Polling wow!

Republican identifying voters outnumber Democrats according to Gallup? Wow.

Here's why I don't trust the polls

Being objective this (or any) election cycle is difficult.  There's a partisan bias inside everyone, and that's the starting point for all of us (even for those who are supposedly still undecided).  It only gets more challenging from there. Rhetoric is heated and on both sides and often off-the-scale inflammatory in nature.  When it comes to the polls, it's concerning that those conducting the polls share these biases and display proclivities based on those biases or at a minimum based on assumptions that may be guided, at least in part, subconsciously by these biases.

Let me cite one specific example.  The latest ABC News poll  has Clinton leading Trump 48% to 42%, a full 6 points ahead.  Taking that at face value, with only two weeks to go to the election, it seems impossible for Donald Trump to make up enough ground nationally, to win enough states to win the election.  That is, until you drill down just a little bit.

This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by landline and cellular telephone Oct. 22-25, 2016, in English and Spanish, among a random national sample of 1,135 likely voters. Results have a margin of sampling error of 3 points, including the design effect. Partisan divisions are 36-29-29 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents.

Take a look at the partisan affiliation split. 36-29-29 Democrats-Republicans-Independents. Seems plausible on the surface - Democrats +7. Except if you look at the latest Gallup survey on partisan split (admittedly from mid-September, but affiliation does not change that quickly) The split is quite different. Gallup has the split 32-27-40. Democrats only +5 and many more Independents which are leaning Trump.

There were 1135 surveyed. Based on the poll's internals, that would mean 409 Democrats, 329 Republicans and 329 Independents. That would leave 68 who were polled who probably refused to state their affiliation. If those numbers were reflective of Gallup's polled mix, there would be 363 Democrats, 306 Republicans and 454 Independents, leaving 12 undeclared.

Interestingly the poll does not give support among the candidates by party affiliation. But if we assume 89% of Democrats will vote for Clinton, 88% of Republicans will vote for Trump and 53% of independents will vote for Trump and most of the remainder will not divulge their vote (these percentages result in a 48% to 42% result per ABC, but this is just to establish a baseline comparison, I'm not trying to correct the poll here, just make a point) then something interesting can be derived.

Simply by adjusting to reflect the Gallup partisan breakdown the Clinton lead drops from 6% to 3%.

That's just one aspect of polls that can easily be skewed by re-weighting only seemingly slightly can dramatically affect the outcome of polling.  A lot of people conflate oversampling with weighting. The Atlantic calls Trump supporters idiots for not getting this - meanwhile they conveniently have glossed over the weighting issue.

The latest ABC poll is just one example.  Weighting this way is best-guessing and other polls could easily have erred similarly in Trump's favor.  The truth is we just don't know.  In fact - maybe Gallup is wrong and the ABC weighting is correct. The point is the polls are all over the place and subject to bias, intentional or not based on how that weighting is applied.  The only way you can account for this is the aggregation of polls and looking at not specifically the margins but the trends.  Polls at least should be internally consistent.  If polls are consistently among themselves showing Clinton pulling ahead, or Trump narrowing the gap, then that's reasonable to believe they are directionally indicative of a trend.  And that's only if the bias is not intentional, as an intentionally skewed poll would probably be adjusted to reflect the desired outcome. Individual polls don't mean a lot trends do.

Gallup - Americans really don't trust the media anymore.

It seems a lot of Americans get it - the media has bias.  Gallup confirms the lack of trust.

Gallup began asking this question in 1972, and on a yearly basis since 1997. Over the history of the entire trend, Americans' trust and confidence hit its highest point in 1976, at 72%, in the wake of widely lauded examples of investigative journalism regarding Vietnam and the Watergate scandal. After staying in the low to mid-50s through the late 1990s and into the early years of the new century, Americans' trust in the media has fallen slowly and steadily. It has consistently been below a majority level since 2007.

Polling from Gallup suggests Republican strengths

Via Gallup, there's this nugget of hope for the GOP.

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Less than half of Americans (43%) view the Democratic Party favorably, but the party's image is still better than that of the Republican Party (38%). Neither party has been able to gain favorable opinions from a majority of the public since June 2013, in the early months of President Barack Obama's second term...

Yet while Americans are more likely to view the Democratic Party favorably, they are split on which party is better at keeping the country prosperous. Americans are slightly more likely to say the Republican Party is better at handling whatever issue they personally define as the country's "most important problem," and much more likely to favor the GOP on "protecting the country from international terrorism and military threats."

Checkpoint: Americans still not digging Obamacare.

The latest Gallup poll confirms that Americans still don't like Obamacare.

This update is from Gallup polling conducted between Feb. 28 and March 2, just prior to the Obama administration's announcement this week that insurance companies will be able to delay until next year the requirement that they cancel or replace policies that don't conform to the provisions of the law often referred to as "Obamacare."

