Darrell Bricker of Ipsos Public Affairs: How pollsters can do a more effective job at predicting election outcomes. Read more »
Imagine There’s No Polling. It’s Easy If You Try.
I’ve just returned from the European Political Science Association conference in Barcelona. One of the more interesting papers I saw was a study of the effect of polling on campaigns. In the paper, Philipp Denter and Dana Sisak note that dozens of democracies have bans on polling late in the […] Read more »
Could recent political polls be painting a picture of what’s to come for Obama?
The mainstream media panic over the CNN/ORC poll showing President Obama’s net approval dropping 17pt to -9pt is over. Pew Research came out with a survey giving Obama a 6pt net favorable rating among adults – only down 2pt since its prior survey. The truth is that the drop is […] Read more »
National Polls On Immigration and Guns Don’t Tell The Whole Story
The president and the press love to cite national polls as the authority on how Americans see the issues. How many times have you heard about the “90 percent of Americans” who support background checks or the “overwhelming majority” who support a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants? But, for […] Read more »
Of polls and megaphones
CNN is a great news organization peopled by wonderful journalists. Their survey department is also run by fine pollsters. So I really do hate to pick on them, especially for a fault in which they are hardly alone. But, they are the most current example of a news outlet that […] Read more »
Is Democratic Criticism on N.S.A. Hurting Obama’s Approval Rating?
… I want to correct an assertion that I made a week ago. Here’s what I wrote at that time: “[B]ecause they create as many fractures across the parties as between them, the recent N.S.A. disclosures might not have all that much effect, for instance, on Mr. Obama’s approval ratings.” […] Read more »