For the last two weeks we have been treated to the narrative that Barack Obama is surging at the polls, Mitt Romney is in trouble and unless there is a massive change in direction it is all over.
Simply put this is a lie.
Of all the polls you have seen, there is one poll that has gotten no attention, it is a poll that has been taken monthly, it is a poll that Doug Ross spotted and promoted on his site. It is the Rasmussen Poll of party identification.
They have party identification results online dating back to 2004. Here are the 2012 numbers through August
That shows a GOP advantage in registration this year but you might say: “Hey, Datechguy, you’ve been hitting polls all year, why can’t THIS poll be wrong?”
That’s a good question, we can answer it by asking another question: Does this poll of party identification correspond with the results of national elections?
Lets take a look:
2004 George Bush wins re-election
The closest the Republicans come to democrats in registration is Sept at a .6 in September. On election day Democrats had a registration advantage of 1.5. Yet not only did George Bush win re-election with that disadvantage but the GOP took 3 senate seats and 3 House seats over 2002.
2006 Midterms Revenge of the left:
In January the GOP was the closest they would be .6 off but by November the Mark Foley scandal was still big news and on election day Democrats had a spread of 6.1 points. This carried them to a net gain of 31 house seats & 5 seats.
2008 The coming of Barack Obama
The year of hope and change. The closest split was 5.6 in January & in September after the Palin Pick but by election day not only was the split 7.6 for Dems but for the first time (Feb) A party had identification over 40%. The Democrats kept that number over 40% 8 out of 12 months that year reaching a high of 41.7% the largest number in this 9 year sample for either party. With these figures it’s should be no surprise that Barack Obama win but Democrats picked up 8 seats in the Senate & 21 Seats in the house.
2010 Midterms The Rise of the Tea Party
2010 proved conclusively that timing is everything for the first time in the nine years, the GOP took an advantage in poll registration from -2.9 to plus 1.3 in one month, and that month was November.
Additionally the 37.0 figure for the GOP was the highest for the party since Dec 2004. At the very same time the 33.7 figure in December was the lowest figure for democrats EVER.
Correspondingly the GOP gained 6 Senate seats (not counting the Jan Scott Brown Race) and in the house picked up 63 seats more than democrats picked up in 2006 & 2008 combined.
These results since 2004 seem to indicate the poll is reliable. So what has it said lately, lets start with 2011 lets look at 2011
This is the year of the great fights between the GOP House & the president and it’s the most interesting year of the lot. The lead changes hands 6 times during the year as the country tries to figure out what it wants and for the first time EVER Other was in the lead, (Aug) tied with the GOP (33.5) ahead of democrats (33.0) other was ahead of the GOP 3 times in 2007.
Now lets look at that 2012 chart again:
At no time during the year do the Democrats have a registration advantage vs republicans, the gap closes in July & re-separates in August. The low point for the GOP was July for 34.9 and the high August at 37.6 For democrats the high was 34.0 in June & July the low was 32.4 in Feb
What does this mean for November? It means a lot.
The Democrats won 2 election in this period 2006 & 2008 with a 6.9 advantage in 2006 & a 7.6 advantage in 2008.
There is no example of the Democrats winning since 2004 with an advantage less that 6.9.
The GOP won two elections in this period 2004 with a -1.6 disadvantage & 2010 with a 1.3 advantage. This means the GOP has proven it can win with not only a small lead but with an actual disadvantage. Additionally with an advantage of only 1.3 they pulled off the biggest house swing in my lifetime.
Can these number change? Well the biggest 1 month swing I’ve seen is 4.2 Oct-Nov in 2010 the biggest 3 month swing was Dec 2007-Feb 2008 6.9 in favor of Democrats at the rise of Obama.
Tell me with the economy in the tank, and the new trouble in the Middle East, what is the prospect of a swing of that size to the Democrats happening again right now? Moreover even if that record registration swing repeated itself right now this would give democrats an advantage of only 2.6 points.
I’ve covered a lot of national polls on this site over the last year and all those polls ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX have one thing in common.
Not a single one of those polls had a sample with a GOP advantage.
As Rush would say: Zip, Zero Nada.
Not only have none of these polls had a GOP advantage but the closest we saw was a D+4 poll.
Doug Ross via (@NumbersMuncher & @AriFleischer) has a great chart on his site that I’ll reprint here:
In every single poll showing Barack Obama ahead on this chart the sample is at least D+4 Even if the biggest swing in history takes place in the next 3 months toward the left that is 1.4 points above what the party split will be.
All of the figures I’ve cited are from a source publicly available. The Media know these figures, the left knows these figures and the Networks know these figures.
Yet they are still using polls with huge democrat samples and representing them as real.
I don’t know what that tells you but I sure know what it tells me
“Ride right through them, they’re demoralized as hell”!
The election of Barack Obama was the biggest con ever perpetuated on the US Public, the polls the media is reporting these days is a close second.
Update: CBS belowns itself, D+13 REALLY?