For those following the polls, the evidence of the last few weeks has been pretty obvious. Following the first presidential debate, Mitt Romney began to eat into the lead that President Obama had amassed. In the last week, he has caught and passed the president in most national polls, especially those without samples that are not overestimating the number of Democrats who will turn out to vote. The race remains very close, and the president is still ahead or tied in a number of the important swing states. Evidence that the Obama campaign thinks it is trailing is everywhere, as the president swings away at his rival as if he were the challenger not the incumbent. Even more telling is, as I wrote yesterday, the first evidence that some influential people within the president’s re-election team are starting to plant stories in the media alleging that an impending defeat isn’t their fault.
And yet despite all these signs of trouble for the president, the most popular story line for liberal pundits and analysts today seems to be an attempt to deny that Romney has momentum or to brand it a media creation. That was the conceit of a much talked about piece in the New Republic by Alec MacGillis. His thesis is that the media — including publications and broadcast outlets that tend to favor the Democrats — are trying to foist a misleading story line about Romney moving ahead in order to make the election a better story. Even most liberals aren’t buying that idea but other voices, including polling analysts like the New York Times Nate Silver and Mark Blumenthal at the Huffington Post, are on slightly firmer ground when they claim that their reading of the polls tells them that Romney’s momentum is over. In a race this close, one has to admit the possibility that they might turn out to be right. But these frantic denials of a Romney surge not only contradict the clear trend of the polls. They smack of the sort of desperation that is often in evidence as candidates who were once thought in a commanding position start slipping. After months of liberals telling themselves that Romney was a fake or a fraud that no one could possibly take seriously, they are having a hard time coming to grips with the possibility that he might be elected president in 10 days. If denial is the first of five stages of grief, liberal mourning about the possible end of the Obama presidency can be said to have begun.
Feeding this denial is the widespread oversampling of Democrats in polls that still show the president leading the race. The assumption that the turnout of the president’s supporters will match or exceed those that lifted him to a historic victory in 2008 seems to be based more on a leap of liberal faith than evidence, but it is statistical tricks like that that are keeping Obama’s head above water in the polls. Partisans always tend to believe polls that tell them what they want to hear, but systems that weigh polls in an arbitrary manner such as Silver’s forecast seem to be similarly positioned to keep Obama ahead for as long as possible.
Just as misleading is the fact that the heavy turnout in early voting states, like Ohio, of Obama’s supporters may be skewing likely voter formulas in the president’s favor. As Josh Jordan writes in National Review today, given the emphasis the Democrats have placed on getting their base out to vote early while Republicans count on theirs to turn out on Election Day, the president’s ability to stay ahead or tied in Ohio polls may be a statistical anomaly that won’t be corrected until the ballots are counted.
But even looking beyond the biased analyses being published by liberal sources, the refusal of many Democrats to accept the reality of the Romney surge may be rooted in something more emotional than just skewed poll numbers. Many if not most liberals share the attitude of contempt for the Republicans that were so easily discerned in the attitudes of both President Obama and Vice President Biden during the debates. Though most Americans have rejected the attempt by the president’s campaign to define Romney as a heartless plutocrat or a monster, liberals bought it hook, line and sinker. The idea that such a person could have caught and passed Obama in the space of a few short weeks seems impossible to them not so much because they think the numbers don’t support this thesis but because they just don’t want it to be so.
Rather than debunking Romney’s wave, liberal analysts who seek to deny it are merely confirming their inability to look dispassionately at what has occurred. Democrats living in liberal echo chambers need a reality check.
There will be no landslide in the presidential race this year, or even a decisive victory like the one Obama scored in 2008. It’s possible that the president can rebound in the last days of the campaign and that Romney could falter. But barring some late October surprise that would help the president (as opposed to one, like last month’s Libya fiasco, which hurt him), it’s hard to see momentum shifting back in his favor. If it doesn’t, expect liberal denial about Romney’s strength to deepen.