The 23% who feel the law has hurt them is the highest percentage for the question since Gallup began asking Americans about it in 2012, and is up from 19% in previous polling.

It's an interesting way of burying the lead that Gallup has used here. 23% doesn't sound so bad. Even in comparison to 10% who said that it has helped them it doesn't seem as terrible. The real story is that the majority of Americans disapprove of the law, by a significant margin.

Well, at least they know

Two thirds of Americans, according to a new Gallup poll, think that the United States government is too big and powerful.

In Gallup's own words:

One reason Americans are dissatisfied with how the government system is working is that they believe it is too big and powerful. Two-thirds of Americans (66%) are unhappy with the size and power of the federal government. These views potentially hamper President Barack Obama's ability to propose large-scale government solutions in his State of the Union speech next week. However, this problem is not a new one for the president. Roughly two-thirds of Americans have expressed this view consistently since at least 2011, after the measure jumped a full 10 points between 2008 and 2011.

That fails to explain how Democrats continue to hold a disproportionate (i.e. more than 1/3 of the seats in Congress and the Senate).  Yes, some of it is timing, after all, elections aren't daily so there is a temporal effect to dampen the swings. 

But the real problem is that many of the people who view government as too big still vote for Democrats, who clearly want to expand the size and scope of government.  Take a look at 2012 - 69% of those surveyed said government was too big and powerful.  But president Obama won almost 51% of the popular vote.  That likely means many conservative and independent voters stayed home.  But it also means Democrats got votes from those who think government is too big.  Clearly many voters do not understand the link between liberal Democrats' views on government and the size of government created by those same liberal Democrats.  Well at least they recognize that government is too big. That's a start...barely, but a start.

Obama's approval rating doesn't matter.

According to the latest round of Gallup Dailies on Obama's Job Approval, the president has climbed back up to the "magical" 40% approval mark.  In other words, it's still terrible.  In fact if you look at the Gallup Obama job approval numbers since election day 2012, they have almost reversed from an approve/disapprove of  52/44 then to 40/53 now.  The thing is, the numbers don't matter.  Obama doesn't have to run for re-election again. He's already won his two terms.  He'll have another 2+ years to inflict his brand of progressivist agenda on the nation, provided the Obamacare train wreck doesn't negate that possibility  (and it just might).

But 5 years in, we know this president and like bad news, reality does not penetrate the his firewall. His agenda has primacy, always.  Regardless of the approval rating being terrible,  mediocre or great, he will pursue and push his agenda.  Regardless of the success or failure of his attempts,  he will pursue his agenda. Regardless of the damage to the nation,  his party or the people he will pursue his agenda.

That's why the polls do not matter. They change nothing, even though now they probably should.

Is Gallup biased? It's Chairman isn't.

I stumbled upon a a book that I haven't read yet, entitled "The Coming Jobs War".  If the description of the book at Amazon does the book justice, not only does Jim Clifton, Chairman and CEO of Gallup seem to not exhibit a bias in his beliefs, he actually gets it about America.

Some more two word opinions

Two cents in two words.

I've been busy at work preparing for my upcoming vacation, and some other exciting personal stuff, so posting this week has been lagging.  But it's never too late for some quick two word opinions.

The Congress has voted, for the 33rd time to repeal some (or in this case for the second time, all) of Obamacare.  Keep going.

Victor Davis Hanson suggest Mitt Romney needs to get specific on his plans for taking the country forward. Too early.

Mitt Romney got booed during a speech for the NAACP when he talked about repealing Obamacare. Outreach, rebuffed.

President Obama claims that Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez is no threat to the United States.  Kidding, right?

The next 'big' liberal anti-banking scandal story to break will be over Britain's interest-rate fixing scandal. Not really.

Senate Democrats killed president Obama's plan to expire the tax cuts for those who have incomes in excess of $250,000 per year.  Planned distancing.

Gallup has reported that Americans' confidence television news has reached an all-time low. Well, DUH!

That's enough of a quick hit for now.  I'll be back soon.  If you are planning to comment, see if you can do it in two words or less...

Is Romney Over?

Bachmann had a surge too early. That's also true for Cain and Perry and for a while it looked like Gingrich was peaking just a smidge too early as well.  Santorum surged at the right time for Iowa.  Each of those candidates for the GOP primary ultimately fell back to earth.  With all of that it looked like Mitt Romney was taking on an air of inevitability.  That's especially true after he won New Hampshire.

Election 2012 Trial Heat: Obama vs. Gingrich

Gallup tends to lag other polling like Rasmussen, in that it seems to take longer to filter results to the Gallup poll. Nevertheless, a mid-December poll shows Gingrich within striking distance of Obama, Election 2012 Trial Heat: Obama vs. Gingrich. Granted, there's a lag, but that puts Gingrich in the same striking distance as Romney.

