Gallup Tracking Poll Thread [Obama vs McCain]

[Torie]

Still 44-44 on June 27 for the third straight day.

[Torie]

If there was a bad sampling one day, how soon will it work its way out of the average?

Tomorrow.

Thank you.  Three day sample, I take it?

I don't know.

Edit:  I looked it up, and it says it's a rolling three day average, so yes, and for the moment not much is rolling.

[Torie]

Sunday - August 24, 2008

Obama - 45% (-1)
McCain - 45% (+1)

bumping around...

This doesn't pick up the Biden thing does it?  Is it a rolling 3 day poll?

[Torie]

I don't know what fancy stuff Silver does (other than find a starting point, where you know the three day numbers because they are so stable and work forward), but here is the unfancy stuff using Silver's prior two day numbers, with X the solution for the one day Saturday number:

(-2.4+4.2+X)/3=3
x=7.2

[Torie]

If I am right, McCain right now has a 9-12% bump in the Gallup poll right?

-8 to +7 = 15, or 7.5% if one is counting the percentage who switched. I don't know if the nomenclature of bounce is the former or the latter.

[Torie]

The last day is McCain +3.6, given various assumptions.

The McCain tsunami may be receding. 

(4.2+7.2+X)/3=5
x=3.6

Someone should keep up my little formula. I am going to be gone for 10 days.

[Torie]

(7.2+3.6+X)/3=5
x=4.2

[Torie]

I just used the 538 numbers from back when, and rolled forward using my simple little equation, which any high school student in the top 10% or so could do.  . I thought Nat Silver was a genius!  What happened? 

[Torie]

(3.6+4.2+X)/3=5
x=7.2

There is a trend! 

[Torie]

What would you guys do without JJ? 


Hey, I leave the States for a few days, and the stock market tanks, and McCain erodes. I will need to get back soon in order to restore some order.

[Torie]

I wonder if the recovery of the stock market on Friday will have an impact. It was massive world wide.

[Torie]

A 13% swing in one day is absurd, even with the financial market recovery on Friday. I guess Alcon would remind us that this is the flaw of small sample sizes or something. To me, it means that maybe pollsters are having some trouble in figuring out who will vote.

[Torie]

I suspect it is close to a done deal now. Sad. Obama passed the gravitas test, and is a very skillful trimmer. 

[Torie]

We won't see it till Tuesday if there is a Palin bounce.

Ras said his daily numbers after the debate were the same as those before, FWIW.

[Torie]

Pretty substantial movement today.

[Torie]

Damn, must have been some insanely pro-McCain sample.

Maybe that 2001 radio interview clip of Obama is hurting him some. I know it bothers me. I was close to finally going for Obama, but am for the moment now pulling back. Stay tuned. Hopefully Obama will say something about it reassuring, such as he's a lot more up to speed now, than then.

[Torie]

Pretty substantial movement today.

Bradley Effect?

The definition of that is something that is not picked up in polls no?

[Torie]

Pretty substantial movement today.

Bradley Effect?

The definition of that is something that is not picked up in polls no?

I'm guessing he was joking.

I fear I might get the reputation as the straight man on this forum. 

[Torie]

Well here is the McCain spin of the day, fed to Rich Lowry, who is glad Christopher Buckley resigned from NR:

"The McCain campaign says their internal polling still shows tightening, and their track shows them down three in the swing states. Fwiw..."

[Torie]

It is interesting that the traditional and expanded LV models are now merging. Is that by accident or design, as Gallup struggles to make a prediction on the actual turnout model as we get close to the wire?

[Torie]

It is interesting that the traditional and expanded LV models are now merging. Is that by accident or design, as Gallup struggles to make a prediction on the actual turnout model as we get close to the wire?

For some reason, the "traditional" turnout model was coming up with more likely voters than the "expanded" turnout model for a long time. That has now reversed and may help to explain the convergence.

How does an expanded model contract the number of voters?  That concept is just a bit too abstract for me. 

[Torie]

Why is the Gallup LV Traditional now only showing 65.2% of RV showing up.  That's below 1996 levels.

Despite this early voting hubbub, traditional indicators seem laggy to me.  Oregon ballot returns (a limited indicator but the best I know of) are down nearly 20% vs. the same day 2004.  Unless something odd is happening, I would be surprised if RVT isn't down a tick from '04.

That suggests demoralization. So is it downmarket blue collars who voted for Kerry who won't be voting, or cross conflicted Torie voters who voted Bush who won't be voting, or base GOP Bush voters who won't be voting, or Hispanics who voted more for Kerry than Bush who won't be voting?

We know the blacks and the punks will be voting in disproportionate numbers, as well as those liberal on both social and economic issues.