Obama never had any lead. He lost this election the day he signed Obamacare. Pollster lie, all of them. They are hired by the Democrat Party and paid BIG money to make it up. And, then to maintain credibility, they get "honest" a few days before the election and then pass it off as a 'stunning upset'. October 24th 1980 Gallup Poll Carter/Mondale hold 8 point lead over Reagan/Bush. Election Day 1980 Reagan/Bush win by 9% over Carter Mondale in a 44 State Landslide.
BDZ, I agree. We Republicans are as bad as the Democrats in wishing the polls and our interpretations of them to be showing Romney leads, and I have no more patience with our friends who do this than I do with our opponents. Having said that, I do think there is a legitimate debate over the size of the advantage some polling firms give to a Democratic turnout. What makes Rasmussen so credible is that he bases his polls on what the most recent party identifications are(almost even) and what the likely turnouts are to be. Many of the other polls, particularly those done in states, fail to make these adjustments. If I remember correctly, Gallup does not make party ID adjustments, but does for turnout rates. Who is ahead is a fun, albeit highly anxious-ridden, game of late. Like most, I think it's close. What might be fun is for the people in charge here at Commentary to have a contest (prizes do not have to be given)among its faithful posters in predicting popular vote and electoral college; the latter including where these swing states will go. Hope you folks upstairs are reading.
The problems with polling today go way beyond the outsized Democrat polling samples and when this race is over and Romney win 320+ Electoral College votes people will begin to understand the folly of relying on polls to be accurate. n nA much bigger problem with polls today than distorted sample sizes is the nature of the samples themselves. As the polling organizations have reported themselves 9% or less of people who are contacted today to participate in polls agree to do so which is far lower than in the past and not only is that not representative of anything from a statistical modeling perspective, it's a self selecting group that frequently takes part with an agenda in mind. n nJimmy Kimmel showed a very revealing bit recently when he did interviews in the streets last week asking people who they thought won a debate between Obama and Romney that hadn't even taken place yet. Again and again Obama supporters claimed to have watched, declared Obama won the debate and explained their reasons why he won the non-existent event with DNC talking points. n nWhen you start digging into the details of the poll specifics, after you get by the outsized Democrats samples and look at the results it's plainly obvious that tiny minority of people who actually respond to polls are not who they say they are and that polling results are based on faulty samples not only mis-sized ones. n nThe left and the DNC is very active in promoting efforts by their people to participate in polls, misrepresent who they are and try to form opinion rather than measure it. This is why after each of the four debates this cycle the percentages of people in polls who CLAIMED to have watched the debate were so completely out of whack with the results of focus groups who are KNOWN to have watched them and overwhelming showed Romney and Ryan winning them all. It's the same reason the gap between exit polling and actual results has grown wider with each election over the last decade. n nThe fact of the matter is in every poll, no matter who the pollster is, no matter how sound they think their methodology is and no matter how they try to address it the vast majority of those being polled are politically active members of the left and the Democrat Party who seek to influence outcomes by misrepresenting themselves.
9%; they should be so lucky. The latest ABC poll said they made 35,000 calls to get 1,200 respondents. That is a grand total of 3.4%. And then they have the gall to actually publish the poll – which shows Romney ahead at 50-47, anyway. But what of the rest of 33,800 people? Presumably many of them will vote, but neither ABC nor we have a clue how.
If only the left were as well organized as you claim that it is!
bah, Rasmussen even skews his polls too heavily Democrat, d+5 nationally I believe, the new survey from Gallup today about the makeup of the 2012 electorate finds that it will be R+3, that's higher than 2004 and 13 points better than many of the media's D+10 garbage.
