Margin of Σrror

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You can trust Gallup’s numbers … for now | Harry J Enten

Method changes last year have substantially improved Gallup’s polling accuracy. That’s good news for early trend spotting

Gallup screwed up in 2010 and 2012. They called for a much wider Republican House victory in the former than what actually occurred, and they polled a Mitt Romney victory in the latter. That put them on a blacklist of sorts with some polling analysts. And while I am just one person, I want to say that I trust Gallup’s presidential approval numbers as much as any mainstream pollster at this point.

Why? The main question when looking at a poll is whether or not the numbers accurately reflect the current state of the country. Methodology is important, but without accuracy, methodology is rather useless. In Gallup’s case, solid technique has led to Gallup’s approval track being reliable since last October.

While Gallup was losing a lot of creditability in the presidential horse race, they were making adjustments to their presidential approval methodology. They added a higher percentage of cell phones, changed weights for the geographic distribution of Americans, and many other minor changes starting on 1 October 2012. These alterations made all the difference in the world (or, at least, the country).

From the beginning of August through the end of September 2012, Gallup pegged President Obama’s approval at only 47.1%. All other pollsters who also used live interviews and called all adults found an average presidential approval of 49.7%. Given undecideds, the difference between the two percentages is that of a president who is in major re-election trouble and one who is probably going to win a tight race.

From 1 October 2012 through the election in early November, Gallup all of a sudden was projecting Obama’s approval at 50.8%. We’re talking over 17,000 interviews in October and nearly 30,000 in the eight weeks prior, so that movement in Gallup’s Obama’s approval rating was outside any margin of error.

The change was not seen by other polling outfits. Although most pollsters switched to a “likely voter electorate”, the ones that continued to poll all adults discovered an average Obama approval of 49.7% – exactly the same as they had produced in the two months prior.

Thus, the movement seen in Gallup’s weekly numbers can only be ascribed to its change in methodology. A change that produced an approval rating indicating President Obama’s re-relection, unlike horserace numbers. The anti-Obama house effect in approval rating essentially disappeared overnight.

Since the election, Gallup has continued to keep the reliable work up. HuffPollster aggregates approval ratings from all pollsters and allows the ability to sort by population (adults, registered, and likely voters) and mode (live telephone, automated telephone, and internet). I have selected adults and live telephone, like Gallup, from all non-Gallup pollsters and compared this plot of local regression to Gallup’s trend* since October 2012.

What we see is what we’d want to see from a trusted pollster. Gallup’s numbers have tracked very well with the aggregate of the other pollsters. Both groups gave Obama post-re-election boosts. Both have shown Obama’s approval rating dropping since January. Both have Obama’s approval fall accelerating since the NSA story broke in early June.

The only difference you’ll notice is that Obama’s approval and disapproval ratings are slightly higher in the overall group. The disparity is only about a point for both. All it means is that other pollsters have designed questionnaires that end up pushing undecideds a little harder. The net approval of both pollster groups is the same.

So what’s this all mean? It means we have the ability to catch trends more quickly thanks to Gallup’s daily and weekly tracking data. Gallup also has very good crosstabs, which thanks to high sample sizes, have relatively small margins of error.

Of course, the major question going forward is whether or not Gallup can translate this success with all adults to registered and likely voters for elections. If they can’t, Gallup will continue to earn a bad rap. If they can, then Gallup’s reputation may be restored.

*Note: An average may produce slightly different results from the averaging technique spoken about earlier.

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Cory Booker: set to be the next senator from New Jersey | Harry J Enten

Any idea that Booker’s Republican rival, Steve Lonegan, has momentum is wishful. Polling says the Democrat is a banker

There seems a belief in some quarters that Republican Steve Lonegan has gained momentum against Democrat Cory Booker in the US Senate special election in New Jersey this Wednesday. Beyond the fact that a Tea Party candidate stands little chance of defeating a Democrat in a state that went for President Obama by nearly 18pt in the last election, the numbers really don’t suggest any trouble for Booker.

Booker holds a 12pt lead per the Real Clear Politics average, with a little over two days to go. I can’t think of a single campaign polled this extensively in the past decade, in a non-primary, major statewide election, that had a greater than 12pt error. That’s hundreds and hundreds of races. But this is a special election, you might say, where turnout is going to be low.

We can look back to the 2013 Senate special election race in Massachusetts, just a few months ago, for a similar example. Turnout in Massachusetts was low. The polls, however, remained accurate. Democrat Ed Markey led by 12.3pt in the Real Clear Politics average and went on to win by a little over 10pt.

It’s not that low turnout doesn’t increase the chance of a polling error; it’s that any error is not likely to be large enough to allow a Lonegan victory.

