Re CBS Poll. How many registered Democrats are there?

[Michael_UK]

There's an article going around the conservative websites saying that the CBS poll with low apporival ratings for Bush are biased because they weigh the Registered Democrats to Registered Republicans at 1.3 to 1.

How many registered Republicans and Democrats are there? Where can I get some stats?

http://newsbusters.org/node/4211

[zanne]

1. Some conservatives will never be able to admit it.

Sometimes, reality is too much for them.

[marmar]

2. Very much so....

And several polls - Gallup and Rasmussen among them - are weighted in favor of Repugs. They all say essentially the same thing lately: Bush sucks.

[wakeme2008]

3. well what about the 70+% Military in Iraq

that want the troops out in 2006. Are all the troops Dems..... Wingnuts just do not get it

[jackbourassa]

4. Last I heard the percentages were:

42% Democrat.

38% Republican.

20% Independant.

But don't take the conservatives whining about ratios as gospel truth either.

[Michael_UK]

5. It does seem a valid criticism though

If the figures are around 1.1 to 1, it doesn't seem right to make it 1.3 to 1.

[Orangepeel]

9. There are more Democrats than Republicans in the country

so there are more in the poll.

It is true that, historically, republicans are more likely to vote than democrats in non presidential elections, so it is not unreasonable to suppose that the rating would be a point or so higher if only those voters likely to vote in '06 were polled.

But:

1) the number would only change slightly. It wouldn't be a dramatic five point jump or anything like that
2) it isn't a poll of voters likely to vote in '06. If one wants to know how voters feels about bush, one should poll voters. nothing at all the matter with that.

[Michael_UK]

10. But I'd like to know how many... (nt)

[Orangepeel]

11. Oh! I thought you meant "was the poll and accurate reflection"

One cannot get an exact number because not every state requires voters to register by party and some do not even allow it.

But, here is some info:

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from http://www.mysterypollster.com/main/2005/03/realignment_or_.html in 2005

The Pew Research Center survey conducted March 17-21, shows a smaller (but non-significant) shift in the same direction. They currently have Party ID among US adults at 34% Democrat, 30% Republican. The four point edge is slightly higher than in February (32%D-31%R) or compared to their average for 2004 (33%D-30% R) on average throughout 2004.

The Time/SRBI poll conducted March 22-24 showed an eight point Democratic advantage (33%D-26%R), up from a four point advantage measured a week earlier (33%D-29%R March 15-17). The difference, of course, was a statistically insignificant three point drop in Republicans.

The CBS News survey conducted March 28, 2005 showed a five point Democratic edge (32%D-27%R). Although CBS had more independents than usual, the five point Democratic advantage was about the same as on the average of the three surveys conducted with the New York Times in 2005 (35%D-30%R) and the average of all surveys in 2004 (34% D-30% R - click the Complete Results link on the right column of the poll story for full CBS/NYTimes results).

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Here is a Harris Poll from January that says 30 R, 36 D, 22 I (I guess the rest are "some other party")
http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=630
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This is from a Washington Post article from 2004: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7329-2004Jun26.html

Since the waning years of the Reagan administration, or basically since the last periodical cicada mating cycle, the number of "other" voters has proliferated. In the 27 states (plus the District of Columbia) that have been registering voters by party since 1987, the Democratic share has plummeted 8 percentage points, declining from an aggregate total of 51 percent to 43 percent. The Republican share has stayed steady at 33 percent. But the proportion of voters who have not identified themselves with either of the major parties has jumped 8 percentage points, from 16 to 24 percent.

What's impressive about these numbers (at least in the view of political analysts such as me) isn't the phenomenon itself, but its staying power. Myriad polls over the past two decades have shown that voters, when asked to identify themselves politically, divide about one-third Democratic, one-third Republican and one-third independent. But in terms of registration, most have opted for one major party or the other -- perhaps because, in some states, that was the only way they could vote in a party primary. Only recently have registration figures begun to reflect the poll numbers.

[Michael_UK]

12. Thanks - that's great (nt)

[Sparkman]

8. NO Repukes EVER vote for DEMS, but Reagan & Bush43 got Dem votes.

There are way too many ultra Conservatives like Liberman & Feinstein, who are pro-choice and barely tolerate collective barganing, but love gunboat diplomacy and CIA wiretapping and freelance U.S. military gulags overseas and hate election reform.

[ThoughtCriminal]

6. I doubt it occurs to them that fewer people are willing

to admit that they were Republicans these days. Party ID does shift.
:dem:

[Lexingtonian]

7. There's a massive 2005 political polling by Gallup

which I'm too lazy to look up. But it said that in November 31% of voters identified as Republicans and 35% as Democrats. Registration numbers on paper are 34% and 34% or 35% and 35%. But about 20% of nominal Democrats and 10% of nominal Republicans consistently turn up on the "wrong" side in polling matters Bush for the past four or five years.

Basically, party identification is a messy variable- 5-10% of people phoned will identify with the one they like that day, which may or may not be the one they're registered with on paper- for dubious retroactive corrections and largely for identifying that 1 in 15 or 1 in 20 pollings that really deviates too far from the underlying real mean to be published. The accuracy of the method lies in sample size and representative random sampling around the country properly weighted for region. 1,000 tends to typically get within 2%; deviations will largely result from the way questions bias. (ARG 'undecideds' lean to support for Bush, Gallup 'undecideds' lean against Bush, that sort of thing results.)

Personally, I think the various CBS polling numbers other than Bush's, on economic stuff and terrorism and all that, are so close to present consensus numbers that they confirm that the poll is very close to a representative sample. Maybe calling yourself Republican is becoming the mark of a dork among the not-so-swift crowd, and as the not-so-swift the freepi are not picking up on that.