As Pew noted about a month or so ago, 91% of the people they call don't cooperate – either they simply don't answer the phone or refuse to answer the pollsters' questions. That means only 9% of people called actually respond, about 1/4 as many as 15 years ago. r nr nIn light of this, why does anyone believe any poll at all? Is it rational to believe that the 9% who answer accurately represent the 91% who don't? Is it possible that a large number of the 91% are self-selecting out of the sample for some reason? If so, would this not affect the accuracy of the poll or do they just say "it's always worked in the past" and trundle on? r nr nPeople tend to anchor to a number, even if it's the wrong one, because it's the only thing they have. But, when the map no longer matches the territory, it's time to throw the map away. Somebody is going to be surprised Nov 7.
BDZ, to me, the most compelling aspect of the polling and the NRO article is Romney's margin with independents. O's 2008 ability to win the independents and the skewing of Ohio's normal even or slightly pro-Republican typical turnout split in the last 40 years explains the 2008 results. I am in suburban Chicago, not Ohio, but cannot fathom there is any more enthusiasm for O than there is here. No way does O repeat his 208 performance in my congressional district. If that is the case in Ohio, too, the +Dem turnout in 2008 will not be repeated and the Romney lead in independents — which is pervasive in all of the Ohio polls — will matter and likely be decisive. n nI am not naive enough to believe that partisans on both sides — myself included — engage in wishful thinking, but look to the insiders and campaigns to get a sense of what is going on. If Romney's team believes it must have Ohio and things look bad (but not hopeless), you would think Romney would be camped out there. Instead, it is Obama who is, and Obama's campaign is sending all sorts of signals that Ohio is its last stand. One can only hope this is the case and we will know soon enough.
And I see that Biden is heading to…Oshkosh. So WI must really be in play. And if WI is in play, I have to think OH is looking pretty good.
If Plugs Biden is heading to Wisconsin then they're in trouble there as well because it means their internal polls aren't good.
It's called sealing the deal. Democrats take nothing for granted. Remember 2000?
Fortunately, even liberals are distracted by baseball this week, and the entire DC-NY-Boston corridor may be recovering from Blizzardcane Sandy next week. n nMay the next October surprise be the Intrade odds. I check RCP usually twice a day, but now that they post Intrade (or I just noticed it there), it is tempting to wonder what is moving those numbers during the day. Not like you can check with Bloomberg to get the key points on market movement. n n
The intrade universe is not so large that it can't be manipulated by anyone willing to spend a few thousand dollars per day — which is very economical vis-a-vis conventional media buys.
The requests for absentee ballots between Republicans and Democrats is almost equal this year which is completely different from 2008 when the Democrats had a 15% advantage in absentee ballot requests. Also, almost 450,000 people have been removed from Ohio's voting rolls since they are deceased. In 2008, there were quite a few of these ''tomb stone voters'' who voted for Obama in 2008. Romney will win Ohio and the turn out will be like the 2010 elections.
Mike, that is one of the best analyses if read in a long time. Bravo!
A simple answer, BDZ – this race isn't that close. So, yeah, I buy it. To not buy it means believing that for the past three years when given a chance Americans across the nation voted against the Democrats despite their love for Obama and all things Obama, like Obamacare. After 2009 (NJ and VA), 2010 (MA then nationwide) – which was a slaughter at the state level, too – and 2011-2012 (WI), are we really to believe that voters, given a shot at the true object of their wrath, are going to suddenly reconsider? Hardly. I can't explain the polls, but once the massacre is over we'll get some insight into what has been going on – why these points of data have been so screwy. nThat's been my feeling for a long time now – common sense tells me Romney wins, and that it won't be a nail-biter and that the Republicans will regain the Senate. The only reason everyone isn't singing that tune is because we live in a culture that saturates us 24/7 with liberal fantasies. Those fantasies, it appears, are influencing the assessments pollsters are making. nOK – there it is. In 10 days I look either amazingly prescient or like a complete idiot! But if I look like a complete idiot I'll be so depressed I won't care, so that's one upside.
