Steve M flags a Bloomberg poll showing Obama 13 points ahead of Romney. Seems high to me, but what do I know?
There’s an interesting dynamic right now where the two big tracking polls on the election both skew Republican. One is Rasmussen, and you know their story. The other is Gallup, which seems to under-sample Latino and non-white voters (via) relative to some other pollsters and relative to what many think will be the actual turn-out in November. That’s not a criticism or allegation of bias; Gallup has its own model and it’s their commitment to transparency that allows for this analysis in the first place.
Real Clear Politics, whose polling average is perhaps the one most often cited, is also a more-or-less explicitly conservative organization. Nate Silver — who’s the gold standard for me — has criticized RCP in the past for the way it handles its averaging.
By October, there will be tons of polls and this will matter less, but the prominence of two polls that seem to skew Republican will probably be used as further “evidence” of ACORN etc. when, Allah willing, Obama kicks Romney’s ass in November.
In the meantime, Bloomberg is a liberal outlet blah blah blah.
Bort
Ah, I am going to enjoy watching them thread that needle of trying to recruit Latino voters while screeching that they are all a bunch of illegal moochers committing voter fraud.
DougJ
@Bort:
Ha ha ha
Brachiator
Early polls don’t mean much to anyone, aside from political strategists trying to jusftify their salaries.
@DougJ:
I think you meant to say:
Southern Beale
…the prominence of two polls that seem to skew Republican will probably be used as further “evidence” of ACORN etc. when, Allah willing, Obama kicks Romney’s ass in November.
Well if it weren’t that it would be something else. There’d be some story about someone’s neighbors’ grandmother’s housekeeper getting her tires slashed, and it will go around the e-mail FWD:s and Joseph Farah will write about it and Victoria Jackson will do one of her citizen journalism pieces on this SCOOP that NOBODY IS TALKING ABOUT!OMG!ELEVEN!
Same as it ever was.
DougJ
@Brachiator:
Thanks.
Actually early polls in aggregate mean a fair amount. But an early single poll means nothing.
c u n d gulag
The more people see Mitt, the less they like him.
And tomorrow, Mitt meets with The National Association of Latino Elected Officials.
This might be fun!
I’m hoping for another Mitt at WaWa moment.
When he’s speaking to them, he asks them, “Who likes taco’s here? Anyone? Taco’s are great, am I right?”
And then, to show even more of his “Commoner Touch,” talks about the wonders of technology to be found at Taco Bell and Chili’s, and the great Hispanic workers there!
Two places neither he nor his family have ever eaten at, and that hire either local teenagers in the former’s case, or, in the latter’s case – whatever pool of service employees they can find in the area, who are willing to work for very low wages, (sub) standard tips, and with little to no benefits.
When’s Mitt going to meet with the NAACP?
eric
Doug this is good news for Obama. I would much rather the narrative be that Obama is catching up or pulling away as the poll averages true up to the proper result, rather than the other way around.
I think it is a sign of Romney’s fundamental weakness that the media and polling organizations (who need to poll to make money) already have to skew the results to create a horse race narrative. They cannot trust Romney himself to keep it close even with all of the SuperPAC money. It is just like what I do with my daughter — I keep the game close so that she has more fun rather than simply outright beating her — where is the fun with that. Now, of course, my seven year old would make a better President, but that pesky Constitution gets in the way
pragmatism
Must…..maintain…….horse race narrative.
FlipYrWhig
@eric: It’s not a horse race narrative, it’s a high-stepping dressage narrative.
WereBear
To judge from the Facebook and street talk; some people are starting to get wise to the fact that corporate news… is not “the news.”
Joel
Pollster’s non-Rasmussen average comes out to about a 2 point Obama lead, and has remained pretty much unchanged since Romney sealed the nomination. Nate Silver has more or less the same. Both sound about right to me.
Valdivia
The problem is that as you point out the daily trackers (Gallup and Rass) both trend Republican right now in their samples. So this is how the narrative is set that Romney has already won.
Southern Beale
Just read that the Romney campaign has hired GOP dirty trickster Nathan Sproul of the Lincoln Strategy Group, famous for voter suppression tactics.
