Dem pollsters acknowledge ‘major errors’ in 2020 polling

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still feel deep down that R’s have been stealing elections for years.

And now they are suppressing votes by law

I said so on the first page and I stand by that.

Look at the Q nonsense, the centerpiece charge of which was that there was a cabal of all powerful Democrats who were trading kids around. Turns out there’s a cabal alright, but it’s Republicans. They are all projection. So their continued obsession with alleged election fraud strongly points the finger to them stealing elections across the country. I think 2020 was an absolute blowout win for the Democrats. I think Biden probably won closer to 90 million votes (if not more) and Trump probably closer to 65 million votes (and probably less). I think there is a solid Democratic majority in the Senate and I think we probably won a lot more state elections, too.

Ask yourself: why would the Democratic pollsters all be off? Does that even make sense? Contrary to the childish conservative belief (but I repeat myself) that pollsters want to steer people, they actually want to be as accurate as possible because that’s how pollsters keep a reputation for accuracy and how they stay in business. But if the GOP pollsters are all in on the GOP’s game, they can adjust their polls as necessary.

So this is what the liberal version of Q looks like ^^^. Wow.

Not really.

DP. I'm a Democrat and yeah it is. I love the 90-65 victory. But no evidence. Just because they are paranoid doesn't mean you aren't.

I don’t care if your name is Joe Biden. I’m not paranoid. What I say makes sense. I didn’t claim to have any direct evidence, but seriously. Look at how Republicans far out perform polls and projections. It makes no damn sense; the article even mentions it: “Tuesday’s statement marks the beginning of a years-long process to examine why, since 2012, most major elections have tilted against the party, despite favorable polling data before the vote. Up and down the ballot, Democrats have been, more often than not, shell-shocked by defeats in races they thought to be competitive, or narrower-than-expected, victories in contests they thought they led comfortably.”

How does this even pass the sniff test to you? There were several very close polling Senate races in 2020, specifically Iowa, Maine and North Carolina, in which it was a tossup or even a lean D and the GOP pulled it out? Even famously unpopular and deeply concerned Susan Collins? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_Senate_elections Then look first at the expected vote margins, then the actual outcome. How is it possible that the GOP outperforms the polls all the time? It doesn’t even make sense and I’m tired of people like you looking away saying there’s no evidence when there’s pretty damn good circumstantial evidence. I’m not claiming to be some high-clearance person in the government who is the only one to tell you about a satanic sex cabal in the government. So don’t dismiss me out of hand.

If your sample differs from the population at large, your sample is probably off, not the population.

Exactly this.

+1

Every conservative on here has tried to explain that they would never answer a political poll (for many reasons) and all the liberals just refuse to accept it.

I'm not sure you should be plus-one-ing this because it does not say what you're saying, and pollsters adjust for nonresponse anyway.

The bigger issue is that pollsters might not be capturing the underlying partisan composition of the electorate. In the past decade there's been an uptick in people who self-identify as Independents, but vote straight R anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still feel deep down that R’s have been stealing elections for years.

And now they are suppressing votes by law

I said so on the first page and I stand by that.

Look at the Q nonsense, the centerpiece charge of which was that there was a cabal of all powerful Democrats who were trading kids around. Turns out there’s a cabal alright, but it’s Republicans. They are all projection. So their continued obsession with alleged election fraud strongly points the finger to them stealing elections across the country. I think 2020 was an absolute blowout win for the Democrats. I think Biden probably won closer to 90 million votes (if not more) and Trump probably closer to 65 million votes (and probably less). I think there is a solid Democratic majority in the Senate and I think we probably won a lot more state elections, too.

Ask yourself: why would the Democratic pollsters all be off? Does that even make sense? Contrary to the childish conservative belief (but I repeat myself) that pollsters want to steer people, they actually want to be as accurate as possible because that’s how pollsters keep a reputation for accuracy and how they stay in business. But if the GOP pollsters are all in on the GOP’s game, they can adjust their polls as necessary.

So this is what the liberal version of Q looks like ^^^. Wow.

Not really.

DP. I'm a Democrat and yeah it is. I love the 90-65 victory. But no evidence. Just because they are paranoid doesn't mean you aren't.