The race is very close.I wish there weren’t so many articles like this on conservative sites. Most liberals had declared the election over months,even a year ago. And they believed that as well. That Silver guy at the NYT is a prime example. He’s declared the race over so many times I’ve lost count. Right now liberals are trying to wake up their base and get them out to vote. Conservatives should ignore them and focus on maximizing Republican turnout. Everything in 11 days is going to be decided by turnout.
So liberals are in denial and conservatives are clear eyed realists? That's a stretch, even for Commentary. Look, here's the thing that will ultimately doom your predictions. Obama draws minority voters to the polls. Historically, these voters have been under represented but not now. nIt's simple math. The demographics are going to ensure and Obama victory in places like Ohio, Nevada and Virginia. Obama wins those states and he wins re-election. Until the Republican party offers minority voters something beyond xenophobia and animus, they will continue to decline in national elections. You guys can win house seats where gerrymandering has helped but in competitive senate races, places like Virginia, Mass, Florida, and Ohio, Republican policies will cost you any chance to pick up seats. It will also ensure Obama wins a second term.
Yeah, right, it's the Republicans who have been running a racist campaign. I guess that's why there are no African American Republicans. Oh, wait a minute — I mean that's why no GOP president has had Aftrican Americans in his cabinet or nominated an African American to the Supremet Court. n nOh, wait a minute — I means that's why the GOP convention featured only male, white speakers. A n nAnd you have busted us over xenophobia, as surely there is no other reason for wanting to prevent illegal immigration.
Are you seriously making the argument that Republicans are likely to win lots of minority voters to their side this election cycle? Okay genius, tell me, what percentage of African Americans will Romney get? What percentage of Hispanics will Romney get? Since your reading comprehension isn't all that good, let me restate what I said. Republicans do no draw minority voters and they are doing virtually nothing to change that. The demographic shifts in our population are such that there are not nearly enough angry white guys voting the straight Republican ticket to overcome their lack dismal record with minority voters. I never said there are NO blacks or Hispanics that vote Republican. You're lucky to get 15% of Hisp
Just thought I would rub your nose in it a little. I was right, the demographics destroyed your side. Latinos and African Americans turned out in droves in spite of Republican efforts designed to keep them away from the polls. That's the lesson from this election. Your side should learn that trying to suppress voters who don't agree with you is un-American and in the end, a losing strategy.
Yep, you were right that the demographics were against us. Obama would probably have won even without the vote tampering that went on in Philadelphia, including the racist Black Panther thugs trying to intimidate white voters at the polls. You were still lying, though, when you charged that asking for ID is motivated by voter suppression.—
Lying? Was this guy lying too?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o32tF-S6K60Also, the supposed voter intimidation you're talking about amounts to one black guy in a beret. I know most of you have been trained to live in fear of black people but the last I checked, it's still legal to be black and go to the polls on election day. You guys didn't lose because your voters were too afraid of the big black guy in the beret. You lost because your ideas suck.
Really? There were two who were arrested and convicted for it for the 2008 election, and the photo that I saw from Phil. in 2012 showed a lot more than 2.—
Okay, just keep telling yourself the reason you lost is because some black guys were at the polling place. Exactly what did the DO that was intimidating? I haven't heard any explanation.And two guys who were arrested in '08 has no bearing on what happened last on Tuesday. Face it. Republicans are the ones who tried to prevent other people from voting. Didn't work.
Eleven days out, Gallup and Rasmussen both have Romney ahead by 3. (Gallup has not shown an Obama lead the entire month of October.) ABC News is also at +3 (those &%$#&@ right wingers!). Battleground, a bipartisan poll that has been highly accurate over the past few cycles, shows Romney +2. AP and SUSA also show Romney leading (+3 and +2, respectively). Obama is polling about 47 percent, even including some highly suspicious favorable polls (TIPP, CBS). No sane political analyst could think this is a good place for an incumbent to be, especially since "undecideds" never break for the incumbent at the end. n nThe line from some Democrat partisans is that even if Romney wins the popular vote, Ohio remains a sturdy firewall that will protect Obama. However, an electoral-popular contradiction can occur only if the popular vote is very close, within a point at most.
