The Washington Post hosts an online chat with Charlie Cook. This is excellent, a treat. He slams on the quality of polling information available on the Internet. Despite being a purveyor, I agree with him. How’s that for mind-bending. The effects of the last debate won’t show up until next week. Polls typically take at [...]
Entries from October 14th, 2004
A Chat with Charlie Cook; Third Bush-Kerry Debate
October 14th, 2004, 12:00pm by Sam Wang
Tags: 2004 Election
What-If Questions
October 13th, 2004, 12:00pm by Sam Wang
Lately I have been asked what-if questions (What if Bush wins Ohio? What if Kerry wins Wisconsin?) I have three ways of answering this type of question. The last answer may be of practical use in guiding your activism! 1. Flipping states: How much is the win probability affected by guaranteeing a given state? If [...]
Tags: 2004 Election
The Party ID Problem
October 5th, 2004, 12:00pm by Sam Wang
As previously mentioned, I have been looking at the party-ID numbers in the Gallup data. I have found evidence that party ID is not fixed over time. The Gallup poll internal numbers contain the fraction of voters who call themselves Republican, Democratic, or independent. The average GOP fraction is 39%, but fluctuates. The fluctuation has [...]
Tags: 2004 Election
The Median Elector Vote Swings
October 2nd, 2004, 12:00pm by Sam Wang
The median electoral vote (EV) estimate is very sensitive to swings in reported opinion because of the winner-take-all mechanism of awarding EV. Under near-tie conditions I find that the change is about 30 EV per 1-point change in the popular margin. Therefore Kerry’s approximately 110-EV slide since mid-August represents a 4-point swing, equivalent to 2% [...]
Tags: 2004 Election