The reason is that any good pollster (pdf) is already accounting for the low turnout typical of an election taking place on a Wednesday in the middle of October. They are projecting who is going to vote and who isn’t. That’s potentially a part of the reason why Booker is leading by 12pt, instead of 15 or 20pt.

Isn’t there a chance the pollsters are way-off? But even when pollsters don’t do a good job modeling the electorate, 12pt is still too big a hill to climb. Consider the 2010 Nevada Senate race, where it was clear pollsters simply couldn’t figure out what was going on with Latino voters. The final polls had Harry Reid down by a little less than 3pt. He won by 5.5pt – an 8pt polling error. That’s still far short of 12pt.

What about pollster accuracy when a candidate is cutting the lead, as Lonegan has (from 16pt to 13pt, to 10pt, in the last three Monmouth surveys)? We can look to the case of Scott Brown in 2010. That was also a special election taking place at an odd time (the middle of January) and in which the Republican candidate in a blue state came up dramatically from behind.

The problem for Lonegan is that the late movement for Scott Brown had already occurred by this point. Every poll conducted by a legitimate pollster in the final week of that campaign had Brown leading. There hasn’t been a single poll in the 2013 New Jersey Senate race that has had anything but a Booker margin of at least 10pt.

The biggest obstacle for the Lonegan comeback story, though, is that any “momentum” he has gained isn’t coming at the expense of support for Booker. The last four Monmouth surveys have Booker holding steady at 53%, 54%, 53%, and 52% respectively. There is no statistically significant difference between these percentages. The last two Quinnipiac polls of likely voters also have Booker at 53%.

The only percentage that has changed is Lonegan’s, which is nice and all for him, but it doesn’t cut it when your opponent is over 50%. Even if Lonegan picked up every undecided voter (and my guess is many won’t vote), he would lose by half-a-dozen points. Chances are, however, that Steve Lonegan is not going to pick up every undecided voter.

The smart bet here is to average the Monmouth and Quinnipiac surveys to project an 11pt Booker win. That’s certainly disappointing to some Booker supporters, as is a campaign that has revealed Booker as more neoliberal and less accomplished than some of his supporters like to believe.

Yet, a win is a win. And Cory Booker is poised to win a spot as the next United States senator from New Jersey.

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The US healthcare paradox: we like the Affordable Care Act but fear Obamacare | Harry J Enten

No wonder Republicans can campaign against the ACA when a plurality of Americans still believes it includes ‘death panels’

President Obama’s healthcare law is hated and loved by some so much that they are willing to shut down the government over it. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen so much passion over an issue about which so few (myself included) know as much as we should.

I wrote about this divide when Obamacare was in front of the US supreme court. Americans were opposed to “Obamacare”, or the Affordable Care Act, yet they were in favor of many of its provisions. Not surprisingly, Americans lacked knowledge of what exactly the law did.

So, as the political fight has intensified, on the eve of implementation of one of the ACA’s key provisions, the creation of new health insurance pools, how much has changed? Does the noisy debate on the ACA mean Americans are better-informed than before about Obamacare? Here are five ways Americans’ opinions about Obamacare have and have not evolved over the past year.

1. Americans have grown more negative in their views

The HuffPollster chart tells the story fairly well. It includes polls that ask about Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

Last June, the split was about 47% opposed to, and 40% in favor of, Obamacare. That gap narrowed, after the supreme court upheld the law’s constitutionality. The difference between those for and against the law dropped to only 2pt by the election.

Since the election, however, US public opinion has changed drastically: 52% of Americans now oppose Obamacare – that’s tied at the record high. A little less than 38% are in favor of it, according to the HuffPollster aggregate.

2. The Obamacare v the Affordable Care Act difference still exists, though may be overblown

A few weeks ago, a CNBC poll purported to show major differences when asked about the law in different manners: 46% were against Obamacare, while only 37% were opposed to the ACA. Importantly, support for the healthcare law also dropped from 29% to 22%. What’s happening is that Americans have heard a lot about “Obamacare”, but not much about the ACA. The key is the difference between those who favor and those who oppose for each question, which is about 15pt.

Most of the polls that show the best numbers for Obamacare (that is, the margin of opposition at 10pt or less) don’t mention Obama’s name. These include the Kaiser and ABC/Washington Post surveys. A Fox News poll found the gap was slightly wider, with the margin between favorable and unfavorable towards Obamacare at 26pt, and just 16pt for the ACA. Some, such as the UConn/Hartford Courant poll, use similar wording and find the largest gaps.

The bottom line is that many Americans oppose Obamacare no matter the wording. But Obama’s name probably makes them even less likely to like it.

