Personally, I don’t see how any polling in Ohio can be accurate at this point.
I would bet that nearly 80% of the Ohio population cringes when their phone rings and only those who do not have caller ID actually answer calls from people they don’t know. Of the calls that are accidentally answered, I bet at least 50% hang up as soon as they realize that it is yet another political call. I keep telling myself that there is just one more month to survive… but, I am personally starting to fantasize about going on a shooting spree against pollsters and anyone who wants a donation to anything at all for any reason.
I don’t care if orphaned children are saving kittens from burning buildings in the hope that I’ll vote for <insert your candidate here>. Just tell me where they’re at and I’ll gladly throw a gallon of gasoline on them if that is what it takes to make them stop calling.
Very funny post. I had wondered how spending hundreds of millions of dollars in a dozen or fewer states would translate with the real Americans who would be bombarded by ads, calls, emails, campaign junk mail, etc. Sounds like “fatigue” might begin to describe it.
I am very much past ‘fatigue’… Fatique was in July. Now, I’m verging on psychopathic? When I see phone banks on the news casts… I really want to break into them and spray the place down with skunk urine. I pray every night that all those patriots are struck with never ending boils on their butts and that their children all become activists for something they absolutely hate.
The short answer, which you can observe by scrolling down on the right to the state maps, and then, below them, the state-by-state analysis, is that Nate Silver gives Obama a 76% chance in Ohio. I don’t remember what the percentage was last week, but, no - Ohio is not back in play. Obama still has a 75% prediction to win the election overall, and has a predicted lead of 70-ish votes in the Electoral College. Virginia is solidly for Obama and NC solidly for Romney.
Florida, otoh, has become virtually a tie. It was never as strong for Obama as Ohio was and now it’s about 51-49 % in Obama’s favor. Not sure what will happen there, but even if it flips for Romney, Florida alone won’t win it for him.
What kind of a weird Twilight-Zone alternate universe must you inhabit that a state like Ohio, which RCP, CNN, MSNBC, and the NY Times all label a “toss up,” “is not and will not be in play?”
The universe where the media needs a horse race to entice readership.
The answer to the OP is still ‘No’. Especially now that a court has ruled against their partisan hack of a Secretary of State who tried unsuccessfully to disenfranchise Democratic voters, and reinstated early voting for all Ohioans and not just members of the military. If you think Democrats aren’t fired up and ready to go to take Ohio away from these craven political actors, you’re living in a universe far outside of the Ohio reality.
Yes. Silver’s gut feeling that Romney might be a point or two better, overall, than his model shows is not the same thing as saying that the specific statistical model for Ohio is 26% points off.
Also, Silver’s statement on the 7th that his gut feeling that Romney’s numbers were slightly better is contradicted by his observation on 8th that in fact Romney’s numbers seem to be fading.
As has been explained to you before, Silver’s mathematical model includes each of those individual polls, and many more.
Yes. Phone rings several times a day and we never pick up.
As for in play, anecdotal observation of lawn signage puts Romney up at least 3-to-1 in southwest Ohio.
Demographics. In order for a state to vote Republican, it needs enough hayseeds, rednecks, hillbillies, or bible thumpers. It may have some of each, but not enough for a Republican win. That plus the fact that there are a lot of auto industry workers that owe their livelihood to Obama and remember full well how Romney wanted the US auto industry to die.
The answer to the OP is really the big one that I’d imagine both campaigns are trying to ascertain. I’d imagine that the Obama and Romney teams each already have a grasp on the effects of the debate in Ohio due to their internal polling, but we won’t know until some public polls come out this week.
Romney CANNOT win the election if he doesn’t get Ohio. My own gut feeling (since we’re talking about those now) is that Romney’s good debate showing could not possibly close the deficit that he had been contending with in that state. We’ll see.
I have to step over a pile of pollsters every morning just to get to my car. I don’t know who the hell out there is actually answering the phone but it ain’t me.
I have no idea what this means for polling data, but wanted to chime in as another Ohioan who would rather shove a sharp object into her eye than answer the phone right now.
Silver’s statistical model shows a three percentage point lead in Ohio. The probability of Romney winning in Ohio is 1 in 4 according to his numbers right now. To me, a 25% chance does not qualify as “not in play.” It’s not likely, but it’s hardly very unlikely, either. I’d wait to see some more recent polling data from that state before I’d declare it “out of play.”
And yet … Bush won it twice. Do you really think Ohio’s demographics have shifted so much in the last eight years that it’s no longer possible for a Republican to win the state?
The proportion of voters who are non-college graduate whites is decreasing. Add to that the number of people who owe their livelihood to Obama’s saving of the US auto industry. Ohio may never vote red again.