Thanks! I've been waiting all day for this post.
Posted by CG at October 31, 2008 06:18 PMIt's all looking good.
Now, I have to tell you that the wingnuts are excited about a leaked report from Zogby that the first half of his Friday polling had McCain ahead 48-47.
I mean, there is just no logic. First, it's only 1/6th of the sample so the MOE has to be huge. Second, this pollster has found swings back and forth of greater than 10 points in periods less than a week and a half, while everyone else is seeing a very stable race during that same time.
Silliness.
Posted by Anonny at October 31, 2008 07:46 PMWow. Nate already has a post about the Zogby news, calming everyone down. Good stuff. Logically I know it has to be bullshit, but it's better to have Nate affirm that.
One point is that the Zogby sample has to be about 200 likely voters, which is 1/6th of his 3 day sample, which is incredibly tiny and has to have an MOE well above 5%. Add to that his unusual weightings and a methodology that seems to accentuate big swings, rather than trying to smooth them as other pollsters do, and it's clear that this is a single data point we just can't trust.
Still, that should help fight complacency.
Posted by Anonny at October 31, 2008 09:14 PMFor those worried about the Obama response to Republican election fraud, here is a personal anecdote.
I volunteered for poll watching in Colorado election day, but they already have enough certified watchers (they are still trying to recruit for PA and a couple other eastern states, if anyone knows someone with a little legal knowledge).
So, I'm doing the canvasser thing instead.
Posted by Anonny at October 31, 2008 09:50 PM"Keating Five" McCain's weakness in Arizona is fascinating. I think a lot of it has to do with people losing money in Lincoln Savings.
Posted by libhomo at November 1, 2008 06:23 AMI think a lot of it has to do with people losing money in Lincoln Savings.
Not that likely. That was 18 years ago, and with AZ's aging and relatively transient population not many will remember that. It probably has more to do with these two things.
1) Demographic shifts. Lots of people, especially Californians, moving to Arizona. And an increase in the Hispanic population, which itself is now increasingly more likely to vote and to vote Democrat.
2) McCain was never all that popular in AZ to begin with. He's perceived as a "national" Senator, not a AZ Senator, and has never built a local base. His home for 90% of his life has been Washington, DC, where he grew up, son of an Admiral working in the Pentagon, and where he's lived during his 26 years in Congress. He showed up in AZ after his marriage to his second wife. In his first election campaign he was asked about the fact that he had arrived in AZ recently. After struggling to answer that he dropped a mention of his time in N Vietnam and found that doing so successfully deflected the question, so he's been playing the POW card ever since.
Posted by Anonny at November 1, 2008 06:42 AMCaPJ, I don't think you explained this before, but how exactly are the press able to report the racial breakdown of early voters? This is now being blatted everywhere. Race, race, race.
As predicted, this unintended consequence of eary voting is being used by Repubs like Saxby Chambliss to energize the redneck vote ("The other folks are voting", he said to his all-white crowd the other day).
I guess there's nothing wrong with everybody going out and voting whatever the reason, progressives like citizens to vote, but so much for the resigned "defeatism" of the supposedly despairing Repubs. Nothing energizes like race-baiting, apparently. It's certainly the last gallon that McShit has in the tank.
Posted by euzoius at November 1, 2008 06:50 AMeuzoius, some states have to track race with voter registration as part of compliance with the Voting Rights Act. Since it is a matter of public record who has voted, one can then calculate the percentage of voters of different races who have already voted. Data by race is available here by race for Georgia, Louisiana, and North Carolina. It would be great if nobody concerned themselves with race, but for electoral analysis and the campaigns themselves it is very valuable information.
Posted by CA Pol Junkie at November 1, 2008 08:49 AM