3. There is a percentage of Americans who oppose the law for not going far enough, though this, too, is likely overblown

Democrats like to point out that even as a majority opposes Obamacare, a certain percentage of Americans think it’s because the law is “not liberal enough”. A new CNN poll puts that percentage at 11%. When you add those who favor Obamacare to those who regard it as “not liberal enough”, you have a near-majority.

The problem with this finding is that I don’t believe that Americans necessarily know what “too liberal” means in this context. My evidence for that is that the group with the highest percentage of those who say they are against the law because it is “too liberal” are, in fact, Republicans.

The actual percentage who don’t like Obamacare because it’s not liberal enough is probably closer to 7%, if not lower. That’s the percentage Kaiser found when they asked if Obamacare went “far enough” in changing the healthcare system. I caution, however, that some of that may be those who want radical conservative change – such as yearning for government to get completely out of healthcare.

4. Americans continue to like the individual provisions, except for the individual mandate

While only 37% of Americans viewed the ACA favorably in a March 2013 Kaiser poll, most liked what the healthcare bill is scheduled to do. Over 55%, and up to 88%, of Americans regard the following facets of Obamacare at least somewhat favorably: tax credits to small businesses to buy insurance, closing the Medicare “doughnut hole”, creating insurance exchanges, giving rebates to customers of insurance customers that spend too much on administrative costs, and the employer mandate. Even Republicans like all of them except the Medicaid expansion, increase in Medicare tax, employer mandate, and individual mandate.

Indeed, the only requirement of Obamacare most people didn’t like was the mandate for all people to join it.

5. Americans still don’t seem to know what Obamacare means for them

Given the discordance between Americans’ feelings on the individual parts of Obamacare and the law as a whole, it’s not that surprising that a striking 41% of Americans don’t feel they have enough information about the ACA, per the UConn/Hartford survey. Only 19% say they are very familiar with the law.

The individual provision questions strike the same chord. More than a third of people are unaware of the health insurance exchanges, subsidy assistance to individuals, or the Medicaid expansion. The latter two provisions of the law have actually seen a decrease in the percentage of people who knew these policies were in the bill, since it first passed. The only part of Obamacare that Americans seem to know really well is the individual mandate, which has also seen the largest percentage-point increase in awareness.

More worryingly, more people than not thought that Obamacare includes a public option, undocumented immigrant insurance, “death panels”, and cuts to Medicare. The Affordable Care Act contains none of these.

The fact is most of Obamacare is liked by the public. The issue is that the provision that is not liked is the best-known.

Conclusion: Americans are confused on Obamacare

There are lots of confused and confusing data here, and it’s difficult to say anything definitive about how Americans feel about the healthcare law signed by President Obama in 2010. As I found more than a year ago, they don’t like the law overall, even while they approve many of its measures.

Some Democrats may say that this points in their favor, but the same dynamic of a differential between the backing people will give for a broad proposition as opposed to their support for individual policies could be said to operate in the case of gun control. Thus two Colorado state senators were recently recalled over a gun control law whose individual provisions many said they liked.

Overall, Americans clearly don’t know enough about Obamacare. Of course, they know just as little about the Affordable Care Act – but to the extent that they are less hostile to a law that doesn’t bear President Obama’s name, it does appear that the embrace of the term “Obamacare” by Democrats and the White House was a tactic that has not worked out.

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Chris Christie’s broad appeal sets up historic win in New Jersey. And then? | Harry J Enten

A Republican governor who can get re-elected in a blue state is something, but look at his coalition and start thinking about 2016

The fact that no one is talking about Chris Christie’s re-election campaign for New Jersey governor is about the most significant thing you can say about it. Many analysts, including this one, thought that Christie’s post-Sandy approval bump would ebb, so that we might get an at least somewhat competitive race with the Democratic candidate, Barbara Buono.

To put it simply, that hasn’t happened. Christie is ahead in the contest by a little more than 25pt, according to the latest Real Clear Politics average. That’s down from his 40pt lead at the beginning of the year, though it’s actually up slightly from the beginning of the month. Christie’s lead has held because his personality popularity has. He has a 68% favorable rating in the latest Stockton poll.

Christie’s dominating lead has pretty much silenced pundits like me: there just isn’t much to talk about in terms of the gubernatorial election. Christie’s going to win, and he’s going to win big.

Yet, it is worth recognizing how impressive Christie’s win looks like it’s going to be. Christie’s going to be the only Republican governor to win more than 50% of the vote in a state where President Obama won by at least 10pt over Mitt Romney. There’s a pretty good chance that Christie is going to be the only Republican governor east of Ohio and north of North Carolina by the end of next year.

