations from big fundraisers who want the eventual nominee indebted to them, but don’t want to throw good money after dieing candidacies.
Coming into the conventions, and shortly therafter, public polls are primarily of interest to the media, who profit by keeping a close “horse race”. The candidates and major parties do their own polling, of course, for strategic purposes, which would only be released to the public when they think it serves them. As far as the public goes, however, the only benefit of the polls (aside from idle curiosity) is whether there is “peer pressure” to go along with the winner.
Of course, that’s exactly been the Republican strategy through most of this year. They spin poll results, and try to discredit other polls, in an attempt to create peer pressure which might bring along some low-information (and low self-worth) voters. They have tried desperatly to convince anyone who will listen that the President is unpopular and behind in the polls, and that if they want to be with the “popular crowd” they need to vote Republican.
It’s kind of like high school all over again, where they try to convince everyone that a handful of atheletes and cheerleaders are the only ones that matter. It’s rather sad, really.
(continued) – at this point, I don’t see a lot of use in following the polls, with only a handful of weeks before the election. The few remaining undecided voters in the swing states will move in one direction or another, irregardless of opinion pollsing. We will find out the result in November – except in those states which recently made “exit polling” illegal, so Republicans can better cover up their attempts to steal the election.
@ 5
Were you as ‘tired’ when the polls were in your candidate’s favor?
I would argue that the current benefit of the polls is to reinforce to the now-paying-attention voter that, in fact, it’s not just that one individual who watched and found Obama very much lacking in substance during debate number 1. It’s most of the 70 million other people who watched the debate, and it’s why the poll data have shifted so suddenly.
Obama was unpersuasive. Romney was likable and presidential.
Who is spinning the poll results this week? Why, it’s Team Obama:
http://hotair.com/archives/201.....ul-debate/
Who ya gonna believe? Obama or your own lyin’ eyes?
How does one know that Obama will lose?
HA libbies @ 6
except in those states which recently made “exit polling” illegal, so Republicans can better cover up their attempts to steal the election.
are already saying the Romney will steal it.
Truly pathetic, rhp. It’s the denial that comes with believing Obama’s bullshit for nearly four years.
[Deleted — TAKE IT TO AN OPEN THREAD! See HA Comment Policy]
You knew leftists were gonna this route…..sow the seeds of “stealing the election” in case they lose.
Its funny though, its the leftists who are against rules and laws that attempt to curtail election fraud.
Now how that be?
And as a side note, its time to start putting house squatters to the sword….just sayin….
Yo, rhpiss…how was last nights vp debate?
@ 6
Speaking of attempts to steal the election:
The Democratic National Committee has terminated the employment of Houston, Texas, Organizing For America Regional Field Director Stephanie Caballero after she was caught on camera calling voter fraud “cool” and “so funny” while advising a presumably-liberal voter how to vote twice.
In a comment to the liberal Talking Points Memo, DNC spokeswoman Melanie Roussell accused James O’Keefe and Project Veritas of selectively editing their videos – but admitted that what Caballero did on his tape was wrong and she’s now been fired.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/10.....z291Ua3NLs
I wonder if Democrats ever gave thought to the idea that if they would stop behaving badly, O’Keefe wouldn’t be able to catch them behaving badly on camera.
Hey Darryl,
After the selection, why don’t you interview David Paleologos as a pet anthropology project. If he’s right you’ll have to admit your use of “over sampled DUMMOCRAPT polls” was “wrong”. If he’s wrong you can your choice words on him!
To the person playing Puddybud,
“After the selection [sic], why don’t you interview David Paleologos as a pet anthropology project.”
I don’t see what interviewing Paleologos has to do with anthropology. If I were to interview him, it would probably have nothing to do with my profession…rather, it would be a hobby thing.
“If he’s right you’ll have to admit your use of “over sampled DUMMOCRAPT polls” was “wrong”.”
You seem to completely misunderstand the issue. The question is whether the state of the race now (as assessed by polling data) indicates that Romney has FL, VA, and NC locked up with certainty—to the extent that further polling isn’t necessary.
The falsification of that would be based on the following evidence (in order of increasing strength of evidence): (1) whether subsequent polls show Obama within the margin of error in a poll showing Mitt leading, (2)whether subsequent polls show Obama leading (but not outside the margin of error, and (3) whether Obama leads in a subsequent poll by a margin greater than the sampling error, (4) Obama wins the state.
Any of these three (but particularly 2 and 3 and 4) would suggest that polling from Oct 10 forward was still indicated for the state.
Paleologos’ idea would only be supported if all subsequent polls showed Romney with a “significant” lead. (That is, every subsequent poll would show a less than 95% probability of Obama winning in the state). That’s why Utah, Oklahoma, D.C. and Hawaii get so few polls. (States with competitive Senate races are exceptions to that, of course. Piggyback polling of the presidential race is why we have lot of MA polls for the presidential race).
“If he’s wrong you can your choice [sic] words on him!”
Irrelevant. He is already wrong. That is clear from polls yesterday and today:
UNF FL poll: O+4%
Marist FL poll: O+1%
Marist VA poll: R+1% (MOE 3.1%)
Quinnipiac VA poll: O+5%
Rasmussen NC poll: R+3% (MOE 4.5%)
None of these polls individually show either candidate leading with a statistically significant lead. Therefore cessation of polling in the states is premature.
Not that this diminishes anything Darryl has stated, but:
Times/Bay News 9/Herald exclusive Florida poll: Romney 51, Obama 44
The debate prompted 5 percent of previously undecided voters and 2 percent of Obama backers to move to Romney. Another 2 percent of Obama supporters said they are now undecided because of the debate.
http://www.tampabay.com/news/p.....44/1255882
Crosstabs people crosstabs.
Darryl, Here is an interesting story on polls vs the prediction market.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bu.....l-a-h.html