Disparaging disparities
Some more interesting disparities I found today
First is a link to a Farmer's Almanac straw poll wherein Ron Paul not only leads among the Republicans, but has more votes than any democratic primary candidate as well. Found here.
The difference between a straw poll such as the previous and following example, and a regular poll is that a straw poll is open to the public, much like a regular election, whereas in a regular poll, people are polled from lists which are generally compiled to favor the interests of whoever commissioned the poll. For example a primary poll for republican presidential candidates may only poll registered republican voters who voted for Bush in the last election.
This is a New Hampshire straw poll from July of 2007
And finally there's this excerpt from an AP news story about Hillary beating Obama
NEW YORK (AFP) - Experts on Wednesday said there was no single reason why opinion polls predicting a clear victory for Democrat Barack Obama on the eve of the New Hampshire presidential primaries were so wrong.
Polls predicted an Obama victory over Senator Hillary Clinton by a margin of five to 13 points -- but when voters cast ballots on Tuesday, Clinton won 39 percent against 36 for Obama.
"It is simply unprecedented for so many polls to have been so wrong," said Gary Langer, director of polling at ABC News, who has been conducting political polls for more than 15 years. "We need to know why."
I think it's funny that the polling method that most closely resembles a fair election gets such drastically different results from the actual votes once they've been fed through the electronic voting machines.
First is a link to a Farmer's Almanac straw poll wherein Ron Paul not only leads among the Republicans, but has more votes than any democratic primary candidate as well. Found here.
The difference between a straw poll such as the previous and following example, and a regular poll is that a straw poll is open to the public, much like a regular election, whereas in a regular poll, people are polled from lists which are generally compiled to favor the interests of whoever commissioned the poll. For example a primary poll for republican presidential candidates may only poll registered republican voters who voted for Bush in the last election.
This is a New Hampshire straw poll from July of 2007
And finally there's this excerpt from an AP news story about Hillary beating Obama
NEW YORK (AFP) - Experts on Wednesday said there was no single reason why opinion polls predicting a clear victory for Democrat Barack Obama on the eve of the New Hampshire presidential primaries were so wrong.
Polls predicted an Obama victory over Senator Hillary Clinton by a margin of five to 13 points -- but when voters cast ballots on Tuesday, Clinton won 39 percent against 36 for Obama.
"It is simply unprecedented for so many polls to have been so wrong," said Gary Langer, director of polling at ABC News, who has been conducting political polls for more than 15 years. "We need to know why."
I think it's funny that the polling method that most closely resembles a fair election gets such drastically different results from the actual votes once they've been fed through the electronic voting machines.