Before I go to sleep, I would like to congratulate Survey USA for their pin point accuracy on Super-Tuesday. Survey USA did an extremely good job and they hit the bull eyes on many races they polled and of course the most important one California.
Before the results came in to prove us wrong, here are what experts, pundits, including myself were saying about the huge discrepancy between Survey USA poll which gave Clinton a +10 advantage and that of Zogby which gave Obama a +13 advantage in California:
Zogby has a 16% turnout for Latino this is much closer to what the expert from California reasoned.I don't expect Obama to win by 13 % but he will win around 5-8%
Of course I was wrong on both counts. Hillary win by the exact 10% margin Survey USA predicted and the Latino turnout was 29% almost the exact 27% they predicted compared to the Zogby's 16% projection which I deemed more accurate at the time
Other experts blew it too. Here's what the Plank had to say :
About Those Dueling California PollsAs you might have seen elsewhere, the two new California polls out today show wildly diverging results: Zogby has Obama up 49-36, while SurveyUSA has Clinton up 52-42. As Josh Marshall says, somebody's gonna end up looking pretty stupid. Most likely they both will--I don't expect the final tally to be more than five or six points in either direction. But SurveyUSA will probably end up looking worse.
I took a look at the crosstabs of the SurveyUSA poll (I can't seem to find them for Zogby--if any commenters can, please link!). Unfortunately, one of the most relevant things to look at is the relative proportion of African-American and Latino votes in the electorate (since, by all accounts, Obama will win the black vote overwhelmingly and Clinton will win the Latino vote easily, though by a smaller margin). In the 2004 Democratic primary, 16 percent of voters were Latino and 8 percent were black. SurveyUSA estimates the 2008 Democratic electorate as being 26 percent Latino and 9 percent black. To be frank, I would be shocked if those numbers end up being correct--particularly given the disproportionate surge in black turnout we saw in South Carolina. If I had to guess, I'd say the proportions will be about 19 and 11--which is more in line with what other pollsters predict. This alone would swing the result several points toward Obama from what SurveyUSA has.
In addition, SurveyUSA has Hillary beating Obama by one point in the Bay Area, which defies all conventional wisdom. The Field Poll, which has more expertise polling California than anyone, had Obama winning in the Bay Area 41-31--and this was just at the beginning of what looks like a late Obama surge in the state. Hillary will win the state if turnout in Los Angeles and the Inland Empire are large enough, but, again, I'd be very surprised if she won the Bay Area (full of latté liberals and African-Americans) outright.
Here's the mea culpa from the Plank:
California Racial CompositionSo, having been disastrously wrong in my analysis of the dueling California polls, I owe SurveyUSA an apology and congratulations: they alone constructed a likely-voter screen that predicted the amazing, historically unprecedented surge in Latino turnout, which accounts for Hillary's margin of victory. The Field poll, which predicted Obama winning very narrowly and which I'd assumed would be close to correct, actually got more or less the right breakdown within each racial group (the white vote was split equally between the two).
What they (and I) missed, by a mile, was the racial composition of the electorate. They predicted 20 percent Latino/12 percent black. It was actually 29 percent Latino/6 percent black (a decline in relative black turnout since 2004, and a near doubling in relative Latino turnout), which could mark a major turning point in California Democratic politics
Survey USA is now the leading choice for Pre-election polls.
Zogby was a complete disaster for missing the coveted prize by such a huge margin. Zogby has something to say nonetheless
About California: Some of you may have noticed our pre-election polling differed from the actual results. It appears that we underestimated Hispanic turnout and overestimated the importance of younger Hispanic voters. We also overestimated turnout among African-American voters. Those of you who have been following our work know that we have gotten 13 out of 17 races right this year, and so many others over the years. This does happen.
Everyone makes mistake but this one is a hard one to swallow as an Obama supporter. His poll raised unprecedented expectations for Obama with bogus numbers.
Survey USA was almost perfect. Yes, they missed Missouri by a wide margin. Zogby can claim victory on that one.
So what do we do with poll? Always treat them with extreme caution. Everyone can spin any poll to his/her advantage but now with this report card we should know which one to give more wait in the upcoming contests.
Ps. Lori is a true believer in Survey USA and she must be elated with those results.
There's more...
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