So be prepared …
Scamp Dog
Another poll I like, although it’s less than scientific, is an email poll of Move On members: should Move On endorse Obama in the fall election? Worried that the emo progs and purity trolls would carry the day, I made sure to vote, and the results at that point were just above 90% for Obama.
This says next to nothing about the results of the November election, but it does tell me that the “I’m gonna stay home ’cause Obama’s just Republican light” crowd isn’t much of a real-world issue.
Culture of Truth
We don’t know. That’s why they take polls.
Then we still don’t know, but at least we have a poll.
CW in LA
The prez up by 13?
Pardon me for getting all wonkette on y’all, but I find this news delightfully easy to masturbate to.
SatanicPanic
@c u n d gulag: Howdy amigos! Heeeeeeey macarena!! I love your sombreros, they’re just the right height…
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@pragmatism:
__
So am I the only one who is expecting that those real-time audience reaction metrics from the 2008 debates will go mysteriously missing this time around (technical problems, dontcha know), so that our media pundit overlords can digest the results at their leisure before telling us that RMoney won the debate, and not have to be contradicted by those pesky voters?
the Conster
I’m a political junkie, but even I’m not paying much attention to much political stuff right now, and with summer vacation starting and kids out of school and long days that you can be outside and not in front of the TV, not many other people are either. Labor Day is when people will start thinking about November, and by then everyone will have heard that Mitt’s not only a Mormon but a bishop in a very secretive church with very strange beliefs, that neither he nor any of his sons has ever served in the military, that Mitt doesn’t drink coffee or beer, that he wants to bomb Iran on behalf of Israel, and he’s a terrible stiff who loves to fire people for fun and profit. If he picks another boring white guy as VP, there won’t be a convention bounce, and by then the press will have had it up to here with his lies and inability to connect with him. There will be too much scrutiny for Mitt to handle, and he’ll make some doozy snide asshole comments that even the most pig ignorant low info “independent” voter won’t be able to swallow. Then the debates will start, and katie bar the door with the lying and the gaffes. I’m not paying any attention to poll numbers today.
pragmatism
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Those will be gone. We will get an updated “Bradley effect” push and a stench of desperation. Good times.
David Koch
The Bloomie poll was conducted by J Ann Selzer, who famously called Obama’s improbable 10 pt win in the 2008 Iowa caucus.
You may remember when she issued that poll, back in 2008, it conflicted with every other poll which had Edwards winning. The blogosphere went nutz, especially MYDD, trying to debunk her, but to no avail, as she nailed it.
So there’s that.
But ya, this would back up the trend PPP reported yesterday discovering that Obama and Mittens are in a statistical tie in freaking Arizona.
Obligatory… PANIC!
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@the Conster:
__
I’m loving every bit of this scenario but the pessimist in me wonders if we also need to factor in that by about the 4th week of the NFL regular season the average swing voter will have become so fed up with toxic political advertising running 24×7 on every fookin channel that merely turning the TV off isn’t enough, the poor thing has to be hauled out onto the front lawn and put out of it’s misery with a 12-gauge. And this is all Obama’s fault that this has happened because he’s the Prez, which means he’s responsible for everything.
Davis X. Machina
@Scamp Dog: Those aren’t real progressives. You can tell.
TheWatcher
“The other is Gallup, which seems to under-sample Latino and non-white voters (via) relative to some other pollsters and relative to what many think will be the actual turn-out in November. That’s not a criticism or allegation of bias; Gallup has its own model and it’s their commitment to transparency that allows for this analysis in the first place.”
It’s not racist, if you show your work…..
Just think, the only thinking keeping the KKK being culturally acceptable is Xcel spreadsheets, instead of just bed sheets.
JenJen
Completely anecdotal, but a regular of mine at the bar is a pretty devout Republican who has annoyed me for years, but he’s been telling me over and over again that Mitt is going to lose. The last time I saw him, I asked why, exactly, and he said, “Well, for one thing, they need to shut up about that stupid horse. If there’s one thing I know about Americans, we don’t like rich people with dancing horses, especially when they try to call dancing horses some kind of sport or some other such bullshit.”
Hmmmm.
Which makes last night’s Colbert all the funnier. Second clip down when he puts on the horsey costume had me rollin’!!
David Koch
okay. I literally heard this on cable news this morning:
“A new poll shows President Obama leading by double digits, but the poll still had bad news for the President”.
