Adrian Gray @adrian_gray CNN OH poll: Obama leads 59-38 among 1.4 million that voted early. Romney leads 51-44 among 4.4 million have yet to vote. You do the math.— Adrian Gray (@adrian_gray) October 26, 2012
Posted on 10/26/2012 2:38:19 PM PDT by Perdogg
Regular source for tons of great campaign information, Adrian Gray, has a column today in Politico demolishing the Obama campaign memo claiming early voting strength in Ohio. I am no big fan of tracking early voting because the numbers are incredibly opaque so drawing substantive inferences is fraught with guesswork and assumptions easily challengeable by anyone with an opposing view. The Nevada situation is a special case for the Battlegroundwatch.com blog which is why I blog that state so extensively and leave the other states to people like Gray and Larry Schweikart.
In today’s column, Gray outlines the egregious mischaracterizations and misrepresentations in the campaign memo as only a veteran campaign operative would know:
At this point in an election cycle, many campaign staffers are busy fighting the press on what they call “process stories.” The candidates and their staffs want to talk about their plans and policies while reporters covering them find their audiences demand a play-by-play of the horse race. The result is constant overstuffing of campaign metrics and polling that only serve to muddy the waters for most political observers. In a close race, such as we have today, there is often plenty of data for both sides to use to their favor. One poll says this, another says that.
Obama memo
This makes it especially surprising to see the piece put out by President Barack Obama’s field director this week on early voting in Ohio. When things are ugly for a campaign, these types of memos can start flying. It is troubling for the president’s supporters that they could not come up with at least a handful of positive data points in Ohio. I worked as director of strategy at the Republican National Committee during the difficult 2006 election cycle — I know firsthand how hard it it is to come up with positive data in a negative cycle.
The takedown
There are normally three signs you know a campaign metrics memo is purely spin.
1. Anecdotes: “We have seen groups as big as 100 voters going to vote in Athens, Ohio.” Only 604 democrats have voted in person in the entire county and no more than 40 in a single precinct (that would be Athens 3-5, for those scoring at home).
2. Unverifiable Data: “Precincts that Obama won in 2008 are voting early at a higher rate”: This is unverifiable and misleading because there is no such thing as an “Obama precinct.” Every ten years, the entire country rebalances its voting districts based on a constitutionally mandated census. In 2010, this process redrew the lines of reportable voting areas that were used in 2008. So this year, we have entirely new precincts, thereby making it impossible to validate their claim.
3. Cherry-picking random sub-poll data: “Time poll shows the President up 60-30” among early voters. That sub-sample was asked of 145 people and was one of many of similar ilk (with a huge variation in results). Their central data argument is that 43 more people told Time’s pollster over a two-day window they supported Obama. If that is their best claim to a lead in Ohio, it is a troubling picture for the president.
The reality of Ohio early voting
I have always been a believer in data telling me the full story. Truth is, nobody knows what will happen on Election Day. But here is what we do know: 220,000 fewer Democrats have voted early in Ohio compared with 2008. And 30,000 more Republicans have cast their ballots compared with four years ago. That is a 250,000-vote net increase for a state Obama won by 260,000 votes in 2008.
ping
The killer is in his last line:
"220,000 fewer Democrats have voted early in Ohio compared with 2008. And 30,000 more Republicans have cast their ballots compared with four years ago. That is a 250,000-vote net increase for a state Obama won by 260,000 votes in 2008."
I would bet we make up that 10,000 margin in Warren County alone.
It's also useful to note that Rich Beeson, Romney's campaign manager, says that Ds are "cannibalizing" their election day vote to try to get "early" votes while Romney's campaign has targeted, as he calls them, "low propensity voters" during early voting. They KNOW the base will turn out.
Adrian Gray @adrian_gray CNN OH poll: Obama leads 59-38 among 1.4 million that voted early. Romney leads 51-44 among 4.4 million have yet to vote. You do the math.— Adrian Gray (@adrian_gray) October 26, 2012
http://www.redstate.com/2012/10/26/why-i-think-obama-is-toast/
I saw that, thank you.
I just want Nov. 6 to be here now. All this speculation is just killing me.
one thing very very few peopel remark on is how many unhappy Dems that voted for Obambi are going to switch - they may be some of the most happy to vote early.
Bkmk for later
Numbers are off slightly in that tweet. Assuming 2008 turnout, there are about 4 million left to vote. Assuming poll is right, however, it would be 51-45 Romney (or there abouts) with the remaining other or undecided.
can u do the math? it makes my head hurt. :)
I didn’t want to ask. I’m glad you did.
I’ll just post the last line in the article.
Mitt Romney will be the 45th President of the United States.
Okay, I broke down and did the math.
Although how CNN polled 1.4 million I don’t know.
This translates into 826K votes for the Communist already cast.
532K votes for the Capitalist Mitt Romney.
If the 51/44 split is true among the 4.4 million voters yet to show up, it will be, on election day, 1.936 million votes for the Communist and 2.244 million votes for the Capitalist.
Finally tally, using these assumptions:
2.762 million for the Communist
2.776 million for the Capitalist.
Too close, in my opinion. I want Mitt to win by a bigger margin to keep Holder’s thugs from “finding” votes or getting a judge to order the polls stay open for 48 more hours.
I did the math. It’s Romney by a razor thin margin (way beneath the polling margin of error).
I did the math and it scared me.
2.776 million Romney to 2.762 million for Obama.
Or if I follow the rules for number of significant digits from college classes that translates to a 2.8 million vote tie.
How do we know that? We just know that nominal democrats lead nominal republicans in early voting right?
LLS
We worked on low propensity voters here in Illinois and the strategy works. These are people who vote GOP, but don’t vote. Go figure.
FReepers - there are Victory Centers in every state. Even if Romney’s winning, we need to think down ticket and give him the most conservative Congress we can.
Please head out to a Victory Center and help call these LPV out to vote. Let’s win and win big!
What’s missing from Adrian’s post is that there haven’t been 1.4 million early and absentee votes cast yet; CNN is assuming EV/AB of about 25% already in, but the Secretary of State’s office is only reporting about 15% in so far. As typical for CNN/ORC, the results are accordingly highly suspect.
I mail my absentee ballot tomorrow. One more Ohio vote for Romney/Ryan.
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