538 Live Blog: Rasmussen Reports Polls Were Biased

[BootinUp]

3:41 A.M. |Rasmussen Reports Polls Were Biased

While waiting for the remaining results to trickle in from states like Colorado and Alaska, I did a quick check on the accuracy of polls from the firm Rasmussen Reports, which came under heavy criticism this year — including from FiveThirtyEight — because its polls showed a strong lean toward Republican candidates.

Indeed, Rasmussen polls quite consistently turned out to overstate the standing of Republicans tonight. Of the roughly 100 polls released by Rasmussen or its subsidiary Pulse Opinion Research in the final 21 days of the campaign, roughly 70 to 75 percent overestimated the performance of Republican candidates, and on average they were biased against Democrats by 3 to 4 points.

Every pollster is entitled to a bad cycle now and again — and Rasmussen has had some good cycles in the past. But their polling took a major downturn this year.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/02/live-blogging-election-night/#rasmussen-reports-polls-were-biased

[FSogol]

1. Rasmussen is propaganda. No need to treat them as anything else. n/t

[Codeine]

2. I like that Nate analyzes each pollster

and adjusts his model accordingly. Seems to work.

[emulatorloo]

3. Bookmarking for all eternity n/t

[LiberalFighter]

4. How much do Rasmussen polls influence voters?

[Capn Sunshine]

6. They get reported and echoed a LOT

First, they make it into the mornin Talking points Fax. Then Joe Scarborough mentiones them, Fox news is all over them, etc and it gets repeated throughout the day. AP , headline king on internet sites from here to Tibet,ramps it up.

Next thing you know the public is thinking "wow. more of them than I thought. Maybe they know something after all"

[AJH032]

5. Absolutely true

Their numbers were often way off, and never in favor of the Democrat.