I like electoral-vote the best out of the various EC sites I've seen. But as an illustration, yesterday the number was 269 Kerry, 253 Bush. A week ago it was something like 311 Bush, 173 Kerry.

That's why polls are fun, but meaningless. Most of these counts swing on margins of 1% or 2% — in any case well within the margin of error.

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Man up.

A single poll is not going to tell you who is going to win the election, but does provide a picture of how the race is going at that point in time. This information is valuable to candidates and helps to guide their campaigns. Polling data is quite worthy of discussion, and should not be eschewed simply because the #'s will change constantly before November.

To say polling data is meaningless is like saying 97% of a football game is meaningless because any team has the possibility of winning the game in the last two minutes.

No, they're not TOTALLY meaningless, but in a race this tight, they might as well be. All you can really say is "this state is close, this state isn't." In many of those states, trying to pick a winner is a fool's game.

To totally mangle your analogy: In a football game, at least you know what the exact score is, how much time is left on the clock, and the field position. And other than injury, unexpected outside events aren't likely to throw a wrench in things.

A pollster trying to determine the outcome of the game wouldn't be watching the game; he'd be asking the audience who they thought was going to win. He wouldn't know the field position or exact score, and his polling results would vary depending on which section of the stadium he polled, since he'd occasionally stray into a section crammed with fans of one side or the other. Further, he'd totally miss the opinion of the people who have left their seats to get some food or go to the bathroom.

Talk about polls for the fun of it; just don't place very much faith or importance on them. Me, I generally find talking about them a waste of time and bandwidth.

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Man up.

I guess I have to spell it out for you?

Whenever there are polls showing Kerry ahead, the wingnuts say that polls are worthless...and whenever there are polls showing the opposite, the Democrats say that polls are worthless....

This polls showed Kerry doing well which would mean that the brownshirts would say that polls mean nothing....

I hope that clears up any confusion...

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The last time this country mixed politics with religion, people got burned at the stake.

So I am a "brownshirt" now? I will have you know that my family has 3 living members who fought the real "brownshirts" my family has EIGHT memebrs who DIED fighting them... My wife's family has a man who served in the 442nd and liberated Rome... My Wife's family had a woman who bolstered morale in internment camps by organizing and writing a newspaper...

Call me a brownshirt again....

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I was banned from godlike productions... and loved it.

And in a political election we know what the speeches are, how the candidates react to current events, their stated positions on issues. Like election cycles, football games are very unpredictable. Other than injury, there are many "unexpected outside events likely to throw a wrench in things" including kick/punt returns, interceptions, fumbles, penalites, player mistakes, etc.

Okay, now you're making a completely different analogy than what I was using. This analogy doesn't work because it's not the audience's job to determine the winner, as it is in an election. A better analogy would be polling of viewers over a season of American Idol to try to predict who the audience will vote to win at the end of the season.

I was saying that interpreting polling data is like watching a football game. While it is impossible to predict with 100% certaintly who will win the game up until the last few second, you often have a good idea based on past performance and how well the teams have been playing. Likewise, the polling "score" may go up and down with time, but you can certainly get a feel for who has the momentum, what "plays" are working, etc.

I'm not going to say polls are completely accurate -- that's why there's a margin of error. Many polls (e.g. Zogby) correct for your problem of polling too many fans of one team over the other by weighting the scores based on actual proportions observed in the previous election. The polls that don't do this are the ones that had Bush leading by double digits, meaning their sample either had a higher proportion of Republicans than actually exists, or that there are more Republicans now than there were in 2000.

I still don't see why. They surely aren't perfect, but they're really the only way to assess how well a candidate is doing at any given time.

In your first quote you are saying that the polls should be believed. In teh second you are saying they should not be believed.

"Spelling it out" for me doesnt do me any good if you keep changing the spelling. Consistency seems to be completely foreign to you.

I for one have never said that polls dont mean anything. Not even once. Polls are good for getting a feel for current opinion. I've never said otherwise.

Lighten up Frances....

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The last time this country mixed politics with religion, people got burned at the stake.

I really do not appreciate that TB... the worst i call anyone person here is "liberal"... Calling me a brownshirt is an outright insult to my heritage, my family, and their loss to further others freedom from brownshirts...

I really do not appreciate it...

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I was banned from godlike productions... and loved it.

..but know this..

My immediate family, in Great Britain suffered through the Blitz, and all of my great uncles and BOTH grandfathers fought in WW II....I appreciate the sacrifices that you and yours have made, but do not EVER think you can lecture me on what is or isn't appropriate when it comes to fighting facists or their ilk...

If you think the phrase was out of order fair enough..that was not the intent..

TB

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The last time this country mixed politics with religion, people got burned at the stake.