Put another way, Christie is defying long-term trends. It wasn’t too long ago that the way a state went in the presidential election was not indicative of how a state would go in the gubernatorial election. That’s no longer the case. So, the fact that Christie is winning in a blue state now is as much of an anomaly as the Republican George Pataki winning in an equally blue New York state in 2002.

I’d go as far as to say that Christie’s win would be historic, if the 25pt margin holds. It’s the type of victory that people will remember because it’s so out of the normal historical range. How so?

President Obama won New Jersey by an average 13.9pt more than he won nationally over the past two elections. If the state was going to vote purely in line with its presidential vote, you’d expect Christie to lose by 13.9pt in a neutral year. Christie is running 39.2pt ahead of that pace.

I gathered the previous 156 non-recall gubernatorial elections since 2002 to see how this 39.2pt difference compares. Christie’s will be the best showing for a Republican candidate versus the presidential vote in the past five years. Of the prior 156 gubernatorial elections, and the two this year (assuming something crazy doesn’t happen in Virginia), since 2002, Christie’s “over-performance” will rank him seventh among Republican gubernatorial candidates.

The only candidates who beat him over the longer period are Jim Douglas in Vermont (a state that had been historically Republican) thrice, Connecticut’s Jodi Rell in 2006, Linda Lingle (who just lost by 20pt in a Senate race in 2012) in Hawaii, and Nevada’s Kenny Guinn in 2002. One thing all of these states had in common is that they didn’t have many black or Hispanic voters. Blacks and Hispanics tend to be less elastic in their patterns, so having more of them in a state makes a Republican’s job at running up the margin more difficult. At the time each of the six better performances occurred, the states where they happened had fewer blacks and/or Hispanics voting than the nation as a whole. That’s not the case in New Jersey.

That’s why it’s not surprising that Christie is only polling so well because he’s doing so well with blacks and Hispanics. He’s down only 19pt among blacks. He’s even with Hispanics. Of all the exit polls I could find over the past decade, no Republican gubernatorial candidate has scored better than that with blacks, and none outside of Florida has performed that well with Latinos.

Christie has shrunk the Democratic margin among blacks by about 70pt, against Obama’s share, in New Jersey. He’s done almost the same with Latinos, whom Obama carried in New Jersey by about 60pt – more than 15pt greater than he did nationwide. For a party looking to make inroads with minorities, Christie has done it.

Another thing none of these other over-performing Republicans had were presidential ambitions. Christie, of course, clearly does. It makes it more difficult to localize the race when this is the case, though Christie has.

Usually, a state’s voters don’t want their politicians to run for president. More Texans thought George W Bush shouldn’t run than should at this point in the 2000 cycle. More Tennesseans believed Al Gore shouldn’t run than should at this point in the 2004 cycle. More Illinoisans, Bay Staters, and New Yorkers thought Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, and Hillary Clinton respectively shouldn’t run than should at this point in the 2008 cycle.

Christie’s been so successful in his campaign that more New Jersey voters think he should run in 2016 than shouldn’t per a recent Quinnipiac poll. Christie has not only gone into a blue state as a Republican governor and convinced many he should be re-elected, but he’s done it even as they know he may run for president. More than that, they like the idea.

Some, especially on the right of the GOP, may say Christie has sold out conservative principles to get where he is in the campaign. The funny thing is that Republicans in his home state don’t agree. A recent survey had him winning a majority of them in a hypothetical 2016 matchup. It’s the only survey done so far this year in any state where a candidate has won the majority of the vote in a Republican primary.

When you look at the whole picture, you can see what I mean when I say Chris Christie’s re-election prospects are historic. He’s winning by a wider margin than nearly every other Republican gubernatorial candidate before him since 2002, compared to the state’s presidential leaning. He’s done so with a wide coalition and has gotten them to go along with his presidential ambitions.

It makes you think that Christie might win a certain election in 2016, too.

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Facing government shutdown, Obama’s party can’t bank on 1996 mythology | Harry J Enten

Convention says Republicans got blamed for the last shutdowns, helping Clinton win in 1996. In reality, it was the economy, stupid

We are less than a week from a possible government shutdown, thanks to the inability of congressional Republicans and President Obama to reach a budget compromise. Much of the disagreement stems from the determination of some Republicans use the budget bill to defund Obamacare. Given the imminence of the threat, much reference has been made to the previous government shutdowns in 1995 and 1996.

For those who don’t remember, 1995-96 featured congressional Republicans led by Newt Gingrich taking on Democratic President Bill Clinton. The conventional wisdom now is that Clinton won the political battle over the shutdowns. Some have taken that a step further and believe Gingrich’s “defeat” cost Republicans in the 1996 election.