Seriously. That happened. Scout’s honor.
I mean seriously, they should have just said, “There’s
Great News for
McCainRomney, he’s down by 13 points in the latest national poll.”Brachiator
@pragmatism:
What does this mean?
The Bradley Effect is a myth resulting from crappy analysis of polls and voting results.
Gex
@c u n d gulag: I’m trying to figure out what he’s going to say to them. I’m betting when he booked it, he was going to try to bond over gay hating, I mean, traditional marriage. But then the NAACP endorsed it. Now what, I wonder.
catclub
@the Conster: “long days that you can be outside and not in front of the TV,”
I am gathering you are not in Mississippi.
Southern Beale
@David Koch:
Repeat after me, children: “It’s Always Good News For Republicans.”
Seriously, it’s a meme. Look it up.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Gex:
__
Here’s a pro-tip: if somebody offers you a drinking game based on this speech with the words “George Romney” or “my father” in it, say no thanks unless you want to wake up sometime in September wondering what the hell happened.
shortstop
@Southern Beale: Since it’s used here about 10 times a day, doubt anyone needs to look that up…
pragmatism
@Brachiator: Back in 2008 wing nuts projected that once white voters were safely ensconced in the voting booth, they would not vote for the black man, even if they told people they would. This theory will be tossed out there again (prior results be damned) and updated to say that after the 4 years of sOcialisum, that white voters won’t ignore their racism this time
the Conster
@catclub:
Massachusetts. My bad.
c u n d gulag
@Gex:
Oh, don’t worry, he’ll blather on and on about something.
Maybe that his Grandfather spent time in Mexico, so they’re all brothers under the skin and his magic underwear.
Or, maybe break out his best imitation of a 1960’s comedian:
“Halo! Mah naaaaame Jooosssse Jeeeeemenesssss!”
Valdivia
@David Koch:
Because even Obama winning was great news for President in Exile McCain.
Alexandra
@David Koch:
MYDD, now there’s a site I had completely forgotten about. Just checked and yep, Hillary is 44 is still plugging away. Heh.
The Institute For A Meaningful Apocalypse
We at the Institute, generally frown upon excessive secrecy. Our studies have shown that full airing of information tends to increase the pleasure response from sniffing the victorious olfactory melody of Napalm in the morning.
When the mind is set free, the truth can be a carnival of the senses in the otherwise drudgery of mayhem. This phenomenon applies also too, the verbal bombs of bullshit –characteristic of American presidential elections. It’s all in the mind, what arrives from the shithouse, of a well practiced democracy.
shortstop
@Alexandra:
No! Is joke, yes?
rlrr
@shortstop:
Only off by 20 years…
Violet
@WereBear:
Can you give an example of what you’re seeing and hearing that shows this?
Mino
@JenJen: That horse has better rhythm than Mittens.
liberal
OT: In the self-hating X category, apparently “GOProud” has endorsed Romney.
I wonder how many prison guards at the “Polish death camps” were Jews hoping for a tax cut.
liberal
@The Institute For A Meaningful Apocalypse:
Aren’t you guys out of work? The Apocalypse occurred 3 years ago.
geg6
@Scamp Dog:
Oh, don’t tell the emo-progs! They are just positive that they are the largest and most influential group among the Democratic Party and liberal organizations. We wouldn’t want them to get their feelings hurt.
Again.
David Koch
Davis X. Machina: Go ahead and laugh. But MoveOn.org has been taken over by the Blue-Dog hippies in Berkeley.
geg6
@David Koch:
I saw that and my jaw literally dropped. And stayed that way for about a good five minutes. It stunned me.
Ben Cisco
@Southern Beale: That’s ELEVENTYONE!
Phil Perspective
@David Koch: What’s sad is that David Broder Jr.(aka Ezra Klein) is trying to trash the Bloomberg poll. Interesting that he never mentioned who ran it. Makes Klein look like an even bigger idiot.
shortstop
@rlrr: 44th president.
The Institute For A Meaningful Apocalypse
@liberal:
The Apocalypse is permanent. We have our doubts about the devotion to truth, over at the Onion.
shortstop
@David Koch:
Is Sheriff Joe’s tent city big enough to incarcerate every brown person and white liberal in the state? I mean, if Paul Babeu were to help him round everyone up?
geg6
@Phil Perspective:
I am so stealing that!
