McCain’s strategy paying poll dividends
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Published September 8th, 2008
The Obama campaign expected a huge bump in the polls following his “rock star” appearance in Denver less than two weeks ago - that expectation landed in a thud after the announcement of Gov. Sarah Palin the day after his speech and last week’s GOP convention.
According to the most recent USA Today/Gallup Poll the only campaign surging is John McCain’s.
McCain leads Democrat Barack Obama by 50%-46% among registered voters.
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McCain leads Obama by 54%-44% among those seen as most likely to vote.
Quite a turnaround from expectations.
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McCain’s timing on Palin was excellent, it certainly sucked the attention away from the Dem convention and deflated any convention bounce they would have otherwise gotten.
There tends to be a lot of variation if i recall in those 3-day polls, i’ll be curious to see if the bounce lasts any sustained amount of time.
JH - just curious and I’m not trying to pry, but exactly how many of those 3-day polls have you commissioned for political candidates? What experience on variation are you recalling? A three day poll is probably the best actually because while a poll is merely a snapshot of voter sentiment, at least the lens is open for three days and not two or one. There is less room for timing a poll to get a pre-determined answer in this format.
NJR, thats sounds logical. By stretching a polls period, you could somewhat counteract the effect of daily fluctuations.
However, I don’t have to have acted in an Uwe Boll movie to tell you they suck, nor do you have to commission a poll to see some rough results. No, I am not nor have i ever claimed to be a pollster or a savant on the subject. But i have dug through some of the raw poll summaries available (from electoral-vote.com and elsewhere), and IIRC the USA Today/Gallup poll is a 3 day poll, and i also seem to remember seeing that poll bounce around a little. If I’m wrong please feel free to correct me.