I don’t care if your name is Joe Biden. I’m not paranoid. What I say makes sense. I didn’t claim to have any direct evidence, but seriously. Look at how Republicans far out perform polls and projections. It makes no damn sense; the article even mentions it: “Tuesday’s statement marks the beginning of a years-long process to examine why, since 2012, most major elections have tilted against the party, despite favorable polling data before the vote. Up and down the ballot, Democrats have been, more often than not, shell-shocked by defeats in races they thought to be competitive, or narrower-than-expected, victories in contests they thought they led comfortably.”

How does this even pass the sniff test to you? There were several very close polling Senate races in 2020, specifically Iowa, Maine and North Carolina, in which it was a tossup or even a lean D and the GOP pulled it out? Even famously unpopular and deeply concerned Susan Collins? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_Senate_elections Then look first at the expected vote margins, then the actual outcome. How is it possible that the GOP outperforms the polls all the time? It doesn’t even make sense and I’m tired of people like you looking away saying there’s no evidence when there’s pretty damn good circumstantial evidence. I’m not claiming to be some high-clearance person in the government who is the only one to tell you about a satanic sex cabal in the government. So don’t dismiss me out of hand.

If your sample differs from the population at large, your sample is probably off, not the population.

Exactly this.

+1

Every conservative on here has tried to explain that they would never answer a political poll (for many reasons) and all the liberals just refuse to accept it.

I stop calling myself a liberal because of this. I'm still a Democrat but I don't like how the left refuses to admit that they are not the majority and they aren't always right. They are the new Moral Minority, even more insufferable than Jerry Falwell was back in the day.

Um, the Dems (may be not "the Left") are the majority. The Democratic candidate has won the popular vote in 7 of the last 8 presidential elections. On the congressional and state levels, collectively, Democrats have gotten more votes over the last several cycles. The problem for Dems is that their voters are not as geographically spread out as GOP voters. Nonetheless, there are more Democratic voters in the US.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still feel deep down that R’s have been stealing elections for years.

And now they are suppressing votes by law

I said so on the first page and I stand by that.

Look at the Q nonsense, the centerpiece charge of which was that there was a cabal of all powerful Democrats who were trading kids around. Turns out there’s a cabal alright, but it’s Republicans. They are all projection. So their continued obsession with alleged election fraud strongly points the finger to them stealing elections across the country. I think 2020 was an absolute blowout win for the Democrats. I think Biden probably won closer to 90 million votes (if not more) and Trump probably closer to 65 million votes (and probably less). I think there is a solid Democratic majority in the Senate and I think we probably won a lot more state elections, too.

Ask yourself: why would the Democratic pollsters all be off? Does that even make sense? Contrary to the childish conservative belief (but I repeat myself) that pollsters want to steer people, they actually want to be as accurate as possible because that’s how pollsters keep a reputation for accuracy and how they stay in business. But if the GOP pollsters are all in on the GOP’s game, they can adjust their polls as necessary.

So this is what the liberal version of Q looks like ^^^. Wow.

Not really.

DP. I'm a Democrat and yeah it is. I love the 90-65 victory. But no evidence. Just because they are paranoid doesn't mean you aren't.

I don’t care if your name is Joe Biden. I’m not paranoid. What I say makes sense. I didn’t claim to have any direct evidence, but seriously. Look at how Republicans far out perform polls and projections. It makes no damn sense; the article even mentions it: “Tuesday’s statement marks the beginning of a years-long process to examine why, since 2012, most major elections have tilted against the party, despite favorable polling data before the vote. Up and down the ballot, Democrats have been, more often than not, shell-shocked by defeats in races they thought to be competitive, or narrower-than-expected, victories in contests they thought they led comfortably.”

How does this even pass the sniff test to you? There were several very close polling Senate races in 2020, specifically Iowa, Maine and North Carolina, in which it was a tossup or even a lean D and the GOP pulled it out? Even famously unpopular and deeply concerned Susan Collins? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_Senate_elections Then look first at the expected vote margins, then the actual outcome. How is it possible that the GOP outperforms the polls all the time? It doesn’t even make sense and I’m tired of people like you looking away saying there’s no evidence when there’s pretty damn good circumstantial evidence. I’m not claiming to be some high-clearance person in the government who is the only one to tell you about a satanic sex cabal in the government. So don’t dismiss me out of hand.

If your sample differs from the population at large, your sample is probably off, not the population.

Exactly this.

+1

Every conservative on here has tried to explain that they would never answer a political poll (for many reasons) and all the liberals just refuse to accept it.

I stop calling myself a liberal because of this. I'm still a Democrat but I don't like how the left refuses to admit that they are not the majority and they aren't always right. They are the new Moral Minority, even more insufferable than Jerry Falwell was back in the day.