The former is definitely true. Republicans clearly took more blame for the shutdowns 17 years ago. Today, though, the “margin of blame” is 16pt smaller – with Americans surveyed only 3pt more likely to blame congressional Republicans than the president (the margin was 19pt in 1995-96). That suggests that Republicans are much in better shape now than they were then.

But even if the polling today did look like 1995-96, I would argue that this looming shutdown will offer nowhere such a clear win for Obama and the Democrats as it did for Clinton. The 1996 elections didn’t differ at all from what you’d expect – given the state of the economy and the outcomes of congressional elections in presidential years when there is split government.

Take a look at presidential and congressional approval from 1995-1996. This allows us to see what impact the budget had on the different parties’ overall stature because of the shutdowns.

You would have expected Congress to see a steep decline in 1995-1996 because of the budget shutdown, but that simply didn’t happen. Check out this graph from Charles Franklin, with the key points of budget shutdown included.

As now, congressional approval was already in the can back in 1995. There was perhaps a slight decline in congressional approval going into 1996, but it’s a point or two at most.

The same pattern held with President Clinton. Here’s a chart from the same time period, created by the Monkey Cage‘s John Sides.

Clinton’s approval rating just after the shutdowns was, if anything, slightly lower than before it. In other words, he really didn’t win much in terms of his standing. He didn’t gain ground in his approval rating, and didn’t lose less than Congress.

Clinton’s major increase in presidential approval occurred in the months after the shutdown. Those ratings corresponded very well with a major increase, also, in congressional approval. That’s not surprising, given that both approval ratings tend to move in unison with one another. Congressional and presidential approval in this case moved up – because the economy was improving.

Perhaps counterintuitively, both Clinton and congressional Republicans actually saw their standing improve in the ballot test for the November 1996 elections. Clinton opened up about a 6pt edge on Republican Bob Dole in the immediate aftermath of the shutdown, when he had been tied prior to it. Congressional Republicans closed a 5pt deficit, to a 1pt deficit, in the national House vote ballot.

Both of those margins pretty much held through the election. Congressional Republicans would gain a little bit on congressional Democrats. Both Clinton and Dole ran away from Reform party candidate Ross Perot (Clinton slightly more so). It looks as though most people did not determine their vote based on their view of the government shutdown.

Indeed, only 10% of Americans said the government shutdown was their greatest reservation about Republicans, following the 1996 vote, per a post-election poll. The exit polls didn’t even ask about it.

There just isn’t much sign that 1996 differed from what you’d expect, given the fundamentals. Clinton won the national vote by a little less than 9pt over Dole. One would think that if the shutdown had really hurt Republicans over the long term, then Clinton would have done far better than the economy would suggest. That simply didn’t happen.

Of the seven economic fundamental models displayed by Brendan Nyhan, two underestimated Clinton’s vote, three overestimated it, and two pretty much nailed it. That’s what you would expect to happen if there were no big event that overrode the 1996 election.

The same holds for the House. House Democrats gained two seats over their 1994 showing, but that’s well within expectations. The result was less of a loss than Republicans went on to suffer in 2008 or 2012, or then Democrats sustained in 1992, for instance. It’s equal to the loss Republicans took in 2000. Only once since 1952 has the majority party gained more than three seats in a presidential election year, when the other party controlled the White House.

In short, there’s just no clear evidence that House Republicans suffered, even if they were largely blamed for the shutdown.

In fact, Senate Republicans actually picked up two seats in 1996. Some might say that Democrats would gladly settle for a two-seat Republican gain in 2014. While that’s true, you have to know the baseline going into the 1996 elections: Republicans controlled 56% of the class up for re-election; they ended up winning 62% of the class thanks to wins in the south.

The reverse will be true in 2014. Democrats will control 60% of the seats up for election in 2014. Republicans have a lot more opportunity to pick up seats. They are playing offense mostly in the south, as they were in 1996. If Republicans were to win 62% of the seats in play in 2014, they’d pick up eight seats.

Now, I don’t think Republicans will gain eight seats in 2014. To me, one would be wise not to project too much correlation between the 1995-96 shutdown and a possible one in 2013. This is a midterm election, not a presidential election year. Congressional and presidential approvals are both in worse shape now than they were then. And polling puts Obama in worse shape than Clinton was at this point, as he faces a possible shutdown.

For those who look to the 1995-96 shutdown as a sign that it will have major electoral implications, look again.

