Thursday, November 16, 2017

I DON'T BELIEVE THE FOX POLL THAT SHOWS DOUG JONES WINNING

This poll from Fox seems like good news:
[Doug] Jones is up by eight points over [Roy] Moore among Alabama likely voters, 50 percent vs. 42 percent, in a Fox News Poll conducted Monday through Wednesday evenings. His lead is outside the poll’s margin of sampling error (±3.5 percentage points).
But I don't believe it, because I looked at the numbers.

First of all, the party breakdown in the poll is 48% Republican (40% solid GOP, 8% leaners) and 40% Democratic (33% solid, 9% leaners). That's in a state that Donald Trump won 62%-34%. A 2016 Gallup survey of party leanings doesn't have quite the skew of the election results, but it does show Alabama as 51.8% Republican, 34.8% Democratic -- a 17-point gap, as opposed to 8 in the Fox survey.

Even more suspicious: The poll asks about Barack Obama -- and he has a 52% favorable rating. Seriously? In Alabama? (Trump is only at 49%. By contrast, the latest Morning Consult state-by-state survey shows Trump with a 59% approval rating in Alabama.)

I'm not prepared to say that Fox is doing the GOP establishment's bidding by publishing a fake or skewed poll that shows Moore trailing. It's also possible that Jones supporters were more eager to respond to the survey, or that some Moore supporters are reluctant to acknowledge their leanings to a stranger.

In any case, I don't buy this. I still believe Moore will win.

No comments: