Their Masters’ Voices
By Mitch Berg
The new MPR/Humphrey Poll shows Dayton at 38, Emmer at 27 and Horner at 16.
Fishy? Oh, yeah; Brauer writes at MinnPost:
One of the wacky things about the 750-voter, landline-only, five-day survey is how much partisan ID shifted in just a month. August’s poll was 46 percent GOP, 41 percent Democrat — the only major survey with a Republican plurality. This one is 48 percent Dem, 38 percent GOP.
Humphrey Institute Prof. Larry Jacobs ascribes this to renewed DFL enthusiasm.
At the risk of being accused of Pauline Kael syndrome – what DFL enthusiasm?
At the risk of being called a cynic, I’d say Jacobs has a bit of a chicken-and-egg issue here. The poll is here – again, this is an accused cynic talking – to boost that enthusiasm.
However, the dramatic shift will inflame the doubters, particularly GOP partisans, whose rightest wing generally regards the HHH poll as the junior member of a Strib-led pro-DFL Gruesome Twosome.
Well, that’s cutting it a bit finely. We can be more broad than that. The HHH, the Strib and MPR are all pr0-DFL – or at least pro-big-government – institutions. Whether by accident or design, their polling operations reflect their institutions’ biases and, at this point of the election.
This demands a little more discussion of how the poll determines likely voters, a topic I broached the other day.
Why yes. Yes, it does.
UPDATE: Look – the logical side of my brain says “these numbers, and those in the MNPoll, do not, no way, no how, pass the stench test”.
The not-so-logical, inductive side of my brain is the part filling in the rest. Which isn’t to say I don’t think there’s something to it.
UPDATE 2: Welcome Politics in Minnesota reader!
September 29th, 2010 at 7:42 am
The lefty media has made Larry Jacobs is now the de-facto expert on politics in MN. I wonder how many kool aid drinkers they had to go through to pick him out of the cesspool?
September 29th, 2010 at 7:43 am
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by mitchpberg, Andy Aplikowski. Andy Aplikowski said: RT @mitchpberg: MPR Poll: More conveniently-timed bad methodology. http://bit.ly/dzjOe7 #stribpol #mn2010 #InTheBagMedia DFL needs a … […]
September 29th, 2010 at 8:36 am
Give yourself some credit. At least now MinnPost is questioning the sample and wondering if there is something out of whack here.
bh429 – What, you expected them to get feedback from Ed Morrissey, Mitch or a PowerLine guy? Larry Jacobs gives them an answer that allows them to be comfortable in their bias. You wouldn’t want them to be uncomfortable now would you?
September 29th, 2010 at 8:43 am
I’m sure Jacobs is 100% correct. Here’s a portrait of unity and enthusiasm among the Democrats:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39404640/ns/politics-white_house/
September 29th, 2010 at 8:43 am
Seflores,
Good yuks!
Yes, God forbid that they would get BOTH sides of the issue.
September 29th, 2010 at 9:09 am
Mr D – Read that this morning as well. Hmm, condescending pri, er, progressives don’t like being condescended to.
September 29th, 2010 at 9:17 am
Humphrey Institute Prof. Larry Jacobs ascribes this to renewed DFL enthusiasm.
More like DFL desperation and panic.
UPDATE 2: Welcome Politics in Minnesota reader!
Amusingly, it sounds like I could respond “All one of them, huh?”
September 29th, 2010 at 9:28 am
Jacobs suffers from the disease of liberalism, it’s true; but he’s not stupid. He has to know this makes a mockery of his lifes work (even tin-foil chapeau wearers like Brauer don’t buy it), but he did it any way.
What’s that say?
IMO, the Democrat party sees a real tsunami headed it’s way this time. They’re going to lose in November, and lose big, to a group that not only talks conservative, but has the conservative fire in their bellies.
They know that Emmer really means what he says, and they’re scared as hell. All bets are off.
September 29th, 2010 at 9:42 am
They know that Emmer really means what he says, and they’re scared as hell. All bets are off.
I agree, Swiftee — I’ve noticed that the DFL has been very quiet this month. I expect a crap storm of epic proportions coming soon. Some of the local candidates in my area are concerned about what the DFL might do. I expect a lot of very nasty lit drops, at a minimum.
September 29th, 2010 at 9:48 am
I posted my take on the polls, Obama’s negative rating and the media’s impact at Anti-Strib yesterday:
http://www.anti-strib.com/blog/the-hangover-is-kicking-in.html#readmore
I don’t want to take up Mitch’s valuable comment space pasting it in here.
September 29th, 2010 at 10:31 am
I wonder, what exactly is the mechanism that would explain the dual — and significant — change of party identification from Democrat to Republican in the last month, coincidental with the surge for Horner (independents stayed about the same). Hard to imagine that many people could decide they aren’t Democrats claim to vote IP, unless they’re confused about which party Horner is in (which is what the DFL and local media is aiming for).
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2010/08/31-mn-governors-race-poll/
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2010/09/29-mn-governors-race-poll/
September 29th, 2010 at 10:32 am
…er, there should have been an “and” between “Democrats” and “claim”…
September 29th, 2010 at 5:31 pm
The methodology of the poll is interesting. This is a poll of “likely voters”. According to MPR, this is determined by a model based on four factors:
If the people polled are truly a random sample, the number of people who voted in the 2006 gubernatorial election had to have been the same as the earlier poll. That means the “likely voter” Dayton number was higher because of the other three factors — whether the interviewee was more likely to be registered to vote than in the earlier poll (probably not a big change), and two highly subjective measures — whether the interviewee expressed a greater interest in the election and whether they intended to vote.
I wouldn’t say that the methodology is necessarily bad, but it seems to put an awful lot of weight on self-reported intention to vote, and modeling this correctly versus actual votes on election day has never been easy.
September 29th, 2010 at 8:28 pm
All this poll stuff aside… where the heck is Emmer’s campaign? I barely know he’s alive, from the lack of media.
September 29th, 2010 at 8:32 pm
As the DFL controlled media wishes.
July 15th, 2014 at 9:39 am
[…] polls on the Minnesota governor’s race; the risible Minnesota poll, the oddly-disconnected Humphrey Institute Poll, the Rasmussen Poll (which may or may not have overpolled Republicans, as opposed to the MN and HHH […]