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‘Cuch’ wins barbecue test in Virginia, but ‘T-Mac’ leads gubernatorial race | Harry J Enten

Virginians find the Republican Cuccinelli likeable – but for his conservatism. On the issues, they prefer the Democrat McAuliffe

Before Eliot Spitzer and Anthony Weiner in New York City, the clown show of 2013 was supposed to be the swing-state Virginia gubernatorial election. Republican Ken Cuccinelli (Cuch) holds deeply conservative views, including his belief that “homosexual acts” are wrong, while Democrat Terry McAuliffe (T-Mac) is seen as unlikable – as demonstrated by the fact that he left his wife alone as she was delivering one of their children.

The question that has marked this campaign is whether it would be Cuch’s extreme policy positions, which, many would argue, the GOP suffers from nationally, or T-Mac’s personality deficiencies that would ultimately be too much for Virginia voters to bear. In my view, issues will trump personality, and that favors the Democrat.

Horserace polling at this early point hasn’t historically given us a good idea of who is going to win. Most voters simply aren’t paying attention. They have no clue, for example, who Republican Lieutenant Governor candidate EW Jackson is, despite much insider discussion of his very conservative social positions.

Yet, Quinnipiac has a very interesting way we can compare the issue v personality problems both gubernatorial candidates have, and see which is more predictive of how the voters feel about the two. On the issues, they asked whether each candidate is too conservative, liberal or about right. Obviously, the percentage of “don’t know” is high given most voters haven’t tuned into the race. For those who have, however, it’s clear that Cuch is going backward.

The percentage of those who think Cuccinelli is too conservative rose by 5pt over the past two months, to its all-time high of 33%. Almost all of that increase is from voters who had previously not registered an opinion. Among independent voters, whom Cuch must win, the percentage of those who thought he was “too conservative” is up from 29% to 38%. The percentage of independents who think he is “too conservative” is now 4pt higher than those who think he is “about right”.

T-Mac has no such problems. The percentage of those who think he is “too liberal” is up 4pt, but that’s mirrored by a 3pt rise in the percentage of those who think he is just right. Voters are 10pt more likely to think he is “about right” than “too far to the left”, versus only a 4pt gap for Cuch between about right and too conservative. Independents are 8pt more likely to say T-Mac is “about right” than “too liberal” – again, much better than how Cuch registers for “too conservative”.

But what about T-Mac’s personality issues? We can test that using the barbecue test. Voters were asked who would they rather have a conversation with at a cookout. The BBQ question is an offshoot of the “who would you rather have a beer with?” It’s trying to measure “comfortability” or the “regular guy” index of the candidates. You’d expect Cuch to do better here, and he does.

Cuch still holds that “personal” edge over T-Mac. Despite thinking Cuch is more conservative than T-Mac is liberal, voters give Cuch this test by 38% to 34%. He is ahead among independents 37% to 34%, even as independents are increasingly thinking that he is too extreme on the issues.

It’s fairly clear, however, that it’s issues not the regular guy index that’s what is shaping perceptions of the candidates. How do I know? Look at the favorability of the candidates. Favorability is very important because no other measure predicts general election match-ups as well as it does in swing states.

Cuch’s unfavorability is up 6pt in the past two months, from 24% to 30% – only slightly better than his favorability of 31%. That’s nearly identical to the 5pt rise in those who think that Cuch is too conservative. Among independents, Cuch’s unfavorability is up 5pt to 30% and now is greater than his favorability at 29%. That 1pt difference among independents is similar to the 4pt difference between “too conservative” and “about right”.

T-Mac’s favorability is up to 30%, from just 22% two months ago. His unfavorable rating is only up 2pt, to 19%. The 11pt difference between the favorability and unfavorability matches the 10pt gap between “just right” and “too liberal” on the issues question. T-Mac stands at 28% favorable to 21% unfavorable with independents. This 7pt gap is nearly the same as the 8pt gap between “about right” and “too liberal” on the issues question.

Therefore, the best measure for predicting the winner in Virginia is looks like being the issues test, and not the “BBQ test”, in Virginia. Voters may not think Terry McAuliffe is a regular guy, but that doesn’t seem to matter. The campaign is developing on the grounds McAuliffe would prefer, and not the one Ken Cuccinelli would favor.

Voters overall, and independents specifically, think McAuliffe is right on the issues; increasingly, they believe that Cuccinelli is not. That makes McAuliffe favorite.

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‘Cuch’ wins barbecue test in Virginia, but ‘T-Mac’ leads gubernatorial race | Harry J Enten

Virginians find the Republican Cuccinelli likeable – but for his conservatism. On the issues, they prefer the Democrat McAuliffe

Before Eliot Spitzer and Anthony Weiner in New York City, the clown show of 2013 was supposed to be the swing-state Virginia gubernatorial election. Republican Ken Cuccinelli (Cuch) holds deeply conservative views, including his belief that “homosexual acts” are wrong, while Democrat Terry McAuliffe (T-Mac) is seen as unlikable – as demonstrated by the fact that he left his wife alone as she was delivering one of their children.