Meanwhile Romney has pulled back ahead of Gingrich nationally.

Take it all with a grain of salt.

Some more two word opinions

I'm not really back from an unintended break in posting.  August has been an unusually busy month for me at work.  Consequently, my  posting frequency has suffered.  That's unfortunate because going into the dog days of August when there will be little new to discuss, my free time might just be normalizing.  That will mean I'll have to write more analytical essays, which might not be so bad since it's my preference anyway. In the meantime, anti-essays will be the order of the day since I only have 10 minutes to get this post done. 

Since brevity is the soul of wit, I give you more two word opinions.  The truth is that each of these today could still be reduced to a single word, so I'm not being as brief as possible..  I'll leave it to you to figure out for yourself  how to shorten these.

Obama's Job Approval Bump Over - Gallup

According to Gaullup (via Drudge), Obama's Job Approval is back down to 48% approval versus 45% disapproval. That's worse for him than Mar 28 - March 30. Killing Bin Laden didn't do it for him. This President is still completely beatable by a solid GOP candidate.  The economy is to iffy, and killing Bin Laden isn't entirely owned by Obama, clearly.  The debt, Obamacare and big government in general are trumping the bump.

Speaking of trumping, the candidate won't be Trump. It definitely won't be Huckabee. But a decent candidate whomever it turns out to be, should be able to win in 2012.

Predictive Awesomeness

I was reading Larry Sabato's prediction for the GOP House gains in the 2010 midterms.  +47 seats.  He lays out a great case for the likely accuracy of the prediction, based on the validity of Gallup's likely voter model. That is predictive awesome - both in statistical validity (97%) and in outcome (+47 GOP seats).  It's a great read if you like that sort of numbers thing like I do.

But it reminded to take a look at something else.  Back on September 9th, I commented about not believing Gallup's numbers for the generic Congressional ballot for the period Aug 30th to Sept 5th.  My reasoning was that the numbers blew up to GOP +10% in the previous period and quickly reverted to GOP +0%.  I figured that that both numbers were statistical outliers and I expected the following set of numbers to look like this:

GOP 48%

Democrats 43%

For a net difference of GOP +5%.

Lo and behold - the Gallup numbers for Sept 6th to Sept 12th - GOP 48%, Democrats 43% for a net difference of GOP +5%.  More predictive awesomeness.  This time by me.  Normally I don't like to toot my own horn but how often does one get it exactly right?

Gallup 'unexpectedly' reverts to no GOP lead?

Wow, a net 10 point swing in one week.  Gallup now has the GOP and the Democrats tied at 46% support after the GOP lead of 51% to 41% previously. What happened? Game over for the GOP? They blew it?

Hardly.

Raining on the Republicans' Parade

I hate to do it.  I would love as much as the next Reagan conservative to see the Republicans pick up 70 seats in Congress and 15 seats in the Senate.  And there are reasons to be optimistic about a takeover of Congress and hopeful about the same in the Senate.  For example, Gallup's latest poll has Republicans up 10 points on the generic Congressional ballot among registered voters. It's never been that high. So what could possibly be wrong?

Gallup's opinions on illegal immigration?

Gallup polls tend to get my attention less than Rasmussen polls because they don't focus on likely voters.  But those polls are better for gauging the mood of the country as a whole.  In any case, I never much looked beyond the polling from Gallup because of that fact.  That is until this post on Gallup caught my eye.

GOP needs PR on U6 (unemployment)

The latest Gallup poll has a surprising result in terms of divergence between Congressional Republicans and Democrats, suddenly, the Democrats are pulling ahead. It begs the question - what just happened?  I'd say that the GOP needs PR on U6 (unemployment).

Conservatives - Take Heart

Conservatives might be a little worried about the latest Rasmussen numbers on the generic Congressional ballot, showing Republicans ahead by 6%, when as recently as April 18th, they were ahead by 10%.  But take heart.  These numbers are astounding.  Republicans at +6% are still poised to pick up a number of Congressional and Senatorial seats.  Besides, there's no guarantee that the Democrat bounce from health care will hold.  Like any other polling numbers, Rassmussen's numbers fluctuation from week to week anyway.  Some of this might just be noise. 

Obama Approval Slips Further in Fifth Quarter to 48.8%

Gallup continues to see the Obama slide. The article at Gallup today, titled Obama Approval Slips Further in Fifth Quarter to 48.8% , indicates that Obama has ratings that rank among the lowest for elected Presidents since WWII.

Obama began his presidency with some of the higher approval ratings for a new president in recent history. But the battle over healthcare reform and the continuing economic slump have apparently taken a toll on his popularity, and his averages for his third, fourth, and fifth quarters have all ranked on the low end historically.

The difference for Democrats between 1994 and today, is that Democrats have Obama this time around.  I'm sure they're comforted by that thought.