/dev/null Posted September 10, 2006 Share Posted September 10, 2006 Website that tracked individual state polls prior to the 2004 presidential election is back up with a map of how the Senate races are looking and some tight Congressional races http://www.electoral-vote.com/ Like anything on the net take it with a grain of salt (and a shot of tequila) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
UConn James Posted September 10, 2006 Share Posted September 10, 2006 The NY Times has a nice article about Tuesday's Republican primary in Rhode Island. The Republican National Committee is pulling out all stops to help incumbent Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-RI), even though he voted against the war in Iraq, the Bush tax cuts, and almost everything else the administration holds dear. Although he did vote for George Bush in 2004, it was a write-in for former president George H.W. Bush. But party officials know all too well that if Cranston mayor Stephen Laffey wins the primary on Tuesday, Laffey has no chance of winning the general election against Democratic challenger Sheldon Whitehouse in this very Democratic state and they can kiss the seat goodbye. I can attest to this, living w/in the Providence viewing area. If you listen to Laffey's propaganda, he's lockstep w/ the administration --- except on oil, which he (rightly, I think) calls them out for allowing the energy companies to write the laws. He says he's an outsider and that Rove et al. hates him. Not a bad strategy for a state that has shown in the past 10 years that they will always elect a Dem statehouse, yet choose more conservative statewide and national reps. Everything else he says, tho, should make him a dream buddy for the WH. Control of the Senate appears more important to the RNC than having people who represent their agenda. Sheldon Whitehouse has been running ads for the past several months detailing specific issues, gaining ground while whichever is getting beat up and spending mad money. He is coming off as the more polished candidate and he is a known figure in RI, not a nobody. Laffey has been running specific ads, tho very muddled (in one 30-second spot, he sits on his parents' couch and goes from saying he'll fight(!) the 'special interests', then says that his brother died of AIDS and his father has Alzeimers (which has me going, "Won't that make you susceptible to those special interests?), and then goes into his oil schpiel) even if what he says does ring hollow when compared to his record and he does come off as an a--hole, berating firefighters, the elderly, people who complained about his tax hikes in Cranston (admittedly, he came into a bad situation).... Chaffee has been running VERY nonspecific ads, you know the sort --- integrity, honor, "bring people together" blah blah blah, but then again he's the incumbent and is pitching from the mound as such. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KD in CA Posted September 12, 2006 Share Posted September 12, 2006 Never mind that. What does RCow say? A 57-43 Dem Senate? A pickup of 60 seats in the House? Inquiring minds want to believe exit polls! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blzrul Posted September 12, 2006 Share Posted September 12, 2006 It was funny to see Cantwell "strong". If you went by what you read in the paper and hear, you'd think she was all but out. McGavick is a weenie though - I think with a better candidate the Repubs had a chance. What will be interesting is the house race in Reichert's district. His claim to fame is being the extremely photogenic guy who happened to be sherrif when they finally caught the Green River Killer. However he's in doodoo so badly that Karl Rove his bad self is campaigning for re-election. Look for lots of slime - which doesn't play real well here. I don't know who the Dems are running but Rove wouldn't be involved if they didn't think Dave was vulnerable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wacka Posted September 12, 2006 Share Posted September 12, 2006 It was funny to see Cantwell "strong". If you went by what you read in the paper and hear, you'd think she was all but out. McGavick is a weenie though - I think with a better candidate the Repubs had a chance. What will be interesting is the house race in Reichert's district. His claim to fame is being the extremely photogenic guy who happened to be sherrif when they finally caught the Green River Killer. However he's in doodoo so badly that Karl Rove his bad self is campaigning for re-election. Look for lots of slime - which doesn't play real well here. I don't know who the Dems are running but Rove wouldn't be involved if they didn't think Dave was vulnerable. 770582[/snapback] If there's slime, it's got to be the dems doing it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chilly Posted September 12, 2006 Share Posted September 12, 2006 Website that tracked individual state polls prior to the 2004 presidential election is back up with a map of how the Senate races are looking and some tight Congressional races http://www.electoral-vote.com/ Like anything on the net take it with a grain of salt (and a shot of tequila) 766363[/snapback] Its an okay site. One of the reasons that I don't like it is that they just give states within the margin of error to one side or another, when in reality a 1% or 2% difference which falls within the margin of error doesn't mean anything. In fact, all it means is that the candidates are very close. Another thing I don't like about the site is that they use Zogby. Zogby is a crap pollster in my opinion. Their latest methods include internet/email polling, which means that its not nearly as random as a simple random sample. They claim that they account for it by weighting the data from minorities versus non-minorties and other data; however, by doing that you are assuming that the minority data that you have is representative of the sample as a whole. When you're using the internet and email to do polling, that presents a problem, as typically you're leaving out the lowest-income voters. Rasmussen is another one that is kind of shaky. Scott Rasmussen has been using a lot of robotic polls, which while they're not as problematic as Zogby's email polls, pose problems. A typical resopnse rate with a live person in polls is around 20-40%, whereas a typical resonse rate of a robotic poll is 3-5%. Robotic polls also provide other biases - seniors typically would hate to talk to a robot more then younger people would and other caveats of not talking to a real person. All in all its a useful site because it allows you to easily and quickly access poll data, but they aren't reliable or always accurate by any stretch of the imagination. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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