At 11:45 AM 9/23/2004, Michael Pollak wrote:
>On Thu, 23 Sep 2004, Seth Ackerman wrote:
>
>>I understand why a bad LV screen would give a skewed finding.
>>But why would Gallup consistently get so many Republicans in their RV
>>sample? Is there some reason why Republicans are more likely to answer
>>the phone when Gallup calls?
>
><... snipping a great response to save k-wattage>
>Bottom line: no idea. But if our assumptions about the basic distribution
>of party ID are right -- and I think they are -- then these samples are
>off. How they got that way is an interesting question.
>
>Michael
I asked this question awhile ago, hoping Doug would post it to AAPOR.
Republicans claimed that the slight Kerry post-convention bounce was due to the fact that it was weekend polling. In the words of one Rush Limbaugh fan:
"Not only that, but weekend polling is not usually done because it's so hard to get a representative sample . . . Republicans go away for the weekend more, so polling will get more Democrats . . . so it's really worse than it looks."
I wanted to know if there was a basis for this claim.
It may simply be that the Republicans GOTV campaigns have been massively successful. They've invested a ton of resources in this and, if I'm remembering correctly, their efforts are mainly on the order of getting their minions to get other people in their circle to register republican and vote. That includes working through evangelical churches. I think an article on that topic was posted here. The strongarming of the Busheviks was so vile that a few churches were annoyed.
Also, they're doing massive voter registration drives a sporting events. Local station aired a piece on it this weekend.
I've said this before. Dem supporters will involve themselves in things like ACT here in limpdick. We get people to register who tend to vote Democratic. These people are obviously pushed out of the sample: they are working second shift (or just plain working); they don't speak English; they are too b usy; they don't have a phone or only use a cell phone.
That could account for the disparity. Or, it could mean that they didn't register as Democrats. When I used to register people to vote for NYPIRG, we used to canvas in the neighborhoods with the lowest rates of voter registration. All these poor folk would sign up, eyeball us, and then inform us, defiantly, that they were registering Republican.
So, I really don't know either but I wouldn't assume that there hasn't been an increase in the numbers of Republicans. (and I know Michael's not saying this either). What will matter is: where do they live. Internals help us with that question.
Kelley
"We're in a fucking stagmire."
--Little Carmine, 'The Sopranos'