Mark Shields: Ignore the point spread

[Kolesar]

This is very encouraging! Mods, how quickly can you create a "toast" icon?

Forget the point spread. Look at point totals in the major polls.


WASHINGTON (Creators Syndicate) -- If anyone tells you that the latest authoritative national poll shows President George W. Bush either running 4 percentage points ahead of or 2 points behind Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kerry, pay him no attention. Ignore the messenger completely.

...snip...

History shows that the percentage of the vote that an incumbent president gets in the major polls before Election Day is an accurate predictor of the percentage of the vote the incumbent will win on Election Day. Thus, in Molyneux's judgment, the "incumbent who fails to poll above 50 percent is in grave danger of losing his job."

In the four most recent elections where an incumbent president sought re-election -- Bill Clinton in 1996, George H.W. Bush in 1992, Ronald Reagan in 1984 and Jimmy Carter in 1980 -- in the three major polls of the broadcast networks and their newspaper partners, the incumbent won the same percentage of the actual vote (or less) as he had received in the polls in three elections. Only Ronald Reagan, who had polled 58 percent of the vote and then actually won 59 percent of the vote, exceeded the average of the three network surveys.

The numbers of the challengers -- a list that includes third party candidate Ross Perot twice -- run better on Election Day than they do in the pre-election measures of public opinion. The average increase on Election Day in the actual vote for a challenger to a president is 4 percentage points.
...snip...

CNN Mark Shields

[terrya]

1. Thanks for posting this. I have a great deal of respect for Mark Shields.

This is very interesting...and encouraging.

[NMDemDist2]

2. i knew that! look at the numbers for Gore in 2000, and he won the vote

CNN/TIME POLL
October 25-26, 2000

Likely voters' choice for president

Bush 49%

Gore 43

Nader 3

Buchanan 1

Sampling error: +/-3% pts

[Jacobin]

3. Mark Shields is a good pundit

btw, the icon for a toast is the word "toast" surrounded by colons.

:toast:

[kaitykaity]

4. He got this almost word for word from

a story at The American Prospect I think. It was on
DU yesterday.

http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewWeb&articleId=8694

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=1033628

[KittyWampus]

5. Jr.'s Latest Debate Performance & Sinclair Smear Indicate

how bad things must be looking in GOP internal polls.

Their base is eroding.

We work hard, we will win.

And Kerry won't allow the election to be stolen.