So instead of waiting a full week to see if the polls have moved after the vice-presidential debate, I’m taking a look at them today as to remove any effect of the second presidential debate.
The numbers as they stood six days ago on 10 Oct 2012
RCP: Romney +1
TPM Polltracker: Romney +2.4
Pollster: Romney +1
Intrade: Obama + $2.57
The same measurement today:
RCP: Romney +0.4
TPM Polltracker: Romney +1.1
Pollster: +0.3
INtrade: Obama $2.37
So three of the indicators moves in Obama/Biden’s direction, while the fourth moved in Romnny’s. What movement there was in Obama’s direction was weak and hardly indicative of a major change in the electorate, which seems to be the case in the movement towards Romney after the 1st debate.
Unless something breaks, this looks to be a tight race. There are only three weeks left before election day and for team Obama the stumble in Denver is proving to be one that is dogging their heels. With a weak recovery following a financial crisis they had little room for error, and yet still went into the debate wholly unprepared.
I had read that the debate stand for Romney was John Kerry. Really? That’s a poor choice in my opinion, one I think that might have been a factor. (But certainly not the sole and or prime factor.)
No, I haven’t followed some particular poll consistently but that’s because no polling I’ve seen (until very recently) makes any difference. No, but you are consistent that every poll you cite supports the party you support.
I like aggregate polling because over time it has a better degree of accuracy than any single poll.
2008 results Obama 52.9 McCain 45.7
RCP’s average before the election 52.1 vs 44.5, Pollster’s average before the election 52.0 vs 44.4. TMP wasn’t doing their’s in 2008 so 2012 will be there first short at the presidential, but you can see that the aggregate tracks pretty well with the popular. So if the aggregates show Obama ahead, I will tend to think that Obama’s ahead and not be swayed by an outlier. Conversely, if they show Romney’s ahead, which they currently do, I will think that Romney’s ahead. You always go off and find a poll that show’s Romney’s ahead no matter what the current state.
INtrade and Silver aren’t aggregators but predictors, in 2008 Silver predicting Obama winning by 6.1 points with 353 Electoral college votes, the results were 7.2 and 365 so he under valued Obama. One data point does not make a line and we’ll see how well he does in 2012.
The point is that I am looking at data that has in the past been right and using that to judge what I think is likely to be the outcome this year. It looks to me that you prefer to jump from poll to poll as if these outliers some invalidate the track record of the averages. I’m not convinced of that.
I think your problem is you keep thinking I look at the polls the way you have been doing.
No, I haven’t followed some particular poll consistently but that’s because no polling I’ve seen (until very recently) makes any difference. I try to stay well aware of the limitations of the information provided by poll results and not jump to unwarranted conclusions.
You follow every bump and jiggle of the polls, thought it indicated the wind was at Obama’s back, etc. Whereas I have only seen pointless noise generated in the main by the polls, and prefer to judge the state of the race on larger real world conditions such as the bad economy which surround and define the campaign environment.
Polls of registered voters are crap. I do prefer Rasmussen because of that, but even then earlier polls have almost always placed both candidates in overlapping results due to the margin of error. It’s impossible to say who was ahead or behind, gaining or losing to any meaningful degree with results like that. About the only real claim that could be made was the race was close and remained competitive.
Some of those polls I cited to you earlier were not because I cherry picked to find some desired result to make myself feel better. It was only to provide to you evidence to counter the conclusion jumping your poll watching was leading you to.
Which is why I am so highly amused by the Nate Silver magical mystery predicatron. It isn’t just who he predicts is more likely to win the election, it’s the precision, the percentile chances that he claims for his prediction. Until you pointed it out, I wasn’t even aware of that little gem of Nate Silver. Thanks for that!
There is a contradiction in that you do not stick with any one pollster. You have cited pollsters three times and each time it was a new pollster. You say you like Rasmussen but you didn’t go with Rasmussen again, Rasmussen on that date only had Romney ahead by 1 point, so instead of being consistent in your measurement you switched pollsters.
Obama still has an advantage over Romney in the electoral college, but not by much and neither has 270 in safe and leaning states.
Ah Bob. You invent contradiction where none exists.
Polls of registered voters don’t mean much. Which is why I prefer polls like Rasmussen which instead poll likely voters.
The earlier poll you cite by Gallup was of registered voters. The new Gallup poll is of likely voters, which is why I thought the new poll worthy of notice.
The wind at his back notion for Obama was not credible at the time, for the reasons which I posted. Which is why I still enjoy mocking Nate Silvers predictions, which are even more obviously absurd today with the most recent polling data. I wonder how far Romney will have to be polling ahead of Obama before the Silver magical mystery predicatron has the race at 50/50!
I find your use of polls amusing. For this comment you mapped to Gallop, for a previous comment you went with Rasmussen, and in yet another comment you cited American Pulse. Why is it you don’t stick with one pollster and follow those numbers? Why the constant switching from one pollster to another?
It’s also interesting to see you continue to mock my comment of Sep 29 as though I have not posted now two posts showing that Romney has taken a lead. Also, if you look at the Gallup tracking poll for 9/29/12 You’ll see that on the day I said that Obama had the wind at his back he lead Romney 50 to 44 with a MOE of 2.
So I would guess there must be some reason why Gallup is good on Oct 16 but no good on Sep 29.
Gallup poll of likely voters has Romney at 51% and Obama at 45%, with a MOE of 3%. That is the first poll of likely voters I’ve seen where the lead of either candidate was equal to or greater than the margin of error. (51 – 3 = 48 = 45 + 3)
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865564667/Gallup-poll-shows-Romney-up-6-too-large-a-gap-for-Obama-comeback.html
Fear not! Nate Silver’s magic mystery predictatron still has Obama’s chance of winning the election at 65%, and Romney at only 35%. Clearly the wind is still at Obama’s back!