MetaFilter posts tagged with democrat

Public Policy Polling: "Do you have enough Santorum in your life, or not?"

flex — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 15:28:59 -0800

How Polling Firm PPP Won The Election With Its Hilarious And Infuriating Questions: "Public Policy Polling, the firm that correctly predicted all 50 states in the presidential election, is known for asking some weird, quirky and, sometimes, controversial questions in its polls... Here are some of the firm's best questions of the election cycle." More from Business Insider - How A Three-Man Polling Team Completely Nailed Their Election Prediction:

While Nate Silver got a lot of attention for predicting the election through poll aggregation and statistics, Public Policy Polling nailed every state through first-hand polling... The firm conducted about 255 polls this election season — including 19 polls in the final four days. It went 50 for 50, and its 50-47 popular vote prediction is coming closer to fruition as all the ballots are tallied. Last week, PPP was rated the election's most accurate pollster. "It feels great," PPP director Tom Jensen told Business Insider. "It vindicates that we are making the right assumptions about the electorate." They didn't do it without receiving their fair share of criticism — because, like Silver, they did not try to hide the fact that they were openly rooting for President Barack Obama to be re-elected.

The Hill - Study finds PPP was the most accurate pollster in 2012:

A study conducted overnight found liberal-leaning pollster Public Policy Polling was the most accurate predictor of the 2012 presidential election... The analysis by Costas Panagopoulos, Associate Professor of Political Science at Fordham University, also found that none of the 28 major polling outlets he analyzed showed bias toward either candidate in the national polls. “For all the derision directed toward pre-election polling, the final poll estimates were not far off from the actual nationwide vote shares for the two candidates,” he wrote.

NPR - North Carolina Polling Firm Spotlighted During Primaries:

Just a few years ago, not many people outside North Carolina knew of a small start-up called Public Policy Polling. It was founded by a Democratic businessman with no political experience. These days, PPP is one of the most prolific polling companies in the country, along with Gallup and Rasmussen. From North Carolina Public Radio, Jessica Jones has the story of a political start-up turned success story... JONES: Debnam is a soft-spoken, jeans-clad entrepreneur who runs two other successful companies. He started PPP after he got tired of seeing local Republican polls he didn't think were accurate. DEBNAM: I decided that the highest and best use of my time was to invest in something that made Democrats more competitive in races. And one of the things to do was to make polling more affordable. JONES: Traditional pollsters like Gallup still use real people to call prospective voters, but that's expensive. So Debnam set aside company phone lines for automated calls. PPP's polls cost as little as $1,500 for clients who range from local school board candidates to big Democratic interest groups... JONES: Jensen enjoys putting together wacky polls too, including a survey last year asking independent voters whether they'd support Sarah Palin or Charlie Sheen for president. Charlie Sheen won. But PPP hasn't neglected its original client base of Tar Heel Democrats. Alan Norman won his first election as a rural sheriff two years ago. He says Tom Jensen's polls helped him identify crucial voters. ALAN NORMAN: He said, you know, here's your weak area and here's where you need to go. And he gave us the numbers. He said you need to zero in and work harder on 65 and older, retired individuals, such as my parents. JONES: Norman says, by following PPP's advice, he won the public office he'd always coveted. And Public Policy Polling got what it wanted too: another Democrat in public office.

Criticism of PPP's "push poll" questions:

The Daily Beast - Obama’s a Muslim? PPP Polls in South Appear Designed to Bring Out Bias:
...every state has its not-so-admirable biases. And asking Republicans in these particular states—and evidently only these states—about these particular issues smacks not so much of political research as cultural profiling.
Betsy's Page - PPP's Clown Question:
I was polled on Sunday by PPP about politics in NC and, for the last question, they asked "Who was more responsible for killing Osama bin Laden, Obama or Romney?" I was just flummoxed. I couldn't figure out what it was doing in a poll of standard questions on whom I was going to vote for or if I approved or disapproved of certain politicians. Well, now it's clear what the purpose of the goofy question was - to generate stats so they could make fun of Republicans. Well, I'll confess - I answered "not sure." That wasn't because I wasn't sure but it was my way of registering how ticked off the question made me. As I tell my students, one problem that we can't account for in polling is that people lied. So I lied. Now my answer is part of a Comedy Central gag.
Washington Post's "Right Turn" blog - Exclusive: PPP caught doing advocacy polling on race:
Whit Ayres of the conservative Resurgent Republic (who also polls for National Public Radio) was taken aback as well. He said, “Particularly for liberals it is a very leading question.” He said, “Suppose a pollster asked, ‘Do you think the conservative media want voters to think Obama is anti-Semitic?’ People would come out of the frame.” Pollsters acknowledged that putting hot-button questions at the end at least did not taint the favorable/unfavorable result. But none of the pollsters I spoke with would have asked the question or thought it was appropriate. As one said, “It goes pretty far over the edge.”

Public Policy Polling say many of their questions are user-driven: they ask for suggestions on where to poll and what questions to ask - on Twitter as well as on their weblog.

