Comments on: Leaked Obama Internal Poll: Is Pennsylvania In Play?

By: jack oneill

jack oneill — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:56:13 +0000

The mathematical exercise you see here in these comments doesn’t deal with the fact that no one really knows the party weighting factors. They are presupposed to have a 6 point lead for the democrats ased on voter registration or in rasmussen’s case a separate poll designed to figure out how many dems vs. reps there are. Both methods are crap. Voter registration is skewed this year because of the weird primary season. I know a number of republicans and independents who registered democrat to vote in the primary between Obummer and CLintonpart2. These people didn’t want either of them to win. They just wanted to see the fighting go on longer.

As far as rasmussen’s method. I wouldn’t take one of his robocalls to participate in his poll if you paid me.

By: Webloggin » Obama and Our Guns

Webloggin » Obama and Our Guns — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 16:00:56 +0000

[...] Leaked Obama Internal Poll: Is Pennsylvania In Play? All the public polls say its out of range, but the Maverick is playing the bluff and putting all chips on the table. Plus, certain Democrats are acting quite nervous about Obama’s absense in the state. Perhaps it is the leaked Obama internal poll showing Obama up only by 2? [...]

By: WTH

WTH — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 13:13:37 +0000

Example:

Purely fictional..

90% of democrats polled vote for Obama
90% of republicans polled vote for McCain
50% of independents polled vote for Each

36% of Americans are Democrats
30% of Americans are Republicans
34% of Americans are Indepenent.

Obama Vote = .36 * .9 + .30 * .1 + .34 * .5
= 52.4% Obama
McCain Vote= .36 * .1 + .30 * .9 + .34 * .5
= 47.6% McCain Vote

Obviously this is a very rough formula.. but you might notice it is based on percentages not actual values. The specific number of respondents of each group only pertains to the accuracy of the poll (the +- variance)

Regardless of the total number of voters polled.. these percentages can be scaled to the general population of the state.. this is the basic principle of polling in the first place. Read a book once in a while..

By: mike

mike — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 02:04:12 +0000

Oh, and for the post from WTH…Yeah, what the hell!! What are you talking about! Adjust for what? Statistics analysis does not work that way. If you ever taken a basic stats class, you can’t magically adjust for it. If you can, please tell us. Because I would LOVE to see that equation.

By: mike

mike — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 02:01:15 +0000

Of course these skyrocketing polls are trash. Like Jim here said, if you read the entire polling reports from ABC, CBS,& blah blah blah they poll an OVERWHELMING number of democrats vs. republicans. This we know. But, does anyone else here think this poll may have been leaked PURPOSEFULLY by Obama because of his reported huge lead just to scare some of his supporters and ensure many more people become more aggressive in voting and campaigning for him in Penn.? I hope not. Just curious.

By: Vegas

Vegas — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 00:53:14 +0000

We don’t know if it’s 2 points or 10 points. We don’t know what’s going to happen. I believe Obama will win Pennsylvania and McCain is wasting time there. He needs his red states and he is flailing in those. Doesn’t bother me though.

By: WTH

WTH — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:57:46 +0000

@Joyce
Heartless much? Go hug your grandmother for me.. She misses you.

@Jim
WTH? Your understanding of basic statistics definitely puts you in with the republican crowd. If they call 500 republicans and 1000 democrats, they can adjust for that. Go back to school you redneck.

By: Rick

Rick — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 13:51:16 +0000

The truth of the Obama Hot Air Balloon is coming out.

By: Jim

Jim — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 06:13:22 +0000

My friends, McCain is within 2% points of overtaking Obama.
These 10% point leads can be easily explained.
Say I want a certain result for Obama. What I
then do as a pollster is pick a demographic
area where democrats out vote republicans…say I call 1000 democrats and call only 500 republicans. Bingo, I get a higher percentage vote for Obama and a small one for MCCain.
The other reason pollsters give Obama a higher percentage point is to disallusion republicans to believe that either you cast your vote for Obama or you forget about voting for McCain because according to these
sly and crooked pollsters, McCain is losing.
That is why they rarely produce the real percentage points because if they do, people would likely throw their support for McCain,
and they don’t want that to happen.

By: joyce

joyce — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 05:48:35 +0000

Sorry, Obama can’t come to PA right now. He’s busy in Hawaii trying to squelch his fake birth certificate.