Obama hits all-time high in latest Rasmussen national, ties Clinton

[mohc]

Obama and Clinton all tied up, 44-44.

Link

Now we can start the Gallup vs Rasmussen debates to follow-up last week's SUSA vs. Zogby debates.

[Pirate Smile]

1. Good but are national tracking polls useful anymore since over half the country has already voted.

Goodbye to National Tracking Polls

Now that 26 states have voted (and two have taken themselves out of contention on the Democratic side) there are just 22 states left to decide the Democratic and Republican nominations.

They don’t include Obama’s home state of Illinois. They don’t include Clinton’s home states of New York and Arkansas. They don’t include John McCain’s home state of Arizona. They don’t include Mitt Romney’s four home states of Massachusetts, Michigan, Utah or (summer home) New Hampshire. And they don’t include Mike Huckabee’s home state of Arkansas.

All that’s left is virgin territory, and a minority of US voters. And the contests will come week after week, day after day, in clusters of one to four at a time.

National polling of a sample group where half have already voted (or had the chance to) now officially tells us nothing about what will happen next.

What means something right now? Louisiana, Washington, and Nebraska. Maine. Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia. Wisconsin and Hawaii. Texas, Ohio, Vermont and Rhode Island. Mississippi. Pennsylvania…

National polls will tell us nothing about what will happen in any of these states. And more than half their survey size has already been “corrupted,” in polling terms, by the act of having voted already.

And the pollsters are having a rough enough year already. Gallup, Rasmussen, Zogby, et al… save your money. Give ‘em a rest, or focus your efforts on the future states, not the past ones.

Posted on February 6th, 2008 by Al Giordano
Filed under: Tsunami Tuesday | 4 Comments »

http://ruralvotes.com/thefield/?p=523

[mohc]

2. Tactical vs Strategic

I basically agree with what you are saying. With Super Tuesday behind us, and the delegate count pretty much dead even, the campaigns will have to shift from being more strategic to more tactical. Campaign themes and narratives will be less important than collecting delegates by targeting specific states, or even certain demographics in those states. I do not think the pollsters were really prepared to be doing state by state polling this far into the contests, then again I doubt they thought they would need to be doing national polls either. But national polls are a bit easier to setup, and I imagine we will see those mostly, at least until March 4. Regardless, the national polls really only tell you one thing right now, a general national mood. On the Democratic side, all I think it shows now is that both candidates have a lot of support.

[hogwyld]

3. What's really interesting is the market value of the candidates

Hillary's down to <45 and Obama's gone up to 57 on their little market page.

[mohc]

9. I don't know

These "markets" are basically people's opinions of what they think other people's opinions are. I am not sure how much I would read from the markets, other than what the "expectations" are right now.

[lurky]

11. The markets aren't predictive, they're reactive.

They seem to reflect the collective conventional wisdom of the moment.

With that in mind, it's pretty cool that Obama is pulling ahead! :)

[GalleryGod]

4. On to Tomorrow!

[Thrill]

7. Wow that picture is

amazing. Has this kid just saw Obama walk on stage?

[Thrill]

5. Is Herman Munster on Suicide Watch right now?

[mckeown1128]

8. LOL

:spray: :rofl:

[thevoiceofreason]

6. But, but

I thought the Gallup poll yesterday pointed to the inevitability of the Clinton machine!

[tishaLA]

10. Didn't he already hit his ceiling?

I keep forgetting from day to day.

[Thrill]

12. K&R