Posted on 11/06/2006 3:11:35 AM PST by dvwjr
WASHINGTON - The 2006 election is shaping up to be a repeat of 1994. This time, Democrats are favored to sweep Republicans from power in the House after a dozen years of GOP rule.
Less than two weeks before the Nov. 7 election, the latest Associated Press-AOL News poll found that likely voters overwhelmingly prefer Democrats over Republicans. They are angry at President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress, and say Iraq and the economy are their top issues.
At the same time, fickle middle-class voters are embracing the Democratic Party and fleeing the GOP — just as they abandoned Democrats a dozen years ago and ushered in an era of Republican control.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
This AP-Ipsos poll is the last pre-election poll conducted over five days, October 20th-25th, 2006. This particular poll seems to have just missed the poll trend towards the GOP in the generic Congressional preference that began just after the completion of this AP-Ipsos poll. The hoof-in-mouth Kerry speech happened after this poll was conducted. This poll doubled the typical number of poll respondents in the Adult, Registered Voter and Likely Voter classifications.
When the actual complete election results and election Exit polls become available later in November it will be interesting to compare them to the internals of this final AP/AOL/Ipsos pre-election poll. That comparison will show if the AP polls are prescient or propaganda...
We have new players in the AP/Ipsos pollitorial game. Welcome our repeat players - Liz Sidoti and Trevor Tompsonto this monthly event, the late October (pre-election) edition. They get an assist from the ever reliable Will Lester and Kasie Hunt - with the Dennis Junius on the polls.
The late October Bush job approval percentage is down 1 point, his dis-approval numbers up 2 points for a 37%A/61%D result from the early October job approval numbers two weeks ago. A three point swing in job approval in two weeks? A bit much even for the AP... These late-October AP/AOL/Ipsos poll samples now have Democrats out-numbering Republicans by an inflated 12 percentage points, down from last month's 16 percentage point difference. Two weeks ago in October that poll sample had Democrats outnumbering Republicans by a whopping 16 percentage points, what could possible account for the decrease of 4 points in the difference of Party ID? Perhaps just an attempt to swing back to a somewhat more realistic R/D/I ratio so that AP's final predictive poll might be somewhat closer to the actual election results.
Probably the most interestingly phrased poll question was number 6, (on PDF page 14) which is: "6. How important will recent disclosures of corruption and scandal in Congress be to your vote in November?" It implies the Foley episode - but that was about 'Internet sex' - not 'corruption'? Quite a 'fair and balanced' inquiry, don't you think... With 57% that say it is only moderately, slightly or not at all important it looks as if the Foley factor has burned itself out.
Now on to the central thesis of the AP article about the control of the US House of Representatives come November 7th, 2006. Let's take a look at the composition of the AP/AOL/Ipsos poll sample for late October and the poll results for certain questions which resulted in the "Poll: Middle class voters abandoning GOP " AP headline.
Poll questions 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d were about party ID affiliation and how strong is such affiliation.
Poll questions 1a and 1b were about which party's House candidate would get your vote and how sure are you that you would vote that way in November.
The Registered Voter numbers seem to indicate that the Democrats are more committed when it comes to the November 7th election. The Democrats seem to have a 17 point generic Congressional preference advantage with just eleven days before the voters actually vote. Hence the tone of the AP politorial...
Now the same R/D/I match-up with the AP/AOL/Ipsos poll 'Likely Voters' House candidate preference:
Holy correlation, Batman! The results of the 'which party's House candidate gets your vote' questions agree with the Likely Voter party ID sample composition of the AP poll. Who'da thunk it? Note the stunning congruence between the 41% 'Republican' poll party ID in the polling sample and the seemingly un-related fact that 41% of all the Likely Voters polled intend to 'Vote Republican'. It boggles the mind... Look at the Democrats - those who self-identify as 'Democrat' represent 51% of the poll's party ID sample. Now contrast this with the suspicious fact that 51% of the Likely Voters in this poll intend to 'Vote Democrat' come November. Now there are co-incidences and then there are co-incidences. One might even draw the conclusion that the composition of the Likely Voter Party ID sample of this AP/AOL/Ipsos poll has something to do with the results of the very poll questions about which party's candidate would get the nod from the Likely Voters questioned. (But what if the AP/AOL/Ipsos poll sample R/D/I percentages are wrong...)