The question that has marked this campaign is whether it would be Cuch’s extreme policy positions, which, many would argue, the GOP suffers from nationally, or T-Mac’s personality deficiencies that would ultimately be too much for Virginia voters to bear. In my view, issues will trump personality, and that favors the Democrat.

Horserace polling at this early point hasn’t historically given us a good idea of who is going to win. Most voters simply aren’t paying attention. They have no clue, for example, who Republican Lieutenant Governor candidate EW Jackson is, despite much insider discussion of his very conservative social positions.

Yet, Quinnipiac has a very interesting way we can compare the issue v personality problems both gubernatorial candidates have, and see which is more predictive of how the voters feel about the two. On the issues, they asked whether each candidate is too conservative, liberal or about right. Obviously, the percentage of “don’t know” is high given most voters haven’t tuned into the race. For those who have, however, it’s clear that Cuch is going backward.

The percentage of those who think Cuccinelli is too conservative rose by 5pt over the past two months, to its all-time high of 33%. Almost all of that increase is from voters who had previously not registered an opinion. Among independent voters, whom Cuch must win, the percentage of those who thought he was “too conservative” is up from 29% to 38%. The percentage of independents who think he is “too conservative” is now 4pt higher than those who think he is “about right”.

T-Mac has no such problems. The percentage of those who think he is “too liberal” is up 4pt, but that’s mirrored by a 3pt rise in the percentage of those who think he is just right. Voters are 10pt more likely to think he is “about right” than “too far to the left”, versus only a 4pt gap for Cuch between about right and too conservative. Independents are 8pt more likely to say T-Mac is “about right” than “too liberal” – again, much better than how Cuch registers for “too conservative”.

But what about T-Mac’s personality issues? We can test that using the barbecue test. Voters were asked who would they rather have a conversation with at a cookout. The BBQ question is an offshoot of the “who would you rather have a beer with?” It’s trying to measure “comfortability” or the “regular guy” index of the candidates. You’d expect Cuch to do better here, and he does.

Cuch still holds that “personal” edge over T-Mac. Despite thinking Cuch is more conservative than T-Mac is liberal, voters give Cuch this test by 38% to 34%. He is ahead among independents 37% to 34%, even as independents are increasingly thinking that he is too extreme on the issues.

It’s fairly clear, however, that it’s issues not the regular guy index that’s what is shaping perceptions of the candidates. How do I know? Look at the favorability of the candidates. Favorability is very important because no other measure predicts general election match-ups as well as it does in swing states.

Cuch’s unfavorability is up 6pt in the past two months, from 24% to 30% – only slightly better than his favorability of 31%. That’s nearly identical to the 5pt rise in those who think that Cuch is too conservative. Among independents, Cuch’s unfavorability is up 5pt to 30% and now is greater than his favorability at 29%. That 1pt difference among independents is similar to the 4pt difference between “too conservative” and “about right”.

T-Mac’s favorability is up to 30%, from just 22% two months ago. His unfavorable rating is only up 2pt, to 19%. The 11pt difference between the favorability and unfavorability matches the 10pt gap between “just right” and “too liberal” on the issues question. T-Mac stands at 28% favorable to 21% unfavorable with independents. This 7pt gap is nearly the same as the 8pt gap between “about right” and “too liberal” on the issues question.

Therefore, the best measure for predicting the winner in Virginia is looks like being the issues test, and not the “BBQ test”, in Virginia. Voters may not think Terry McAuliffe is a regular guy, but that doesn’t seem to matter. The campaign is developing on the grounds McAuliffe would prefer, and not the one Ken Cuccinelli would favor.

Voters overall, and independents specifically, think McAuliffe is right on the issues; increasingly, they believe that Cuccinelli is not. That makes McAuliffe favorite.

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Liz Cheney: a high-profile name – but she isn’t going to win in Wyoming | Harry Enten

Cheney’s bid for the Senate just doesn’t make sense – and a new poll shows her trailing incumbent Republican Mike Enzi

Sometimes people do things in electoral politics that make no sense. Liz Cheney running for the United States Senate in Wyoming looks to be a prime example. I said so on Wednesday, and nothing has changed.

Today, a new poll shows Cheney trailing longtime and popular incumbent Mike Enzi in a Republican primary 55% to 21%.

The top line, however, is probably too kind to Cheney. In order to successfully challenge someone in a primary, you need to be more popular than the incumbent. Enzi is actually the more popular one. He sports a 76% favorable rating against just 6% who see him in an unfavorable light. Despite being less well known, Cheney has a higher unfavorable rating at 15%. Her favorable rating, meanwhile, is 31pt lower at 45%. That will go up as the campaign goes on, but so will her unfavorable rating.

