I recently wrote a piece that argued there is an anti-winner bias in polling. For races expected to be competitive, I noted that the predicted poll margin underestimated the actual vote share for the winner. I’ve thought more about this issue and talked with some people about it (including the […] Read more »
Why President Obama hasn’t been getting credit
If I were President Obama, I’d be enormously frustrated. The actual President Obama may be frustrated, too. After all, the country has created more than 200,000 jobs each month for the last 10 months, and unemployment has dropped to a level that is lower than it was before the president […] Read more »
Mary Landrieu’s Loss and the End of Ticket Splitting
Louisiana Sen. Mary L. Landrieu’s defeat in the Dec. 6 runoff certainly was no surprise. If anything, it seemed inevitable since the evening of Nov. 4, when it became clear a Republican rout was underway and Democrats would lose control of the Senate. But the veteran Democrat’s defeat is another […] Read more »
White Flight From Southern Democrats Doomed Landrieu
Democrats have been worried about the African-American vote in Louisiana for months. But what really doomed Sen. Mary Landrieu’s reelection bid was the near-monolithic white vote against her. Landrieu’s loss Saturday to Republican Sen.-elect Bill Cassidy followed a November all-party primary in which the incumbent got a lower share of […] Read more »
Unlocking the secrets of the 2014—and 2016—elections
After nearly a month of forensic analysis, the 2014 midterm elections are shedding more clues than a late-night CSI marathon. While the initial diagnosis spelled disaster for Democrats, a more nuanced examination reveals encouraging data for progressive candidates running in 2016. … Here, then, are the five most telling secrets […] Read more »
Voters to Washington in 2014: ‘Fix It’
For President Obama and Democrats who were on the ballot this year, 2014 was a reflection of the Administration’s record and the reality that the patience of the American people had come to an end. The President found himself in the unenviable position of a football coach brought in to […] Read more »