Looks like an identical correlation... One thing that jumps out in comparing the 'Registered' to 'Likely' voters is that even with the over-sampling of Democrats their 17 point advantage in the Registered Voter generic Congressional preference, the Likely Voter generic Congressional preference narrows to just 10 points. Looks as if the Republicans are the more committed to their party even before the late Republican surge.
What changed from the previous AP/AOL/Ipsos poll in early October of 2006? Now their late October poll sample composition of Republicans and Democrats are now separated by 12 percentage points which is 4 points less than early October's sample where the difference was 16 percentage points... In a defensive move, AP-Ipsos reveals in this month's polling results that their initial screen of poll respondents consisted of 30%R, 36%D, 23%I, 11%None, 1%NotSure. Compare this to last month's 28%R, 36%D, 25%I, 10%None, 1%NotSure. Now maybe it's just me, but if someone does not self-identify as a Republican or Democrat - they are by these poll definitions an Independent (it does not matter if they are communist, socialist, vegan, green, etc). So what AP-Ipsos has done is to start with a sample that was 30%R, 36%D, 35%I - then they push 'Independents' for leaning Republican or Democrat, if they don't lean the person is classified as a hard-core 'Independent'. Looks like AP has salted the sample again by hiding Democrats in the overly large 'Independent' category.
Just to add to the media polling bias, here is the recent history of the "ever-reliable" AP/AOL/Ipsos polls (January 2005 - late October 2006) and their political Party ID sample composition for each poll. The AP/AOL/Ipsos polls push Independents to identify with either Republicans or Democrats, only the 'hard-core' remain as self-identified 'Independents'...
This is an mixed ADULTS, Registered and Likely Voters poll, not just ALL Adults. The new "Likely Voters" category is not compared so that all previous comparisons will be consistent. Note the persistent gap in the party ID between Democrats and Republicans, strange given that the 2004 Presidential Election exit polls identified 37% Republicans, 37% Democrats and 26% Independents among the voting American public. The Republicans have achieved voter self-identification parity with the Democrats for the first time since the late 1920s.
This series of AP/AOL/Ipsos poll result on Presidential job approval and the American public views on the 'direction of the country' was as always based on a skewed demographic sample that has 'averaged' 40% Republican, 50% Democrat and 10% Independent composition since January 2005. I think that when the AP poll fails to get the results they desire, they 'play' with both the registered voters party self-identification composition sample and vary the un-registered voter portion of the poll sample. Since the Registered voter portion of the poll averages around 80% and the 'breathing' voter averages around 20% you can see they have quite a bit of "statistical slack" to play with to get the results they require...
Note: The AP/Ipsos polls are published in PDF format and become unavailable after one month. You must be a 'premium' member to access those PDF files on their web site. No consistent links are provided for that reason.
Source: AP-Ipsos Poll, October 20-25, 2006 Project #81-5861-09 - Final Pre-election poll
Hope this helps,
dvwjr
AP poll analysis ping...
dvwjr
I see no factos in this Ipsos poll.......
Well, they'll always stay middle class if they're so stupid to vote for Democrats.
Democrats will raise their taxes, the economy will slow down and interest rates will rise. Someone needs to tell me how any of that will benefit the middle class.
Old data that will mean nothing tomorrow when people walk in to vote. The Dems will keep spinning a win until late tomorrow night when all the polls out west close. They can't lose any votes anywhere.
Late tomorrow night we will find out the truth, don't trust anything that is said by the MSM and the exit polls.
The last three elections, 2000, 2002, 2004 were late deals because the Dems were going to lose and they didn't want it coming out till late at night.
How plausible is it that middle class voters want to be charged more taxes?
