rmolin73;1316079 wrote:Lol dude I was one of the people that stated that polls are not as effective as either side made them out to be. If I'm not mistaken sleeper has said that as well. But finally you have admitted the error of your ways. Hopefully the Republican party can do the same.
Fair enough - I'm not sure what you thought I was denying as obviously Obama won and I figured it to go to Romney. I did say if it was D+3/4 it was a complete toss-up, and it was and within the margin of error. I was hoping for R+2 and that might have been enough, but Romney didn't get that turnout. That was the big surprise. The turnout did come down on Obama, but Romney didn't even hold McCain's which was unexpected.
A lot of what I said about the polls was correct. Interesting that Rasmussen and Gallup ended-up being the worst. I don't know if they adjusted their baselines to reflect what most expected or not.
I'd normally say what they poll is pretty good. They can't poll or predict baseline, and in a very divided election that's why no one really knew what to expect. That's probably why they missed the independents badly as well - divided election like this and some of those "likely voter" independents might have stayed home and vice versa. Saw a blurb also that independents broke late more evenly, or possibly even for Obama, and they normally go to the incumbents. Could have been a very late move the polls didn't catch - 3% of independents switch at the last minute and that's +2 for Obama.
I think it also has to be questioned how accurate these polls are, and going forward, doing mostly phone surveys. Definitely puts an age and income bias in and might also explain the bias on independents toward Romney.
Anyway, the polls were a nice distraction.