Polls Are Used To Shape Opinion, Not Reflect Opinion
Monday, October 27, 2008 at 01:09AM El Rushbo speaks: "The Drive-By Media do these polls, and for the longest time -- whether it's a presidential opinion poll or whether it's a poll of the American people's opinion on anything -- we all know now these polls are used to shape opinion, not reflect it. But now we're getting to the point where, you know, all these pollsters have their credibility to be concerned about; and they want to be right at the end of the day. And I think that's why, with a couple of exceptions, you're seeing a lot of polls tighten now, because the race is tight. It's not over. Nationally, of course, is one thing. You do have these battleground states to be concerned about. It's not looking all that bad for McCain out there, so I don't think this is anywhere near over. There is an onslaught in the media to make it seem like this has been long-ago over, and I think the purpose of that is to suppress and depress Republicans and their vote turnout." (my emphasis)
View Printer Friendly Version
Reader Comments (25)
When the polls favored McCain, he had no problem with the polls. But it is easier to blame a media conspiracy than accept losing.
Mahons: Question: Why do polls "tighten up" as the election gets closer?
Answer: Because the polls are bogus until the pollsters reputation is at stake - right before the election.
Actually the polls have become fairly accurate, much more so than in Truman's day. That is why campaigns spend a fortune on polling. You may dislike the results of polls, and of course there are instances where they are off, but they certainly are not bogus, which is why you see McCain sweating.
Mahons, you mention the candidates internal polls. As Rush says, if this is so in the bag for Obama, why is he keeping up such a fevered pitch? I think his data says it's still quite the horse race.
Also, are you going to watch him Wednesday night? I'll be working.
Charles - Victory is hard earned, and it would be foolish to let up now. I don't see any popular vote landslide, and it takes a lot of work to "turn" battleground states, so while he is in the lead these last few days it would be poor political judgment to coast home.
Rush, who incidently couldn't stop McCain from getting the nomination, is probably secretly happy. He'll push more buttons with the Republicans on the outs than when they were on the inside.
Mahons: All the pros agree that the polls don't matter until the end.
The media seems to have declared victory for Obama. But if McCain pulls slightly ahead I think you will find the media once again stating that polls are just polls, and don't matter until the very end, and in fact turnout matters more.
Patty- The pros think nothing of the sort, they invest heavily in polling, and concentrate their time, appearances and money accordingly. The public face of their response to polls is off course to downplay them when behind and not act too overconfident when ahead.
I know the media scares rightwing folks, and of course they'd never admit that they are losing because their candidate or message might be the cause. But we'll see.
Charles- I hope to be asleep.
I get some polling data from Real Clear Politics as they give a daily listing of all the polls taken.
Mahons: "I know the media scares rightwing folks,"
why do you stoop to this kind of verbage? Scared? Right-wing?
Are you actually saying there is no media bias? Do you live under a rock?
Mahons, I'm glad you'll be getting some sleep, but if he wins, all addresses will be manditory!
You're spot-on, Patty. The opinion polls are an instrument for CREATING opinion, not for reflecting it.
From our much loved British sitcom "Yes, Minister", Here's a perfect example of how it works.
>>you're seeing a lot of polls tighten now, because the race is tight<<
I wonder where. Certainly the RCP average has Obama in a stronger position than he was last week, which was in turn stronger than a week previously, and that was of course much stronger than he was a month ago.
>>Mahons: Question: Why do polls "tighten up" as the election gets closer?<<
Mahons actually mentioned a few reasons why this could be so last week, including a certain hesitance on the part of the electorate before such change in this case. At all events, the phenomenon has been seen in almost all previous elections, when the outsider seems to make up ground in the last 10 days.
>>If this is so in the bag for Obama, why is he keeping up such a fevered pitch? <<
Well, obviously he wants his victory to be as comprehensive as possible. He would like to have as wide a national mandate as possible before implementing the kind of changes that seem to unsettle so many of you.
Besides, his lead in many of the swing states is quite slim, well within the margin of error. Obama is not a man for complacency, either in campaigning or in political action!