Um, the Dems (may be not "the Left") are the majority. The Democratic candidate has won the popular vote in 7 of the last 8 presidential elections. On the congressional and state levels, collectively, Democrats have gotten more votes over the last several cycles. The problem for Dems is that their voters are not as geographically spread out as GOP voters. Nonetheless, there are more Democratic voters in the US.

I mean specifically the left wing of the Democratic party are insufferable. Or maybe I should just call them the insufferable wing. Like PP, who actually doesn't understand polling but talks down to everyone who disagrees with her anyway. Who makes up statistics, like Biden REALLY won by 90 million to 65 million, so hey look it, was a LANDSLIDE! That's no different than what Trump did. Forgive me for being disgusted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I mean specifically the left wing of the Democratic party are insufferable. Or maybe I should just call them the insufferable wing. Like PP, who actually doesn't understand polling but talks down to everyone who disagrees with her anyway. Who makes up statistics, like Biden REALLY won by 90 million to 65 million, so hey look it, was a LANDSLIDE! That's no different than what Trump did. Forgive me for being disgusted.

Nah, I won’t forgive you for being disgusted, especially when you don’t even understand what I wrote nor will you engage with the meat of it. I’m also not left wing.

I didn’t make up a statistic. I said my guess was that, absent the GOP changing votes, that was probably the actual outcome. You think people stood in line for hours and hours in some locations because they were happy about how things were going? You think that the GOP just magically outperforms the polls in almost all the states they need? Like how in 2016 Trump magically managed to win the swing states he absolutely needed, and just by the margins outside automatic recall?

And if you seriously think that some anonymous poster on the internet sharing her opinions about the real reason for the “Dem pollsters [...] ‘major errors’ is the same thing as the sitting president using the bully pulpit to screech about election fraud and to attempt an autogolpe, just stop calling yourself a Democrat altogether.

I believe I also said that the GOP’s projection about election fraud is one of the thing that advertises to me that they were doing it themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ah. So when someone disagrees with you, you accuse them of “not understanding how polling works.” Never change, arrogant liberal!

But you don’t understand how polling works. You guys literally believe that pollsters will mock you for your beliefs and you imply that they’ll tell all your friends. Plus you think they’re purposely slanting questions and trying to steer how people answer. That’s not polling. You literally don’t understand how polling works. That’s not arrogance. You’re just wrong.

Furthermore:

Your side worked with Russia. Forgive me if I think Russia may have had a direct hand in 2016’s outcome.

I don't think they literally believe it. They are saying that a lot of people are uncomfortable with answering pollsters now and it's messing up data. They don't literally believe a pollster will yell at them, but they just don't trust them. It's a feeling not a factual inference. And not necessarily wrong. Most people won't talk to a pollster at all. Normal behavior now is not to answer polls, so they have to call 100 people to get one participant. That one is not necessarily representative of the 99 who didn't answer.

As for "purposely slanting" this does happen all the time in partisan polls that are released like normal polls. And the sponsors are news orgs like CNN who they also don't trust. How do you know their pollsters are doing it right? You don't really, you just trust that they have a good quality control process. But you can't verify their QC, so you don't really know.

This is part of the breakdown in social trust across society. People don't trust the government, the media, the corporations, the other party, the police, and each other. And they certainly they don't trust people who don't understand what they really mean and instead insult them for what they don't mean.

1. It doesn’t really matter who the sponsors are, because I actually still have a landline and love answering polls. You know who polled me the most? The GOP. You know what else? They don’t tell you till the end who the poll was conducted or sponsored by, so that excuse doesn’t float.
2. If this is a societal problem, why is that only Democratic firms are affected?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean specifically the left wing of the Democratic party are insufferable. Or maybe I should just call them the insufferable wing. Like PP, who actually doesn't understand polling but talks down to everyone who disagrees with her anyway. Who makes up statistics, like Biden REALLY won by 90 million to 65 million, so hey look it, was a LANDSLIDE! That's no different than what Trump did. Forgive me for being disgusted.

Nah, I won’t forgive you for being disgusted, especially when you don’t even understand what I wrote nor will you engage with the meat of it. I’m also not left wing.

I didn’t make up a statistic. I said my guess was that, absent the GOP changing votes, that was probably the actual outcome. You think people stood in line for hours and hours in some locations because they were happy about how things were going? You think that the GOP just magically outperforms the polls in almost all the states they need? Like how in 2016 Trump magically managed to win the swing states he absolutely needed, and just by the margins outside automatic recall?