The Democrats got the worse election beating in 2010 with Republican wins not seen since 1938. The Democrats were in total denial not even considering for a minute that these results were because of their ultra-left-wing agenda. Nope, it was right back to the same old tricks that gave them the 2010 political beating in the first place. It is against their DNA to admit defeat because in their warped mind, they think they are morally superior to Republicans. This is the party that supports abortion of the innocent right up to the full term but they think they are morally superior.
I live in central ohio and yes I think there is some momentum building for Romney. Remember that we voted out Ted Strickland, a democrat, after one term as gov. and repubs took most state offices in 2010. Yes, Kasaich over-reached in his fight with the unions, but no one is talking about that. Its all about the economy and how everyone is struggling to pay for food, gas and their mortgages.
I had not seen that. Thank you for posting. Truly appalling. If we had a real media, this president would not stand a chance.
No more Affirmative Action presidents. Ever!r nr nNo more racist Attorney Generals. Ever!r nr nNo more Welfare Queen first ladies. Ever!r nr nNo more Obama-boot-licking MSM. Ever!r nr nJim Whittakerr nHemet, CA
“Welfare queen first ladies”r nr nDisgusting and offensive. Quite the example of why those on the other side affect such a morally superior tone.
it took 8 years for bush to get us to where we were losing 800k jobs per month, so it makes sense to give obama 8 years to get us all the way back. after 4 years, obama has gone from the negative 800k per month, to positive 150k jobs per month, so people saying obama hasn't improved our situation just don't understand how the economy works.
“In the last week, he has caught and passed the president in most national polls, especially those without samples that are not overestimating the number of Democrats who will turn out to vote.”r nr nOh I see. Jonathan S. Tobin has now bought into the debunked right wing conspiracy theory of unskewed.com. Good to know.
Romney regained chances after the first debate (not his own merit but Obamas fault) then after the other two debates the situation is much more stable than it appears. The campaign wont last forever and Romney already did the most up to mid October (the so called "surge"), but time is running short and there are no other huge occasions to gain everything he need to be elected. Obama has a tight margin, but stable at this time, fluctuations are marginals, even if media still focus on Romneys surge and supporters hope for a self-fulfilling prophecy. n nReal Clear Politics got all states in 2008 except one, so better if you take it seriously. This are updated polls: n n(i) Nationally: Romney + 0.9 (up from previous +0.6, but gaining mostly in solid states). n n(ii) Electoral votes, no toss up states: Obama 281, Romney 257 n n(iii) Electoral votes, toss up states: Obama 201, Romney 191 (lost North Carolina, now toss up) n n(iii) Toss Up States: nOhio: Obama +2.1 (increasing from last week +1.7) nIowa: Obama +2.3 (slightly up from previous +2) nMichigan: Obama +4 (decreasing from last week +5) nPennsylvania: Obama + 4.8 (stable) nNew Hampshire: Obama + 1.1 (Romney up last week) nWisconsin: Obama +2.3 (down from previous + 2.7) nNevada: Obama +2.5 (slightly down from previous +2.8) nFlorida: Romney +1.8 (decreasing from last week +2.4) nColorado: Romney +0.4 (slightly up from previous +0.2) nVirginia: Romney +1.5 (up from last week tie) nNorth Carolina: Romney +3.5 (down from previous +5.7%, shifting from leaning Romney to toss-up) n n(iv) Intrade Real Time Quotes: Obama 63% (up from all time low of 56% in mid October), Romney 37% n
Polls are one thing, but were the liberals in a Coma during the 2010 election? Do they think that the wave of ousting Obamaism from government that led to ousting of over 600 Democrats in elections nationiwde was somehow forgotten? Do they think that those that pulled the R lever then forgot why the did it then, and wouldn't do it now? n nAll 2010 was anti-Obama. Nothing, but nothing is better now, than then, which by default makes it worse, given the increased time of a bad economy. Now there's a solution besides just voting out Obama's minions, but Obama himself for a guy who is known to fix failing companies. n nRight guy for the right mission at the right time.
