Now, why do you think such a headline would attract my interest? May I suggest, if you are a normal person with any interest beyond sitting each day watching six different TV judge shows, or flipping between various mindless reality shows (including various derivatives of talent panel contests), the headline should have piqued your interest.
We can also extend the analysis to consider the 90 polling firms that conducted at least one likely voter poll in the final three weeks of the campaign. One should probably not read too much into the results for the individual firms that issued just one or two polls, which is not a sufficient sample size to measure reliability. However, a look at this broader collective group of pollsters, and the techniques they use, may tell us something about which methods are most effective.
You Gov Dot Com
Figure 1 below shows the point estimates (and reported margins of error) for final national polls from different polling organizations for the Obama share of the national major party vote. The final YouGov poll, released on Sunday November 4, based on 36,472 interviews of likely voters between October 31 and November 3, had Obama at 48.5 percent, Romney at 46.5 percent, other candidates at 2.3 percent, and the remaining 2.7 percent of voters undecided. This translates into a 51.1 percent share of the national major party vote for Obama. As of this writing, the Associated Press reports that the Obama share of the national two party vote was 51.0 percent, so the YouGov estimate had an error of less than 0.1 percent. Two other polling organizations also pegged the Obama lead at two percent.
A few words about AP/GfK. As I sought information about AP/GfK, I ran across quite a few survey/poll authorities that employ survey takers and some pay the respondents on a per survey basis. I suppose I was naive enough to think political polling took place predominately on random sampling by land line or cell phone. My knowledge of online “for pay” survey was at the level of nil; I did not know. I was also not aware that some survey firms actually have their “members’ (as they call them), identified by profiles that includes information related to family size, rent or own home, race, gender, religion and social economic groupings.
While visiting one survey company website, I saw a comment complaint from a family respondent who complained about others in the household receiving multiple survey opportunities while stating they appeared cut-out of survey opportunities.
I understand many companies and political organizations use focus groups and they do so extensively. So, my surprise at for fee survey taker, again, was embarrassingly naive and downright ignorant. A question from the revelation, “How difficult would it be to discern the inclinations of the survey and adjust answers to facilitate more calls or online opportunities?” Could contribute to a busy Pay Pal account since at least one authority stated they affect pay via Pay Pal.
We have knowledge GfK is a for fee polling (gift points – small dollars) authority. I also found GfK has an invitation or coded survey application process, See the image that follows. Please excuse the fuzzy screenshot.
Back to MSNBC and other media that are using the AP/GfK survey results. Commerce is commerce; viewers listeners and readers are objects to acquire revenue. I get all of that. If they media is going to use, what seems a very biased survey authority like GfK, why not include a broadcast or written disclaimer. The perfect example is CNN.
When CNN reports on the Pew and Quinnipiac survey results you hear this: “Left leaning.” why not give the quoted poll source perspective that is readily available via a couple hours of research?
I should out of fairness state, ” I have never heard any host on CNN refer to Rasmussen” as “leaning Right.”
Polls are critical to the American political process. Americans are not heavy viewers of news and we probably do not read enough for our own good. Polls provide perspective on public sentiment. Public sentiment is constantly and effectively manipulated by the poli/social Right. Why would anyone believe surveys are not a tool or strategy item for Right-wing operatives?
If you think I am off-base with this piece consider a few final points.
Why do you think Karl Rove literally freaked out the night of the Obama defeat of Mitt Romney? Rove’s survey results and political data organization acumen was flawed, while Obama’s via the Narwhal Project was impeccable.
Why do you think Romney never developed a concession speech? He knew via polling he had the eliciting won!
Why would AP/GfK even publish a pre-2012 poll results that led to headlines: “Majority harbour prejudice towards lacks.” Especially, after conducting a poll via online methodology with over almost 70% of survey takers white and from the US South?
Final question. Do you seriously believe the AP/GfK results showing only 26% of 1,012 respondents “support” the ACA?
Steven Seagal favors Putin over Obama and says he may emigrate to Russia (via Raw Story )
The Pardu's Scroll 