And if you seriously think that some anonymous poster on the internet sharing her opinions about the real reason for the “Dem pollsters [...] ‘major errors’ is the same thing as the sitting president using the bully pulpit to screech about election fraud and to attempt an autogolpe, just stop calling yourself a Democrat altogether.

I believe I also said that the GOP’s projection about election fraud is one of the thing that advertises to me that they were doing it themselves.

I understood what you perfectly fine. I read it. None of these are reasonable arguments in defense of your points, you just seem utterly convinced they are. And oh so condescending and insulting to those who disagree. Just like Trump's attitude and words. I clearly wasn't accusing you of an autogolpe.

I don't need to engage any of that, because you didn't take statistics 101. If your sample and your population don't match, there is probably something wrong with your sample, not the population. This is very basic science. If you don't get that, there really isn't anything to talk about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH always picks on pollsters who call. He feigns his ability to speak English, asks a million questions to them, and then lies. It’s great fun to listen to! He does the same to telemarketers.

With all the bullying going on everyone just says they vote Democrat. No attacks and no bullying then.
Mass media and social media put pollsters out of a job. The country is not 50/50, its 99% democrat!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ah. So when someone disagrees with you, you accuse them of “not understanding how polling works.” Never change, arrogant liberal!

But you don’t understand how polling works. You guys literally believe that pollsters will mock you for your beliefs and you imply that they’ll tell all your friends. Plus you think they’re purposely slanting questions and trying to steer how people answer. That’s not polling. You literally don’t understand how polling works. That’s not arrogance. You’re just wrong.

Furthermore:

Your side worked with Russia. Forgive me if I think Russia may have had a direct hand in 2016’s outcome.

You’re actually linking to... Peter Strzok... and you expect to be taken seriously?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ah. So when someone disagrees with you, you accuse them of “not understanding how polling works.” Never change, arrogant liberal!

But you don’t understand how polling works. You guys literally believe that pollsters will mock you for your beliefs and you imply that they’ll tell all your friends. Plus you think they’re purposely slanting questions and trying to steer how people answer. That’s not polling. You literally don’t understand how polling works. That’s not arrogance. You’re just wrong.

Furthermore:

Your side worked with Russia. Forgive me if I think Russia may have had a direct hand in 2016’s outcome.

I don't think they literally believe it. They are saying that a lot of people are uncomfortable with answering pollsters now and it's messing up data. They don't literally believe a pollster will yell at them, but they just don't trust them. It's a feeling not a factual inference. And not necessarily wrong. Most people won't talk to a pollster at all. Normal behavior now is not to answer polls, so they have to call 100 people to get one participant. That one is not necessarily representative of the 99 who didn't answer.

As for "purposely slanting" this does happen all the time in partisan polls that are released like normal polls. And the sponsors are news orgs like CNN who they also don't trust. How do you know their pollsters are doing it right? You don't really, you just trust that they have a good quality control process. But you can't verify their QC, so you don't really know.

This is part of the breakdown in social trust across society. People don't trust the government, the media, the corporations, the other party, the police, and each other. And they certainly they don't trust people who don't understand what they really mean and instead insult them for what they don't mean.

+1,000,000
THANK YOU. Finally, a normal, intelligent person. The deliberately obtuse are beyond exhausting, especially when they think they’re incredibly clever. They are anything but.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean specifically the left wing of the Democratic party are insufferable. Or maybe I should just call them the insufferable wing. Like PP, who actually doesn't understand polling but talks down to everyone who disagrees with her anyway. Who makes up statistics, like Biden REALLY won by 90 million to 65 million, so hey look it, was a LANDSLIDE! That's no different than what Trump did. Forgive me for being disgusted.

Nah, I won’t forgive you for being disgusted, especially when you don’t even understand what I wrote nor will you engage with the meat of it. I’m also not left wing.

I didn’t make up a statistic. I said my guess was that, absent the GOP changing votes, that was probably the actual outcome. You think people stood in line for hours and hours in some locations because they were happy about how things were going? You think that the GOP just magically outperforms the polls in almost all the states they need? Like how in 2016 Trump magically managed to win the swing states he absolutely needed, and just by the margins outside automatic recall?

