Rasmussen

leaningright said:
Simple question:

Is Rasmussen a right-leaning polling group?
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Yes and no. As a general matter, their likely voter model is much more favorable to Republicans than Democrats. However, as elections near, they change their likely voter model to get accurate results.
 
There findings are always leaning to the right compared to most of the others.

That says alot
 
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NigelTufnel said:
Yes and no. As a general matter, their likely voter model is much more favorable to Republicans than Democrats. However, as elections near, they change their likely voter model to get accurate results.
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I'd say this is rather accurate.
 
Rasmussen himself is pretty right wing. And the firm does a lot of polls that seem designed pretty much only to lend credence to his right-wing populist ideology.

In the generic congressional ballot they're usually an outlier, but they posted election polls that were pretty consistent with everyone else.
 
I would say that they tend to oversample conservatives and Republicans on issue polls, but it is hard to claim that their electoral polls of likely voters is not the most accurate at predicting elections.
 
NigelTufnel said:
Yes and no. As a general matter, their likely voter model is much more favorable to Republicans than Democrats. However, as elections near, they change their likely voter model to get accurate results.
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LOL you pulled that out of your ass? Do you by chance have source for this wisdom?
 
tinfoil said:
LOL you pulled that out of your ass? Do you by chance have source for this wisdom?
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Yes, I do. Scott Rasmussen:

First of all, we actually do have something in our daily presidential tracking poll that says that it's likely voters not adults, and we we do have a link to a page that explains something about the differences, maybe not as concisely or as articulate as I will say here...

There's a challenge to defining a likely voter. The process is a little different than in the week before an election for us than it is in two months before an election than it is in a year before an election. And to give a little history, normally if you would go do a sample of all adults, you go and interview whoever picks up the phone and you model your population sample to the population at large. When you begin to sample for likely voters you do it by asking a series of screening questions.

At this point in time, we use a fairly loose screening process, in the sense that we don't ask details about how certain you are to vote in a particular election next November. In fact, even the term "likely voters" is probably not the best term. I used to use the phrase "high propensity voters," because it was suggesting that these people who were most likely to show up in a typical mid-term election. We're not claiming this is a particular model of who will show up in 2010. When we used the phrase, "high propensity voters" -- I got a bunch of journalists who wrote back saying, "what does that mean?" I tried to explain it and they said, "oh you mean likely voters." So I finally just gave up.

Now for us [what] happens is that from this point in time, from now until Labor Day right before the election we will continue to use this model. These are people who are generally likely to show up in a mid-term election. When we get closer to the election, we add additional screens based on their interest in the election and their certainty of voting in this particular race and so the number does get more precise.

What does it mean in practical terms? Rasmussen Reports and Gallup are the only two polls out there with a daily tracking poll of the President's job approval. If you go back from January 20th on, most of the time you will see that Gallup's reported number is about three or four or five points higher than ours, because these are surveys and there is statistical noise. Sometimes the gap is bigger, sometimes its smaller. In fact there are some days when our number is a little bit higher than Gallup's. But typically, the gap between the adults and the likely voter sample is in the four or five point range.

The reason: Likely voters are less likely to include young adults, people who [as] Tom mentioned were very supportive of the President. They are less likely to include minority voters who are, again, very strongly supportive of this President. And so the gap is consistent.

Now I would explain that, at this point and time, it's a little like the difference between measuring something in inches or in meters, inches or in centimeters: the trends are the same in both cases, the implications are the same in both instances. And, by the way, the ultimate answers are that Republicans strongly disapprove of this President, Democrats strongly approve of this President, and independent voters have grown a little bit disenchanted, but they're not anywhere near the level of discontent that Republicans show. And that's true whether you measure it with likely voters or adults.
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Good enough for you?



http://www.pollster.com/blogs/so_whats_a_likely_voter_answer.php
 
OK, I only asked this question because I heard Keith Olberman mention the "right leaning Rasmussen polls" the other night. I remember in '00 and in '04 and again in '08 they were about as accurate a poll that I looked at during the presidential elections. I just wanted some views of the people on the board here. Basically what it comes down to seems to be:

1. The more liberal you are the righter Rasmussen leans, in your eyes.
2. The more conservative you are the more reliable Rasmussen appears, in your eyes.
3. So there is no wonder that Olberman speaks of them with a disdainful tone.

Nigeltufnel gave a pretty good description of Rasmussen, IMO.
 
leaningright said:
OK, I only asked this question because I heard Keith Olberman mention the "right leaning Rasmussen polls" the other night. I remember in '00 and in '04 and again in '08 they were about as accurate a poll that I looked at during the presidential elections. I just wanted some views of the people on the board here. Basically what it comes down to seems to be:

1. The more liberal you are the righter Rasmussen leans, in your eyes.
2. The more conservative you are the more reliable Rasmussen appears, in your eyes.
3. So there is no wonder that Olberman speaks of them with a disdainful tone.

Nigeltufnel gave a pretty good description of Rasmussen, IMO.
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I don't know very much about the various pollsters but my impression has been the Ramussen polls lean right and Zogby's polls lean left. It would be interesting to see if you get a similar response asking the same question with Zogby. In a way you already see with someone on the left, Mott, claiming Zogby more accurate and Damo refuting it.
 
cawacko said:
I don't know very much about the various pollsters but my impression has been the Ramussen polls lean right and Zogby's polls lean left. It would be interesting to see if you get a similar response asking the same question with Zogby. In a way you already see with someone on the left, Mott, claiming Zogby more accurate and Damo refuting it.
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That's not even really the point so much as likely voters traditionally lean right and Rasmussen takes great pains to poll only likely voters.
 
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