But the problem is that it could just as easily be David Broder, Jr. (aka Jon Stewart), too.
Decisions, decisions.
Ben Cisco
@c u n d gulag: July 11 in Houston, Texas.
Going to make sure my cargo hold is empty no later than July 5 – I’m stuffing it from floor to ceiling with popcorn for THAT one.
Anoniminous
Gallup can point to the historic fact the core base of the Republican Party does, indeed, vote while the sloppy base of the Democratic Party doesn’t. Oh, the latter will say they’ll vote, but they don’t … to the same percentage as GOPers.
The reason Obama won so convincingly in ’08 was getting these slackers into the voting booth. OFA is working hard to accomplish the same this November. IF they do, Obama will be re-elected and the House may very well flip, again. If not, Obama will still, most likely, be re-elected but control of the House goes up for grabs.
nickgb
On the topic of Real Clear Politics, they aren’t just bad at averaging, they inject their narrative right into the stats. (shameless self-link)
DCLaw1
@JenJen:
(LOL’d)
JenJen
@the Conster: I agree. And another post-Labor Day thing that happens in US politics is a new season of Saturday Night Live. Tina Fey had the nation in stitches in 2008, and I’m hoping the writers have a little fun at Romney’s expense. Of course, they can go the other way as they did with their portrayal of Al Gore throughout 2000…
FlipYrWhig
@geg6: According to a bit last night, the Obama immigration policy is another dismaying example of “scorched earth politics.”. Um, OK.
c u n d gulag
@Ben Cisco:
Ah, I smell another leather-clad Dolce & Gabbana shoe in mouth moment!
Mitt is the WHITEST white man EVAH!
Ok – maybe his sons.
David Koch
I guess this 13 point lead proves the ole adage: Once you go Black, you never go back.
geg6
This also stands out in the Bloomberg stuff:
bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-20/americans-say-they-re-better-off-since-obama-took-office.html
the Conster
@JenJen:
Tina Fey saved the Republic, literally. Sarah Palin never said she could see Russia from her house, but I’ll bet 90% of the people you ask would say she did.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
No, you’re not.
Someone here pointed out on a thread the other day (I’m sorry, forget who) that the 2008 insta-feedback on the crawl-bar made it harder for MSM to do to Obama what they had done to Kerry in 2004. I agreed with their point, and had the same thought you did.
We shall see.
geg6
@FlipYrWhig:
I must admit that I was never a fan of his. Too smug and self-satisfied for my taste and that whole shindig he did supposedly in response to the Teabaggers just was the cherry on top. He was a complete and utter asshole there and I simply dismiss him as another fucking idiot on the box, no better than the assholes he seems to think he is better than.
Colbert, OTOH, is a genius.
Sentient Puddle
Of course this result is off, and anybody who doesn’t immediately grasp that is beyond delusional. As good as Ann Selzer is, even the best pollsters are going to miss a few (or more specifically, they’ll be outside the margin of error 5% of the time).
To put this in perspective, a 13-point margin would be somewhere north of Reagan’s 1980 win. Do you really expect this year’s results to be even more lopsided than that?
Valdivia
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God:
That was me :)
I too expect them to not have it but then again they love their gadgets so we shall see.
David Koch
@Sentient Puddle: absolutely. The media doesn’t want to cover it, but reams of fundies are just not gonna vote for a French speaking cult member who says God lives on Planet Kolob and denies the holy trinity and also too, owns a dancing horse. They’d sooner vote for L Ron Hubbard.
I should ad your comment is the exact thing people were saying in 2008: “no matter how good she is, there’s no way a skinny black kid with an african name beats both Edwards and Clinton by 10 points in rural farm country”.
Turgidson
@Gex:
He’ll just cook some books with the economic numbers to show that Obama’s policies have deliberately harmed their community. That seems to be his go-to move to deflect attention from how horrid a candidate he is for women/Latinos/etc.
Mino
Two separate Mexican restaurants in Phoenix refused to host campaign function for Russell Pierce. Gee, I wonder why?