You might be wondering whether or not Cheney’s connection to her father Dick will help her during the campaign. The former vice-president does have a 58pt net favorable rating, yet that’s significantly less than Enzi’s 70pt net favorable rating. The younger Cheney is going to have to come up with a better strategy than just connecting herself to her father if she wants to win.

The problem for Cheney is there really doesn’t seem to be any area to exploit. As I noted on Wednesday, Enzi simply isn’t vulnerable on his right flank like other Republicans to go down in a primary over the past few years. Senators like Bob Bennett and Dick Lugar were among the top ten most liberal Republicans in the Senate. Enzi was the 11th most conservative member of the Senate last Congress. Wyoming’s other Senator John Barrasso was right next to Enzi at 12th most.

Indeed, there are very little policy differences between Enzi and her. She can try to play up her opposition to the internet sales tax, though that’s an issue that split Republicans down the middle. Moreover, how many people actually will vote on that issue? Most would agree that those voters would be few and far between.

Cheney, meanwhile, is likely vulnerable on her favoring of gay marriage. The Republican controlled state legislature not only didn’t get marriage passed this past year, but it couldn’t even get through a watered down domestic partnership law. A poll taken in next door more liberal Montana showed that 84% of Republicans were against gay marriage (pdf).

One would think that percentage may actually be higher in Wyoming.

Finally, Cheney won’t even be able to play up the “Enzi’s been in Washington too long” angle. Cheney just recently moved back to Wyoming, after living just outside of the District of Columbia for many years. Grover Norquist wondered why Cheney didn’t run for senate in Virginia. Enzi has been living in the state for over 40 years.

The truth is that Cheney’s bid makes no sense from an electoral perspective. She must be doing it because she’s bored or just felt like it. That will likely not be enough to make her the next senator from Wyoming.

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Liz Cheney: a high-profile name – but she isn’t going to win in Wyoming | Harry Enten

Cheney’s bid for the Senate just doesn’t make sense – and a new poll shows her trailing incumbent Republican Mike Enzi

Sometimes people do things in electoral politics that make no sense. Liz Cheney running for the United States Senate in Wyoming looks to be a prime example. I said so on Wednesday, and nothing has changed.

Today, a new poll shows Cheney trailing longtime and popular incumbent Mike Enzi in a Republican primary 55% to 21%.

The top line, however, is probably too kind to Cheney. In order to successfully challenge someone in a primary, you need to be more popular than the incumbent. Enzi is actually the more popular one. He sports a 76% favorable rating against just 6% who see him in an unfavorable light. Despite being less well known, Cheney has a higher unfavorable rating at 15%. Her favorable rating, meanwhile, is 31pt lower at 45%. That will go up as the campaign goes on, but so will her unfavorable rating.

You might be wondering whether or not Cheney’s connection to her father Dick will help her during the campaign. The former vice-president does have a 58pt net favorable rating, yet that’s significantly less than Enzi’s 70pt net favorable rating. The younger Cheney is going to have to come up with a better strategy than just connecting herself to her father if she wants to win.

The problem for Cheney is there really doesn’t seem to be any area to exploit. As I noted on Wednesday, Enzi simply isn’t vulnerable on his right flank like other Republicans to go down in a primary over the past few years. Senators like Bob Bennett and Dick Lugar were among the top ten most liberal Republicans in the Senate. Enzi was the 11th most conservative member of the Senate last Congress. Wyoming’s other Senator John Barrasso was right next to Enzi at 12th most.

Indeed, there are very little policy differences between Enzi and her. She can try to play up her opposition to the internet sales tax, though that’s an issue that split Republicans down the middle. Moreover, how many people actually will vote on that issue? Most would agree that those voters would be few and far between.

Cheney, meanwhile, is likely vulnerable on her favoring of gay marriage. The Republican controlled state legislature not only didn’t get marriage passed this past year, but it couldn’t even get through a watered down domestic partnership law. A poll taken in next door more liberal Montana showed that 84% of Republicans were against gay marriage (pdf).

One would think that percentage may actually be higher in Wyoming.

Finally, Cheney won’t even be able to play up the “Enzi’s been in Washington too long” angle. Cheney just recently moved back to Wyoming, after living just outside of the District of Columbia for many years. Grover Norquist wondered why Cheney didn’t run for senate in Virginia. Enzi has been living in the state for over 40 years.

The truth is that Cheney’s bid makes no sense from an electoral perspective. She must be doing it because she’s bored or just felt like it. That will likely not be enough to make her the next senator from Wyoming.

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