A group of polls from the Big 10 Battleground Poll
came out today. They show nearly every state in the Midwest to be a tossup:
Illinois – Obama + 16
Indiana – McCain + 4
Iowa – Tie
Michigan – Obama + 4
Minnesota – Obama + 2
Ohio – Obama + 1
Pennsylvania – Tie
Wisconsin – Obama + 1
I found myself saying, "Huh??" Then I spent the rest of the afternoon looking at the internals as much as possible.
Here’s what I found.
GENDER
In nearly every state the Big Ten polls over-represent men and under-represent women.
Male/Female Ratios
Illinois – 49.6/50.4
Indiana – 48.4/51.6
Iowa – 46.6/51.4
Michigan – 51.8/48.2
Minnesota – 49.7/50.3
Ohio – 50.9-49.1
Pennsylvania – 50.1/49.9
Wisconsin – 49.8/50.2
In the 2004 presidential election the number of women who reported voting
was 67.3 million to 58.5 million. That’s a 46.5/53.5 ratio – a seven-point difference. This self-reported figure is nearly identical to the 2004 exit polls which gave a ration of 46/54 – an eight-point difference. Significantly more women have voted than men in every presidential election since 1964.
The closest any of the Big 10 polls come is a 3.2 difference in Indiana. All the other polls are roughly even. This is nothing short of a stunning fault in the polls. Obama has consistently polled stronger among women; therefore the poll results under-report Obama’s strength in every state.
RACE
African American Respondents vs. % of Population
Illinois – 10.0% / 15.0%
Indiana – 4.8% / 8.9%
Iowa – 0.9% / 2.5%
Michigan – 8.4% / 14.3%
Minnesota – 1.9% / 4.5%
Ohio – 6.7% / 12.0%
Pennsylvania – 5.0% / 10.7%
Wisconsin – Not listed
UPDATE - Wisconsin last pages now available - 3.2% / 6.0%
Is it just me – or am I hallucinating? I mean, no, I never got a tenure track position, but "Holy Toledo!" I would certainly make sure my sample reflected the racial composition of the electorate in this election of all elections. If the authors of this survey have a model that shows conclusively why African Americans will vote at half their percentage of the population, then they should have presented it in the analysis of the results. Otherwise, this suggests to me that the results are clearly worthless.
SPECIAL TREAT
Wisconsin –
Primary Vote Breakdown
Dem – 51%
GOP – 34%
N/A – 15%
The Wisconsin primary had roughly 1,100,000 Democratic voters and 400,000 Republican voters. So either the sample is skewed or a lot of Republicans lied about voting in the primary. I'm sure there are more doozies like this.
Folks, we have to get the word out that this set of polls is HIGHLY suspect. You can Google "Big 10 Battleground" and find all kinds of news outlets already spouting the company line that the Midwestern states are all tossups. Faculty at major Big 10 universities came up with this. I am going to watch my DVD of "Casablanca" because I am shocked, simply shocked.