Violet
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God:
I don’t think they’ll stop the insta-feedback on the debates. But even if they do, Twitter will serve as something like an insta-feedback. Remember, back in the dark ages of 2004, Twitter didn’t even exist.
beltane
@Mino: Mexican restaurant? Silly wingnut, doesn’t he realize that a Beer Garden would suit his brand of politics better?
Piratedan
well I’m not sure what the rest of you are smokin’ but I’m gonna place my bets on big money driving the Campaign. The Campaign will not be Obama versus Romney imho, the Campaign will be 2008 Obama versus 2012 Obama and look at all of the broken promises, look at the gridlock, look at our country and who is in charge, yessirree its that 2008 Obama fellow and the unspoken, unsaid implication will be that its all HIS fault. Nevermind the reality of who’s to blame and what has been done. Therefore, we have to punish him by not voting for him. You know, the usual big lie, brought to you with sad images and somber music.
Yeah, I know that ad campaign is a coming and depending upon the images and the voice actors used, it’ll be designed to hammer at those low information voters to not pump up Mittster but to smear the curent officeholder. They’ll be designed to be incrementally nasty, with the most outrageous stuff slated for the last week in October.
I sure hope we win against these asshats.
Brachiator
@pragmatism:
Ha.
I think you are probably right about this one.
@the Conster:
Still stoopid, as a response to a question about foreign policy.
Yes, Palin did say “you can actually see Russia, from land, here in Alaska.”
MikeJ
@beltane: Some one some putsch that out there for him to think about.
Calouste
@Violet:
I also think they won’t stop the insta-feedback on the debates. But only because you can’t “stop” something that there won’t be a single mention of that it has ever had been there. 1984’s Ministry of Truth will look like rank amateurs.
The fake fake al
The right has its horse, and the left has its horse. The independents aren’t paying attention and even if they are, they have not see Mitt live. So yes, things are tough so that drags Obama down, but Mitt has yet to be really introduced to the independent voter through debates and the intense coverage that starts in October. So current polling data fails to measure information-limited voter. Whats going to hurt Mitt is Mitt and that god damned fake-ass family he has, dear baby Jesus no. He’s going to be live in front of the entire country and its not going to go well.
Pandemoniac
@Sentient Puddle:
The poll has Obama up 53 to 40. Reagan beat Carter something like 51 to 41. 51%? Not as impressive as the electoral college ass-beating that resulted from those numbers.
Obama beat McCain 53-46. Maybe lightening doesn’t strike twice; but I can see Obama getting 51 and Money straggling behind. By my sipping-a-beer-whilst-bikeriding estimate, this poll ain’t THAT far off.
Bobby Thomson
@Southern Beale:
At least Holder is around now and aggressively going after Jim Crow II. And will be so long as the concern trolls and useful idiots who think a new AG would be confirmed before November don’t prevail.
the Conster
@Brachiator:
Which is why Tina Fey’s caricature was so freakin’ brilliant – mimic her so thoroughly and to put even dumber words in her mouth so that no one could tell the difference. All everyone knew was that Palin = moron. Thanks Tina!
David Hunt
@geg6:
It’s a nice thought, but I have confidence that the Republicans in Arizona will work day and night to make sure that no one who likes Obama will ever actually vote…
pat
This really disturbs me: headlines on Yahoo that the majority of Floridians are in favor of Scott’s efforts to PURGE INELIGIBLE VOTERS.
Excuse me, but there is no evidence that the voters being purged are in any way ineligible!!! Of course the low-info ignoramus is going to think this is a good thing if it is presented that way.
Arrgggghhh…
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@pat:
__
File it under the category of: All suspects are guilty. After all, if they were innocent then they wouldn’t be suspects now, would they?
askew
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
I’ve been expecting that for some time now. Or the focus group will be stacked with all Republicans. Either way I expect the media to find a way to neutralize the issue.
Mnemosyne
@pat:
I detect a stupid poll question. I’m guessing it was along the lines of, “Do you think ineligible voters should be purged from the rolls?” There’s not too many people even on the left that would disagree with that.
But the question of whether Rick Scott is doing it correctly and fairly is a whole different one.
Julia Grey
Me neither. But I think they’ll deliberately skew the audience samples. That’s WAY easy to do, and wouldn’t involve a lot of secrets to keep or too many people to keep them.