Reading polls can be a complicated business. Consider the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News survey. By most measures it is a very bad poll for President Barack Obama in particular and for Democrats, as a group, more broadly. It doesn’t look like a good 2014 is on tap for them.
But the numbers also suggest there are serious challenges ahead for the GOP as well – particularly in, say, 2016. Seeing those two stories in the data is the difference between reading a poll for short-term impact and longer-term meaning. And viewing this latest poll with those two perspectives in mind reveals very different findings. CONT.
Dante Chinni (American U.), Wall Street Journal