08-19-2022, 11:41 PM
Here is something to contemplate. This is a copy of something I posted on an election forum three years ago,
Comment on this:
Polling may be more stable than you expect. Personalities of adult politicians do not change much over time. Political cultures and demographics of an electorate can change, but not that fast. If you wonder about breaking scandals, then consider that the political journalists generally have a good idea of who the crooks are and stay clear of them as if those politicians had contagious diseases that would wreck journalists' careers. Scandals typically break for politicians with bad polling. Maybe those pols have some signals such as being unusually defensive and less ebullient than the usual optimist.
What of earth-shattering events? Even a 1929-style economic crash takes several months to show that it is big trouble. Wars? Those take time to sort out, and if anything the rally-around-the-flag effect comes into play (probably intensifying the effect of the limitation of time).
So look at the dynamics. A year before the election, even a 20-point lead by an incumbent against a generic opponent may be too slight to hold up. The political climate may not have consolidated, and nobody knows who the opponent will be. That could be a strong opponent or a weak one. A weak one ends up doing as one expects, serving as nominal opposition who gets the partisan hacks on his side and nobody else and ends up losing 60-40 in a state or district that the incumbent fits well. Defeating an incumbent who leads Generic Opponent by 20% happens about 19% of the time, so giving 4-1 odds in favor of just about any incumbent a year before the election if there is no clear opponent isn't preposterous. If you would have asked me whether Democrats had a chance of winning the Senate seat in Iowa or Ohio in 2022 back in November 2021 I night have given something like 6-1 odds against it.
Six months later the primary contest is established, and if an incumbent is running for re-election he gets to establish whether he is up to the task. If not, then his polling will show that. If the opponent is unusually strong, then the early edge can completely disappear and then some. By May the likely opponents have surely grafter their messages, and anyone who must change the message after that is in deep trouble. Voters generally dislike flakes.
Three months? Opposing sides have set their agendas, and most of the campaigning is about getting a positive image in public appearances or demonizing an opponent (basically, the Other Guy is against prosperity because he does not believe that those who own the assets should have absolute power over everyone else if he is a liberal facing someone with support from the economic elites).
Time limits what one can achieve in a campaign, and as time runs out, campaigning reduces to getting the right ads in the right times in the right TV markets, making fitting campaign appearances, and trying to avoid catastrophic gaffes.
If one is down 1% according to the polls on the day before the election, then one has one's best hope in expecting the polling data to be wrong.
.
Quote: As a rule I do not predict polling results except to expect more of the same. I am at least as much concerned with disapproval as with approval.
Now how important are leads with time? Close to Election Day, electoral leads of even 1% can give the leader nearly 2/3 of a chance of winning the state. Leads that may not look 'that bad' for the nominee behind in polling can go from troubling to ominous to politically lethal over a year even if the lead remains the same.
...(From) Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise (why so many predictions but some don't) I get this revealing chart. It relates probability well, and as I have suggested, being up 5% in a binary election a year before means little, being up 5% a month before the election is huge. It is from 2012, and it relates much other than elections (like sports, poker, and even chess). What it says of electoral leads as a campaign approaches its conclusion is telling.
On page 63, Figure 2-4 shows the probability of a Senate candidate winning (1998 to 2008) with a certain lead (1, 5, 10, and 20 points) at one year, six months, three months, one month, one week, and one day. Because statewide races for President are much like statewide races for the Senate -- with the qualification that Presidential nominees do not usually make appearances where they see themselves losing -- unless they really are losing nationwide.
Time to election |1 point|5 points||10 points|20 points|
one day............. |...64%|....95%|.....99.7%|.99.999%|
one week........... |...60%|....89%|.......98%|...99.97%|
one month......... |...57%|....81%|.......95%|.....99.7%|
three months..... |...55%|....72%|.......87%|........98%|
six months..........|...53%|....66%|.......79%|.......93%|
one year.............|....52%|...59%|.......67%|.......81%|
(I am going to put this back in my "electoral theory" section because it will remain relevant.
So what conclusions can I draw? You might be surprised that a five-point lead one month before Election Day is no less significant than a twenty-point lead one year before the election. Thus one hears things like Democrats saying "We have a chance of winning West Virginia if everything goes right" and Republicans say that they have a chance of winning Massachusetts... yadda, yadda, yadda. Or is it "Yabba, dabba, doo!" Likewise, being one point ahead on the day before the election is worth almost as much as being five points ahead six months before the election or even ten points ahead a year before the election.
Comment on this:
Polling may be more stable than you expect. Personalities of adult politicians do not change much over time. Political cultures and demographics of an electorate can change, but not that fast. If you wonder about breaking scandals, then consider that the political journalists generally have a good idea of who the crooks are and stay clear of them as if those politicians had contagious diseases that would wreck journalists' careers. Scandals typically break for politicians with bad polling. Maybe those pols have some signals such as being unusually defensive and less ebullient than the usual optimist.
What of earth-shattering events? Even a 1929-style economic crash takes several months to show that it is big trouble. Wars? Those take time to sort out, and if anything the rally-around-the-flag effect comes into play (probably intensifying the effect of the limitation of time).
So look at the dynamics. A year before the election, even a 20-point lead by an incumbent against a generic opponent may be too slight to hold up. The political climate may not have consolidated, and nobody knows who the opponent will be. That could be a strong opponent or a weak one. A weak one ends up doing as one expects, serving as nominal opposition who gets the partisan hacks on his side and nobody else and ends up losing 60-40 in a state or district that the incumbent fits well. Defeating an incumbent who leads Generic Opponent by 20% happens about 19% of the time, so giving 4-1 odds in favor of just about any incumbent a year before the election if there is no clear opponent isn't preposterous. If you would have asked me whether Democrats had a chance of winning the Senate seat in Iowa or Ohio in 2022 back in November 2021 I night have given something like 6-1 odds against it.
Six months later the primary contest is established, and if an incumbent is running for re-election he gets to establish whether he is up to the task. If not, then his polling will show that. If the opponent is unusually strong, then the early edge can completely disappear and then some. By May the likely opponents have surely grafter their messages, and anyone who must change the message after that is in deep trouble. Voters generally dislike flakes.
Three months? Opposing sides have set their agendas, and most of the campaigning is about getting a positive image in public appearances or demonizing an opponent (basically, the Other Guy is against prosperity because he does not believe that those who own the assets should have absolute power over everyone else if he is a liberal facing someone with support from the economic elites).
Time limits what one can achieve in a campaign, and as time runs out, campaigning reduces to getting the right ads in the right times in the right TV markets, making fitting campaign appearances, and trying to avoid catastrophic gaffes.
If one is down 1% according to the polls on the day before the election, then one has one's best hope in expecting the polling data to be wrong.
.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.