Is that a shrub in your pocket...
Friday, November 03, 2006
Infamous Zogby Poll
As with movies, some polls are released, and some escape. The infamous Zogby do-over in the NY-25th has finally escaped. Apparently Zogby figured, "what the hell, I'll release the damn thing myself."
As anticipated (based on the whiny Walsh reaction), the poll shows Democratic challenger Dan Maffei with a 4 point lead - and a rather amazing 14% still undecided. With the margin of error pegged at +/- 4.5%, this poll pretty much shows what we all suspected - this race is a dead heat going into the final weekend of the campaign. Crosstabs (pdf) are here.
The war in Iraq was cited as an important factor in deciding for whom to vote for Congress in the 25th District, and the Zogby poll showed it gave Maffei an advantage. Among those who said it was "very important" in deciding their vote, 49% said they supported Maffei, while 44% said they supported Walsh.
[...]
Just 41% said they think Walsh deserves to be reelected, while 49% said they think it is time for someone new. The Zogby survey showed there is widespread discontent in the district about the direction in which the nation is head—just 24% said things are going in the right direction, while 65% said they think things are off on the wrong track. Asked about how things are going locally, 40% said things are headed in the right direction, while 50% said they think things are off on the wrong track.
Walsh has a huge money advantage, was (predictably) endorsed by the Syracuse Post-Standard (a rather limp endorsement at that), and has the Republican GOTV machine goose stepping behind him all the way, but the fact that Maffei is still in this thing so late in the game must have Walsh - who has come to think of his office as an entitlement, rather than public service - very angry and confused.
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
More Stupid Poll Tricks
One Zogby poll you won't be seeing is for here in my district - the NY-25th - for the race between Democrat Dan Maffei and nine-term, Bush rubber stamp incumbent, James Walsh, which had to be re-run (as I wrote about before) when Zogby used the wrong district's makeup to weight the poll. This time around, the Walsh campaign appears to have been successful in getting the poll pulled because they disagreed with Zogby's basic methodology (read, Walsh - who is whiny, even for a Republican - is behind). According to one of the poll sponsors, local ABC affiliate WSYR (owned by Clear Channel, which is a contributor to the Walsh campaign):
...we discovered that some of the same people who were called for the first poll, were called again. Zogby confirmed they did indeed use the same larger sample of 5000 likely voters, to come up with this "new" poll sample of 502 likely voters. Our independent expert felt this raised a red flag...an unknown variable. The concern? How would you react if you were called twice in about a week, to answer the same questions? Would you answer differently? The same? Would you even take the call?
[...]
Mr. Zogby firmly stands by his findings. He insists his methodology is sound, and was prepared to join us live at 5:30pm to explain his findings and back-up his results. He points out pollsters often disagree about each other's methods. With respect to Mr. Zogby, we felt the questions raised by the outside reviewers, coupled with the short time we had to make a decision, left us with only one choice: We had to pull the poll.
Yesterday - no doubt fearing the release of the Zogby poll - Walsh - after steadfastly refusing throughout the campaign to release internal polls - posted a message on his website touting an internal poll showing Walsh with a "double-digit" lead in the race, and attacking Zogby as inaccurate, and partisan.
Certainly sounds like things in the 25th are closer than Walsh would like.
