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An Editorial Comment about Polls and Polling…

This last week we saw a number of organizations and candidates release poll results
about the political situation in Connecticut.

One of the most widely quoted was a poll released by Public Policy Polling, a North
Carolina polling firm that utilizes an automated calling system in which those who get a
call respond by selecting their answers using their telephone keypad.

While many “traditional” pollsters are highly critical of this type of polling, I have to say
that they have been pretty accurate, even compared to the more common “live caller”
methodology.

Further down in this post you’ll find a couple of links about the accuracy of this type of
polling, but first a quick summary of the this latest survey.

The Public Policy Polling press release was entitled “Democrats favored for Governor in
CT.” and the poll contains some very good news about how our candidates are doing
compared to the Republican contenders.

The full press release and survey can be found at:


http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_CT_108.pdf

Ned Lamont’s campaign quickly sent out a blast email “Ned leads all GOP candidates!” .
In fact, he does, although it should be noted that Susan and Dan also lead all the GOP
candidates.

According to the PPP release, “Democrats Susan Bysiewicz, Ned Lamont, and Dan
Malloy all lead prospective contests with Republican hopefuls Michael Fedele and Tom
Foley. Bysiewicz appears to be the strongest of the candidates, holding leads of 25 and 22
points over Fedele and Foley respectively. Lamont and Malloy lead by more modest
margins of 10-11 points against the GOP candidates.”

The PPP press release goes on to say “ Bysiewicz and Lamont are both known to slightly
over half of the state’s voters, with the Secretary of State’s favorability breaking down
39/16 and the 2006 Democratic Senate nominee’s coming down at 29/28. They have
similar numbers with Democrats, with 47% having a positive take on Bysiewicz and 46%
seeing Lamont in a good light. Bysiewicz is a good deal more popular with Republicans
and independents though. “

“Democrats haven’t gotten a lot of good news across the country in the last few months
but Connecticut is proving an exception,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy
Polling. “Chris Dodd’s retirement made that seat safe again, and Jodi Rell’s has given the
party a great chance to pick up the Governorship.
Let’s be clear. There are a lot of legitimate questions about how accurate telephone
based polling is these days. With so many people using answering machines and shifting
to cell phones, there is significant debate about whether telephone polls truly reach a
random sample of all voters. These questions are even more relevant when discussed
automated calling surveys.

That said, there is still a lot of evidence that telephone survey’s can still successfully
capture public opinion on the status of political campaigns.

For those of you who are interested, there are some good assessments of the efficacy of
automated polling at the Daily Kos website including the following link.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/5/28/115320/517/626/524140

In addition, check out this other website where they actually went through a complex
process of ranking the accuracy of pollsters and concluded that some of the automated
polls were among the most accurate polling firms of all.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/05/pollster-ratings-v311.html

Polling Firms Ranked by Accuracy of Results:

1. Selzer & Co
2. SurveyUSA (Automated)
3. Rasmussen (Automated)
4. U of New Hampshire
5. Chicago Tribune/Market Shares
6. Field Poll
7. Mason-Dixon
8. Research 2000
9. Quinnipiac
10. Detroit News/Mitchell
11. Ohio Poll/U of Cincinnati
12. Public Policy Polling (automated)
13. Strategic Vision
14. Insider Advantage (automated)
15. Franklin Pierce
16. ABC/Washington Post
17. Zogby
18. EPIC-MRA
19. Farleigh Dickinson
20. Suffolk
21. CNN/Opinion Research
22. LA Times/Bloomberg
23. ARG
24. Fox/Opinion Dynamics
25. Gallup
26. Public Opinion Strategies
27. Star Tribune
28. Marist
29. Franklin & Marshall/Keystone
30. CBS/NY Times
31. Zogby Interactive (Internet)
32. Columbus Dispatch (mail-in poll)

In summary it is certainly appropriate to take any poll, especially those released by a


candidate, with a grain of salt. While Public policy Polling’s most recent poll was, for
example, independently conducted and released, the truth is they are a firm that works
exclusively for Democratic candidates.

That said, these automated polls have a pretty good track record and, most importantly, I
think we can all agree that the results of this latest poll remind us that if we do our work
over the next 10 months we will finally elect a Democratic Governor and can then begin
the process of putting Connecticut back on track.

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