Analysis of Recent Obama Job Approval polls (user search)
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  Analysis of Recent Obama Job Approval polls (search mode)
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Author Topic: Analysis of Recent Obama Job Approval polls  (Read 1037 times)
CARLHAYDEN
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Posts: 10,638


Political Matrix
E: 1.38, S: -0.51

« on: July 13, 2009, 01:02:51 AM »

Suggest everyone check out the data at Pollster.com.

Mark Blumenthal (he used to use "Mystery Pollster") provides a great deal of useful information, along with enough spinning the qualify him for a whirling dervish (he's a "progressive" Democrat).

Now, summer polls should be read with a grain of salt, but I am more concered with the relationship between the numbers for the surveys as opposed to their numbers per se.

The subject of the polls I have examine is approval/disapproval of Obama job performance.

I have found eight pols over the past thirty days which have identical polling dates (polls with overlapping dates can have legitimately different numbers) for comparison:

Date                    Organization                    Type                    Approve          Disapprove

7/9-11                      Gallup                         Adult                         58                    35
                             Rasmussen                Likely Voter                   52                    46
7/6-8                        Gallup                         Adult                         57                    36
                             Rasmussen                Likely Voter                   51                    48
6/18-21                 ABC/WaPo                     Adult                         65                    31
                                  ARG                           Adult                         57                    41
6/12-16                  CBS/NYT                        Adult                         63                    26
                                  PPP                    Registered Voter              52                    42   

First, the media polls (ABC/WaPo and CBS/NYT) provide far higher approval ratings, and far lower disapproval ratings.

Second, not suprisingly, the Likely Voter and Registered Voter polls show lower approval, and higher disapproval ratings than the Adult polls.

Finally, the "robo" pollster register signficantly higher disapproval ratings than the live interviewer polls.               
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CARLHAYDEN
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 10,638


Political Matrix
E: 1.38, S: -0.51

« Reply #1 on: July 14, 2009, 05:51:03 AM »

I was expecting Mark Blumenthal to try to spin the Obama Job Approval numbers, and sure enough, he did: 

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline/mp_20090710_2090.php

For those not familiar with survey research, let me elucidate, as Mark pulls a couple of fallacies in his “Obama Numbers Follow the Economy” piece in National Journal (July 13, 2009)

First, Mark compares the percentage of independents who voted for Obama according to the Edison national exit poll (2008) against the number of independents who now say they approve of Obama’s job performance in an adult poll from Gallup in June-July of this year.  Specifically, according to Edison, 52% voted for Obama in 2008 while according to Gallup, 53% approve of his job performance today.

Now, those in the survey research field can tell you that historically, adult polls tend to show higher approval ratings for Democrats than likely voter or exit (actual voter) polls.

The Rasmussen poll of likely voters (June 28-30, 2009) found that 46% of independents approved of Obama’s job performance and 53% disapprove of his job performance.

You need to compare apples to apples, not oranges Mark!

Second, the exit poll to which Mark refers was taken in November of 2008, while the adult poll from Gallup was taken in June of this year.  Now Mark is well aware that historically summer polls are more favorable to Democrats than polls taken the rest of the year.  Lou Harris wrote of this several years ago (for those of you who don’t know about Lou Harris, he was John Kennedy’s pollster).

Oh, and here’s what The Vorlon had to say about the matter:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=3755.0
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