The Washington Post was very excited to
report on Feb. 5 that President Obama has finally achieved “the edge” over Mitt Romney in a “general election matchup” poll. The
Post was pleased to note Obama was “boosted by improved public confidence” and that he now led Romney by over 50%. Well, he does if you don’t poll actual voters, anyway, and therein lies the major problem with the
Post’s polling.
The flaw in the
Post’s poll is that they seem to have polled “adults” instead of “likely voters” and this fact calls into question the claim in the headline that “Obama holds edge over Romney in general election matchup.” You see, you have to be an actual voter before your opinion in an “election matchup” much matters but the
Post apparently did not make sure that its respondents were actual voters before declaring that Obama is now winning over more voters.
But the bigger problem is the fact that the
Post has decided it no longer needs to include the partisan breakdown of its respondents for readers to assess. The
Post did not include the percentages of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents in its polling data so there is no way to know if the poll included a fair representation of all parties or if the whole poll was weighted heavy with Democrats.
The
Post has had troubling polls before. Ed Morrissey
notes for instance that a WaPo poll from April of 2011 had 22% Republicans overpowered by 33% Democrats and 38% purported independents. If the
Post is shorting Republican representation, no wonder the Obamessiah seems to be surging!
By excluding in reports its partisan breakdown, the
Post risks having its results easily dismissed by serious readers. It makes the poll practically worthless. Of course, the problem is that the average reader won’t realize that things are askew with the polling and will accept the claims of Obama’s popularity at face value. But maybe that’s why the
Post won’t include its partisan breakdown in its reports? As Morrissey
says, “it’s easy to assume that the reason that the
Post has ended its sample transparency is because they have something to hide.”
And with quotes from the
Post story like, “Overall, 55 percent of those who are closely following the campaign say they disapprove of what the GOP candidates have been saying,” one has to wonder if those respondents scoffing at the Republican message were actual voters that the GOP should pay attention to, or partisan Democrats whom they won’t be able to reach anyway, or even disinterested “adults” that aren’t voting in the first place? Unfortunately, with this poll we have no way to assess the answers to those questions.
Still, the
Post assures us that, “Meanwhile, the president’s recent remarks are better reviewed.” How do we know? Well, we don’t. We just have to take the
Post’s word for it if we are going to believe it.
Essentially, what we have with these
Washington Post polls is simple cheerleading for the president instead of legitimate analysis of the current sentiments of voters.
Warner Todd Huston——
Bio and Archives
Warner Todd Huston’s thoughtful commentary, sometimes irreverent often historically based, is featured on many websites such as Breitbart.com, among many, many others. He has also written for several history magazines, has appeared on numerous TV and radio shows.
He is also the owner and operator of Publius’ Forum.