And if you seriously think that some anonymous poster on the internet sharing her opinions about the real reason for the “Dem pollsters [...] ‘major errors’ is the same thing as the sitting president using the bully pulpit to screech about election fraud and to attempt an autogolpe, just stop calling yourself a Democrat altogether.

I believe I also said that the GOP’s projection about election fraud is one of the thing that advertises to me that they were doing it themselves.

JFC. DP here. You are - by far - one of the most arrogant posters I’ve seen here in a long time. When people disagree with you, you continue to pretend they “don’t understand” and “won’t engage”. Engage with what? Your completely fictionalized account of what went down in 2020? What a joke. You’re welcome to your crazy conspiracy theories, but when called out on how stupid they are, don’t smugly pretend you’re just too smart for everyone else. You’re making a fool of yourself - repeatedly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ah. So when someone disagrees with you, you accuse them of “not understanding how polling works.” Never change, arrogant liberal!

But you don’t understand how polling works. You guys literally believe that pollsters will mock you for your beliefs and you imply that they’ll tell all your friends. Plus you think they’re purposely slanting questions and trying to steer how people answer. That’s not polling. You literally don’t understand how polling works. That’s not arrogance. You’re just wrong.

Furthermore:

Your side worked with Russia. Forgive me if I think Russia may have had a direct hand in 2016’s outcome.

I don't think they literally believe it. They are saying that a lot of people are uncomfortable with answering pollsters now and it's messing up data. They don't literally believe a pollster will yell at them, but they just don't trust them. It's a feeling not a factual inference. And not necessarily wrong. Most people won't talk to a pollster at all. Normal behavior now is not to answer polls, so they have to call 100 people to get one participant. That one is not necessarily representative of the 99 who didn't answer.

As for "purposely slanting" this does happen all the time in partisan polls that are released like normal polls. And the sponsors are news orgs like CNN who they also don't trust. How do you know their pollsters are doing it right? You don't really, you just trust that they have a good quality control process. But you can't verify their QC, so you don't really know.

This is part of the breakdown in social trust across society. People don't trust the government, the media, the corporations, the other party, the police, and each other. And they certainly they don't trust people who don't understand what they really mean and instead insult them for what they don't mean.

1. It doesn’t really matter who the sponsors are, because I actually still have a landline and love answering polls. You know who polled me the most? The GOP. You know what else? They don’t tell you till the end who the poll was conducted or sponsored by, so that excuse doesn’t float.
2. If this is a societal problem, why is that only Democratic firms are affected?

Ah, this explains so much. You love to answer polls. And so you think everyone else should, too. You seem lonely, so I imagine you would look forward to those chats with pollsters.
DP

[Anonymous]

When people just flat out refuse or lie, yes, polls can be skewed. The weighting process tries to account for this, but as I said previously, that is an imperfect science. It is a guesstimate of actual population that the pollsters then use to weight the sample of respondents.

But, again, reputable pollsters do their absolute best to remove bias from their questions.

Take the time to read through the poll questions every once in a while to understand this.

For the most part, the major networks/news channels are linked with reputable pollsters. They do sometimes do flash internet poll questions that are NOT part of a public polling effort and don’t fit this mold. Know the difference.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When people just flat out refuse or lie, yes, polls can be skewed. The weighting process tries to account for this, but as I said previously, that is an imperfect science. It is a guesstimate of actual population that the pollsters then use to weight the sample of respondents.

But, again, reputable pollsters do their absolute best to remove bias from their questions.

Take the time to read through the poll questions every once in a while to understand this.

For the most part, the major networks/news channels are linked with reputable pollsters. They do sometimes do flash internet poll questions that are NOT part of a public polling effort and don’t fit this mold. Know the difference.

Yes, they do try be accurate, but they are having more and more trouble getting it to work. There is more than one reason this may be happening, but the bottom line is that we should assume polls are less reliable in the past and not assume that election fraud is increasing.

[Anonymous]

It boggles my mind that anyone would waste their time participating in a poll. Why?

[Anonymous]

The problem was not the polling as much as it was the assumptions in their turnout models. They adjust the raw polling data to the demographics and geography of their projections of turnout. They assumed that 2016 maxed out the rural white vote for Trump but millions more turned out in 2020. Democrats also had much higher turnout and flipped a lot of suburbs and that helped Biden win states but did not help Democratic House candidates in non-urban districts. Generally, every county in America voted pretty much as expected but some areas had more total votes than expected. The only real misses in the polling were the Florida Cuban-Americans and the SW Texas Hispanics who liked Trump better in 2020 than in 2016.