[lbo-talk] Poll: Lieberman Surging

[Michael Hoover]

On 8/7/06, Gar Lipow <the.typo.boy at gmail.com> wrote:
> No - Connecticut is one of those sensible states where you have to
> register for a party to vote in its  primary.  Further the deadline to
> switch from Republican to  Democrat was some time ago - May I think.
> However Independents were allowed to switch  to Democrat  at the last
> moment, and Lieberman is popular among  Independents.  Also, all these
> polls are  fairly meaningless except as they show a trend.   They
> depend on likely voter models, and it is extremely hard to predict who
> will vote in a primary - especially one that the media starts paying
> attention to at the last minunte.   Obviously what the polls show
> about the trend is important (to those interested in the contest I
> mean) - that a long term trend against Lieberman has been at least
> partially reveresed.  We'll know  Tuesday. I suspect the election will
> be close,  but no one really  knows..  I will note that last week when
> everyone was talking about 13 point leads, Lamont's staff  was leaking
> info that this was way overstated - that their internal polling
> consistently showed a lead within the margin of error.
<<<<<>>>>>

not sure that any primaries are sensible although closed type - used
in 27 states - does the least to weaken the role of political parties,
of course, "not-so-progressive" era advocates of primaries were
precisely interested in weakening them...

primaries are major contributor to 'candidate-centered' electoral
process in which political 'entrepreneurs' seek office on their own...

re. primary polling, samples tend to exaggerate percentage of likely
voters because pollster screening is generally inadequate, little
matter of financial cost...

re primary voters, party wings are overly represented in turnout,
thus, in outcomes...   mh