Posted on 09/05/2004 8:58:27 AM PDT by Turk82_1
Sunday September 05, 2004--The Rasmussen Reports Presidential Tracking Poll shows President George W. Bush with 48% of the vote and Senator John Kerry with 46%. The Tracking Poll is updated daily by noon Eastern. Two-thirds of the interview for today's report were completed after the President's speech on Thursday night.
Over the past nine days, Bush has been ahead eight times and the candidates have been tied once. Senator Kerry has not been ahead in the Tracking Poll since August 23.
(Excerpt) Read more at rasmussenreports.com ...
You know all these polls assume a lot and are so much BS. They assume that they are all getting a clear picture of the voting public. I question if that on a holiday weekend an accurate read is even possible. I also question the weighting of the voting public. Turnout is everything and that is something the pollsters cannot even come close to getting right. I think President Bush is 7 to 9 points ahead based on a post convention bump. How long this bump lasts and if it can be increased is up to the president and how he handles his campaign between not and Nov. 2.
I got an automated call a few weeks ago. There were 5 questions with 3 possible responses for each...Bush, Kerry, other, and questions about support/non-support of war, abortion, feel good about the economy. I don't know which group it was, unidentified.
"I am skeptical that this weighting is representative of party affiliation, especially among likely voters and especially if done earlier in the year (when Bush and Republicans generally were in a weaker position than they are today). More generally, I distrust polls that weight by party affiliation because the weighting destroys the randomness of the sample and thereby renders the poll unscientific."
That is very accurate. With Rasmussen's model there is NO way you'd ever have a landslide election being predicted by his polling. There is no way Bush could ever be polling significantly ahead of Kerry with his sampling demands. Yet landslides do happen (like this year possibly!!!)
His is a three day rolling poll. The poll today only included 2/3 of people that heard the presidents speach.
If you have premium membership they have a article explaining the Newsweek poll. I guess they disagree with it.
The do have Bush leading now in 16 battleground states.
WHAT VIET NAM VIETS RALLY/
Hmm, isn't it Labor Day weekend now? (Or is that next weekend?)
For some reason Ras polls have alweays been worse for Bush on Sundays. If that has something to do with how easy or hard it is to get Dems vs Reps to answer questions during the weekend, may not that possible bias be increased during a public holiday?
Really, the only poll I trust for accurate topline numbers -- based on years of experience -- is Gallup. They don't use special sauce (i.e. weighting), they use scientific polling methods, and their methods (especially including how they identify likely voters) are backed by decades of experience (going back to FDR, I think). The other polls are relevant mainly to show trends.
Thanks. Any idea how big the crowd will be? Will Kerry or any other pols be there?
I doubt any pols will be there. But you'll probably have pro-Kerry forces making noise. I have no idea how big the crowd will be. I think there are a lot of Vets out there who hate Kerry but would rather lay low.
After all, what's being said of Kerry is nothing compared to what's being said of his accusers.
Dems are windsurfing with an easy breezy calm numbers don't support.
The leftwing 527s and the MSM have to really start cranking up now.
The Newsweak poll is unreliable, except for how it shows trends. It had Kerry leading Bush by seven points before the Democratic convention, and leading by seven points after the convention (i.e. no bounce). So, at most, the Newsweak poll shows that Bush got a significant bounce from the convention, and Kerry did not -- a result in line with most other polls to date. I wouldn't rely on the Newsweak poll for anything else.
Also, the Newsweak poll arguably contained too many Republicans relative to Democrats and Independents, although the reason may be that more people are willing to identify themselves as Republicans today than they were several weeks or months ago. Someone else mentioned that Newsweak doesn't weight their polls by party affiliation, so the question becomes just how random the polling was and how good or bad a job it did identifying likely voters. Going by past experience, don't bet the ranch that they did a good job.
While I'm not sure about RASS polls - in how accurate they are - I think his numbers of one of a group we need to look at -
With that said, the reason the NewsWeek poll had such a drastic change was because of how they fudged with their "weightings" to some degree (Newsweek polls are junk...they are right up there with CBS polls) -
I think even the Times/CNN poll fudged with the weigthings a little to make such a drastic change appear -
The fact is that GWB definitely got a bounce out of his convention - However, it is doubtful that we have a 10 pt lead at this time either - (probably around 5 to 8)
Republicans being out of town....or having cell phones has NOTHING to do with polling results - This is simply a myth - The fact is polling firms "weight" responses -
Therefore if they poll 200 Dem's and 100 Rep's - They still then put those responses into a "weighted" formula - Which means the 200 Dem's X .38% and the 100 Rep's X .34% -(the rest going to Indy's) - (just as an example) -
Therefore contacting more of one group over another doesn't mean a poll is biased in and of itself -
Well a truly random poll that is accurate will have the appropriate number of Dems/Reps/Ind as will turn out on election day. If they don't then the sampling size may be too small.
If Rasmussen is getting a 39-34-27 split on a truly random basis then fine. If he is continues to poll until he gets the 39-34-27 mix then obviously the polling is skewed, biased and not valid.
I'm afraid Rasmussen is setting his party affiliation dynamics to reflect 2000. He could be setting himself up for even worse results this time by weighting. We don't know what the percents will be that is why we have elections. Rasmussen is saying Democrats will win every time with his numbers and no Republican will ever be able to win in a landslide. Post 9/11 I think he may just be off in his analysis.
Four years ago, Rasmussen didn't even bother polling on Friday and Saturday. I guess the Sunday results are explained by the fact that Republicans are at least slightly more likely to be in church, or on family outings, than Democrats. I would further guess that the problem gets even worse with holidays. This goes back to random sampling problems or errors that some pollsters do a better job avoiding than others.
Something's gotta be wrong here. There are two polls that contradict this beyond the MOEs.
I agree. Both Time and Newsweek are showing identical Bush bounces coming out of the convention. Rassmussen's poll seems to suppress Bush's support by about 4%. His numbers change so slowly, and never very dramatically...it seems he's built-in a dampening effect to opinion shifts.
If this is the case - then Rass polls can be trusted a little more - And you are exactly right with regard to the Newsweek poll - if you weight it properly it shows GWB with a lead ......but more around 5pts....not the 11pts -
We are up right now - but not by double Digits - Just as the LA Times poll that was so skewed for Kerry a month ago....the same thing happened in our direction with the latest NewsWeek poll -
Food for though. If the media is biased, and the media has an agenda, and the media uses their front page reporting to forward their agenda, wouldn't the polling conducted by those organizations be suspect as well?
If I were the head of CNN, Time, Newsweek, or the like, wouldn't I use my polls in the same way that I use my reporting?
I can't wrap my mind around some vast conspiracy theories where showing a big bounce for Bush really helps Kerry in the long run. But seriously, if I don't trust these guys to give me the straight story on national events, why would I trust their polls?
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