[Vision2020] Polls 'oversampling' Democrats?

[Art Deco]

Without a detailed, boring mathematical lecture suffice to say that the
Central Tendency Theorem is frequently misinterpreted to mean a statement
about the elements of a subsample rather than the properties of the
subsample as a whole.

w.

On Mon, Nov 5, 2012 at 7:28 PM, Sue Hovey <suehovey at moscow.com> wrote:

>   Gee, I would have thought any pollster with any credentials at all
> would understand measures of central tendency.  Are you saying Central
> Tendency Theorem is something else again?
>
>  Sue H.
>  *From:* Art Deco <art.deco.studios at gmail.com>
> *Sent:* Monday, November 05, 2012 2:40 PM
> *To:* vision2020 at moscow.com
> *Subject:* Re: [Vision2020] Polls 'oversampling' Democrats?
>
> As someone who has acted as a consultant in years past to various polling
> attempts, I can safely say that almost every poll fails to meet the
> standards set for using the Central Tendency Theorem, the
> mathematical/statistical basis for accurate sampling.  Some pollsters do
> not seem to really understand it at all.
>
> The most obvious error is the lack of a random sample in these times due
> to several factors.  The problem is sometimes so bad that the degree of
> randomness is not even able to be reasonably predicted.  Therefore, the
> confidence value and range of error cannot be accurately calculated.
>
> I haven't done it, but if someone were to Google several of the most
> recent, so-called major polls, I'd guess  there would be a range of
> predictions.
>
> w.
>
> On Mon, Nov 5, 2012 at 5:14 PM, Scott Dredge <scooterd408 at hotmail.com>wrote:
>
>>  Not surprisingly is that right wing radio / media has been complaining
>> about liberal pollsters supposedly 'oversampling' Democratic voters so make
>> it look like Obama is winning.  I'd think that polling is fairly accurate
>> these days and if the pollsters track record is poor, they wouldn't get
>> much credence or attention until they made the necessary adjustments to
>> have their predictions more closely matched to results.  I'm looking
>> forward to watching all the fun tomorrow night!
>>
>> My can't miss prediction:  Meet the new boss.  Same as the old boss.
>>
>> -Scott
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
> art.deco.studios at gmail.com
>
>
>
>  ------------------------------
> =======================================================
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>           mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
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>


-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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