Finally, I'm suprised that nobody has noticed that even many big guns in the McCain camp seem to have realised their candidate is in a bad way. Whence all the recrimination about Palin?
"At all events, the phenomenon has been seen in almost all previous elections, when the outsider seems to make up ground in the last 10 days."
I'm not sure that's true, in both 1976 & 1988 the incumbants rallied strongly in the latter stages of the campaign. Anyway it isn't obvious who the outsider is this year.
I suspect that the final result will be closer than the polls suggest for the simple reason that turnout will be lower than 2000 & 2004 when the race was on a knife edge.
Ross,
I take a similar view.
Ross may have a point about lower turnout. The simple fact that Bush Og is out on his ear this time means some people may not be too fussed who wins, but breathe a big sigh of relief that the clusterf**k is gone.
Rightworld is crying over the polls, just because they show their guy is losing the race.
It's just as likely that the polls will breed complacency among Obama supporters, and no doubt if the polls were showing McCain ahead, Rightworld would be making this case and spouting absurd conspiracy claims.
Get over it guys.
Patty - You can blast people willy nilly and then are worried about the phrase rightworld? Hysterical.
Where did Patty complain about the (new?) term rightworld? Which I've never seen other than on this site.
Peter: I agree with your 12:32. Both sides use polls - and the media if they can - to shape public opinion.
The Republican side just have a disadvantage with the media because the MSM are so in the tank for Obama. And yes, all the pre-victory Victory Laps might create complacency in Democrat voters. (As you probably guess, I hope for this)\
Mahons: Saying I blast people "willy nilly" and am "hysterical" only cheapens the English language. The meat of my comment to you - before you blasted me "willy nilly" ;) (great little phrase,"willy nilly", btw, underutilized..but I digress) is that you seem to imply/think, in your prior comments above, that there is no media bias .
I think we are a long way off any certainty in the US Presidential election.
Polls or no polls......
Patty - there is media bias, although I don't think it is determinative (witness the elections of Bush I and II, and the late Ronald Reagan). I may post on it tonight as I feel the New York Times committed what amounts to a journalistic sin in their disgusting attack on Cindy McCain. Thanks for agreeing on willy nilly.
P.S. Unrelated to our ongoing war of words, I hope everything works out for the kid on the bike you mentioned. Good luck.
Ross,
"I suspect that the final result will be closer than the polls suggest for the simple reason that turnout will be lower than 2000 & 2004 when the race was on a knife edge."
I don't see why that would make the result closer. Other things being equal, both sides would stay at home - the Dems because they think it is in the bag, and the Repubs because they think they've lost and there is no point.
What none of the polls (know how to) account for what seems like to be a unprecedented grass roots GOTV campaign by the Dems, as well as a possible undercount of younger voters due to not polling cellphone users. Both of these suggest the margin of victory will probably be bigger even than the polls suggest.
And the race is not tightening so far - the polls with the largest samples have been very stable for weeks now.
"I don't see why that would make the result closer. "
Because Republicans are more likely to vote. That's why the Gallup Expanded poll always has a larger Pbama lead than the Gallup Traditional poll.
"What none of the polls (know how to) account for what seems like to be a unprecedented grass roots GOTV campaign by the Dems"
Well we heard about this in 2004 but it never materialised. It may be different this time but I won't believe it until I see it.it isn't certain.
"a possible undercount of younger voters due to not polling cellphone users."
I've thought about that and I don't think that it will be a problem for competent companies. Good polls weight their samples to fit the electorate. If they survey too few young people (based on the proportion of young people who typically vote) then they increase the weighting of those in the sample. Take YouGov, the most accurate British pollsters, their entire polling is done online yet we know that the elderly and the poor are far less likely to be internet users than the national average. So they simply reweight their survey,
http://ghankgtwwsaabfrgppklioo.com ghankgtwwsaabfrgppklioo
ghankgtwwsaabfrgppklioo
ghankgtwwsaabfrgppklioo