LOL LOL LOL
"How plausible is it that middle class voters want to be charged more taxes? "
BINGO! Also, the only issue the rats have is gay marriage. Sorry, rats, it doesn't affect me and I don't care about it. LOL.
Why bother posting a meaningless poll taken over a week ago?
About as plausible as the likes of pro-abortion, anti 2nd amendment, LIBERAL harold ford JUNIOR luring Evangecials to vote for him. Even though he's running not just to the middle to try and fool us, but to the far right,
fickle middle-class voters are embracing the Democratic Party and fleeing the GOP ????? No one polled me.
From Captain Ed at Captain's Quarters Blog: (http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/008449.php)
Pew Research has published its crosstabs for the poll that shows the Republicans tightening up the race, which I linked last night. The internals deliver even more bad news to the Democrats, as significant leads in several demographic categories have been cut drastically or wiped out entirely.
The last Pew Research poll was taken in early October. In a month, the Democrats have lost non-minorities altogether. The gap among all whites went from +5 Democrats to +5 GOP, a ten-point swing. White females had supported Democrats by a 15-point margin and a majority (55-40), but now give the GOP a 2-point lead. The Democrats have also lost the middle class, a big problem in this election.
Households earning between $50K-$75K and $30K-$50K have both slipped to the GOP. The former switched from a 14-point margin for the Democrats to an eight-point Republican lead, while the latter has had an even more dramatic shift. Those earners had favored Democrats by 22 points, but now go Republican by 3. The Democrats even lost the tie they had with earners above $75K, and now trail there by seven. They did extend their margin for earners below $30K from 25 points to 30.
In the religious demographics, where the Democrats have tried mightily to find some traction, they also have problems. They held a thin lead (5 points) among all Protestants, but now trail by 9. Their ten-point lead among white mainline Protestants has dissipated into a tie. They lead among all Catholic, having lost three points off of an eight-point lead, but non-Hispanic Catholics now favor the GOP by 5 points, a ten-point shift.
Even in areas where Democrats maintained their leads, they have cause for some nail-biting. They lost part of their margin among self-described moderates, going from a whopping 44 points to 27. They had led in all regions of the country a month ago, but now have lost the South altogether in a 16-point shift, and a 26-point gap in the Northeast has narrowed to nine points -- a remarkable comeback for Republicans in a liberal stronghold. The GOP also cut the Democratic lead among urban voters from 32 points to 10.
The theme of this poll is the attack on Democratic gains in this election cycle. The GOP has rolled back the Democratic intrusion onto Republican demographics, which leaves the field looking similar to 2004 and 2002. This race may hold some very unpleasant surprises for the Democrats in the House races if these numbers hold up or continue to erode over the next 40 hours.
Thanks for the ping...I think the Blue Wave has disappeared. LOL!!!
I does appear that the GOP is on the comeback trail. We are going to lose some seats in both houses. The discussion was gloomy on FOX NEWS last night.
"The discussion was gloomy on FOX NEWS last night."
_________________
I think pundits are missing one significant dynamic in this election season and that is the complete anger and dislike for the drive-by-media. Since they have so obviously tied themselves to the democrats it will be a key to the dims downfall. We never see any polling probing this dynamic, yet it's a sizable one. The obvious questions that come to mind will not be allowed by the "intellectual" class. How about a question like this: What is your estimation of American mainstream media? Will it influence how you vote? If so, how?
Good job. This alone pretty much covers it: 30%R, 36%D, in the "initial screen," when we have, pretty much, a 50/50 country in terms of actual voters, as "Is" tend to either vote D or R.
Don't count on us losing. We'll GAIN in the Senate, and possibly still gain in the House. All the trends will make several of those races close, and we might easily win 10 "tossup" seats by 1% each.
Your '04 track record was good (actually the best IIRC), so I think we'll hold both House and Senate, and pick up a couple of seats.
I just haven't seen any discontent amongst my "R" friends after the border bill was signed.
The dems will try anything to discourage us - but it's not working!
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