Thursday, August 7, 2008
At the end of last month, I posted an article on HuffingtonPost that examines congressional approval and suggests that people should not be surprised when Congress gets a lower approval rating than the president. In the 35-year history of Gallup polls, that has always occurred – except for the very first time, when the House was holding impeachment hearings on President Richard Nixon. So, what does “Congressional approval” indicate? See here.
Posted by David Moore 
No Comments »
Monday, July 21, 2008
My critique of the New York Times article, which reported the results of the latest NYT/CBS News poll, is now posted on The Huffington Post, where I will contribute commentary from time to time.
For other commentary on the issue of the Times article, see Mark Blumenthal’s report here.
Posted by David Moore No Comments »
Monday, July 21, 2008
This article was previously posted on Pollster.com.
In a post on July 10, I suggested the size of the group that Gallup calls “swing voters” was probably a significant under-estimate of the actual proportion of the electorate that is up for grabs. A new CBS/New York Times poll seems to confirm my suspicions, reporting the equivalent swing voter group at one and a half times greater than what Gallup reported – 36 percent vs. 23 percent respectively.
(read more…) »
Posted by David Moore No Comments »
Monday, July 14, 2008
On Thursday, July 10, USA Today published an analysis of voter intentions that produced “six types of voters” who the paper claims “will decide the presidential election.” The types included: true believers (30 percent of the electorate), up for grabs (18 percent), decided but dissatisfied (16 percent), fired up and favorable (14 percent), firmly decided (12 percent), and skeptical and downbeat (12 percent).[i]
As Mark Blumenthal indicated, this is a fascinating analysis, but how useful is it for understanding the election?
(read more…) »
Posted by David Moore No Comments »
Thursday, July 10, 2008
In a recent post, Gallup’s Jeff Jones reports that for the first time this election cycle, Gallup has measured the number of “swing voters” in the electorate. That’s certainly a step in the right direction, but one might well wonder why it took so long for pollsters to admit that there is a substantial proportion of the public not committed to a candidate.
(read more…) »
Posted by David Moore No Comments »