i am a strong Romney supporter and also a statistician. I understand the 538 methodology, but I believe something changed in 2008 with the first Black President. Flipping a coin eight times in a row and getting heads does change a true coin's odds on the next flip from 50%. n ni think Romney can win, but I would be willing to bet that neither reaches 300 electoral votes, and that it will be very close in at least 8-10 States. n nBut I hope the model is right!!! But get out and vote for Romney
I don't see how it's "denial" to look at the actual facts. n nNobody denies that the first debate had a huge impact which took a very solid RCP AVG Obama +3.1 lead heading into the first debate, and took it all the way to an RCP AVG Romney +1.3 by the VP debate. A massive swing for sure. n nBut it's very clear that there hasn't been any "momentum" since the VP debate. n nThe day after that VP debate it sat at R 47.3 / O 46.0, and since then Romney has bounced around between a low of 46.9 and a high of 48.0,, and currently sits at 47.9. Since then Obama has bounced between a low of 46.7 and a high of 47.3, and currently sits at 47.0. n nThere's no arguing that any "momentum" Romney had stopped after the VP debate, and there has been no momentum either way since (though we've yet to get a full picture of the effect of the 3rd debate).
My daughter is a championship dancer. For years when her competitors would underestimate her she would just smile and keep moving up the ranks. It's like this for the election this year and in 2010. The Democrats think they are so vastly superior, hipper, cooler than the old stodgy Republicans that there would be no way they could lose. Please keep thinking that way Democrats I'm looking forward to the optics on election night when Romney wins, the R's win control of both houses and Obama and his regime are finally defeated. I hope you don't see it coming. The left has grossly underestimated the anger of the majority of the electorate and it will cost them.
. . . late October surprise [...], like last month’s Libya fiasco, which hurt [Obama] n nFour Americans killed in Libyan embassy — Obama hardest hit.
I don't think there's any denial that there was a shift in Romney's favor a couple of weeks ago. The trend stopped a couple of weeks ago. Anyway, all of the bravado here is pretty funny – trying to keep the "momentum" myth alive by accusing Democrats of being in denial requires some pretty advanced denial skills on your part.
It is denial for the purpose of selfishness.
Things look pretty good for Obama in Ohio. Every single recent poll puts him ahead, although none by more than a few points. Still, the polls are all singing the same tune. Obama also has a strong Democratic ticket to run with — the incumbent Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown is comfortably ahead of the Republican challenger, Josh Mandell. Then there's the automobile bailout. And finally, every college football fan knows that there's no chance a guy from Michigan will carry the Buckeye state!
For your next article, how about analyzing the momentum of denial by the right of the electoral vote landscape? The aggregators keeping track of the EV picture (RCP, 538, PEC) know it's Romney who needs to rebound if he hopes to win. RCP has Obama leading 201-191 and with no tossups, 291-248. Online betting sites are dodgier for a lot of reasons, but find me one that will pay out more for an Obama win than a Romney win. n nRemember President Gore, who won the popular vote in 2000?
I made a bet 2 months ago that Romney wins and gets 320. Now I think it may be 340-350 range. My buddy will be happy to pay up when I win. Landslide is happening. Over sample of Democrats in most polls. Even my home state of Oregon may be in play. Remember 2010 not one thought the Tea Party was very strong. Romney will win 52-47 and we take back the Senate. Gain 4-6 in House.
What I can't understand is why Mr. Woods didn't punch that idiot Bite me in the mouth? If that were me and he said that about my son, I don't think the secret service could stop me, I'd get a sucker punch in. nJoe Bite me shouldn't be allowed to mention the name of such a brave American hero, he should be given the Medal of Honor, after all, he was a seal.
Replace the word "Liberal" with the word "Conservative" and you'll get it about right. Oh the Schadenfreude.