Pity the Billionaire

shivohum — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 20:17:37 -0800

Pity the Billionaire (YT): Thomas Frank discusses how the American right pulled off a massive coup and successfully branded itself the party of rebellion and protest in the wake of the financial crisis.

Politicopsychopathology

j03 — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 23:19:37 -0800

According to Adorno, in psychoanalysis only the exaggerations are true. If you wished to characterize the Democrats and the Republicans in terms of true exaggerations, you might say that the Republicans have become the Party of Psychosis while the Democrats have become the Party of Neurosis. The Republicans are psychotic because they have lost contact with reality, and orient their behavior not toward realities but toward fantasies. The Democrats are neurotic because they are aim-inhibited, as an old-fashioned shrink might say: their anxieties, hang-ups, and insecurities mean that they can’t attain satisfaction, since in a basic way they won’t even allow themselves to know what they want.

The Definitive Guide to the Medicare Debate

reenum — Thu, 23 Aug 2012 10:38:10 -0800

Jonathan Cohn compares the effects on Medicare from the Affordable Care Act with the proposals being promoted by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan.

Off The Rails

cashman — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 11:05:46 -0800

"Let's just say it. The Republicans are the problem." "The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition. When one party moves this far from the mainstream, it makes it nearly impossible for the political system to deal constructively with the country’s challenges."

The Conservative Teen

reenum — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 18:38:11 -0800

Presenting for your perusal: "The Conservative Teen", a new magazine designed to instill the right values in today's youth.

The Republican "brand" is collapsing

reenum — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 19:19:13 -0800

According to a report by Democracy Corps, the Republican "brand" in US politics is collapsing.

The End of the Christian Right?

reenum — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 09:49:05 -0800

Historian Michael Kazin says that we are witnessing the end of the Religious Right's influence in American politics. Peter Montgomery of Alternet says not to declare the Christian Right dead quite yet.

Guantanamo: An Oral History

reenum — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:26:45 -0800

Guantanamo: An Oral History

Down But Not Out

reenum — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 12:07:44 -0800

With the recent news that unemployment applications are at their lowest levels since 2008, Congressional Republicans are attempting to curtail unemployment benefits. Democrats want to extend benefits for another year. This has led to an impasse. Still, there are many long term unemployed who will slip into poverty without an extension of these benefits. The uncertainty has left many of these people fearful and angry. Economists are also arguing that the current extensions of unemployment benefits helped prevent the economy from sinking into a depression. Additionally, only 22% of long term unemployed are currently receiving any unemployment benefit.

Send Congress To Boot Camp

reenum — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 09:44:08 -0800

Lt. Gen. Russell Honore has a solution to the increasing splintering and radicalization of Congress: send all the members of Congress to boot camp and keep them there until they recognize their duty to America.

Obama goes to China

mek — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 09:30:01 -0800

Obama proposes Social Security cuts. Amid ongoing debt talks wherein the Democrats are seeking to raise the debt ceiling to prevent the default of Federal debt, "entitlement reform" has been a hot topic. This morning, Obama has taken the unusual step of proposing even larger spending cuts than Republicans have asked for, mystifying many. Has the Grand Bargain arrived?

NY-26 special congressional election won by Kathy Hochul

ofthestrait — Tue, 24 May 2011 22:16:30 -0800

Media outlets are declaring a winner in NY-26 as Democratic candidate Kathy Hochul has a 6% lead (with 91% reporting) over Republican Jane Corwin (previously) in Tuesday's special election. The 26th district, located between Buffalo and Rochester, was formerly represented by Christopher Lee, who promptly resigned after craigslist-based infidelities surfaced (previously). Jack Davis, a Tea Party candidate who drew Democratic and Republican support, garnered 8% of the vote. Davis, formerly polling at nearly 25% just one month ago, until he assaulted a Republican tracker who turned out to be Corwin's chief of staff. Additionally, Green Party candidate Ian Murphy, known for his prank call to Wisconsin governor Scott Walker posing as billionaire donor David Koch, garnered 1% of the vote. He was deemed an 'unserious' candidate by a local Tea Party organization which was holding an 'open candidate forum'. DNC Chair Deborah Wasserman-Schultz is attributing Hochul's victory to her criticism of the House budget plan authored by Paul Ryan passed by Republicans which radically alters Medicare for Americans who are under 55.

The pulsing popularity of political parties in America over the previous passage of years

nomadicink — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 09:26:48 -0800

"Isarithmic maps are essentially topographic or contour maps, wherein a third variable is represented in two dimensions by color, or by contour lines, indicating gradations. I had never seen such a map depicting political data — certainly not election returns, and thus sought to create them".

"They told me their God was 'Aqua Buddha'"

krysalist — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 12:20:40 -0800

Jack Conway, a candidate for United States Senate, is catching flak from Democrats and Tea-Partiers alike, for airing an attack ad against his opponent, Rand Paul that brings up some bizarre dirt published in GQ a few months back. At a debate between the two candidates Sunday, Paul refused to shake Conway's hand at the end. Today, the National Republican Senatorial Committee released a response to the Aqua Buddha ad. In the GQ expose published in August, the author writes that Rand Paul and a friend kidnapped a fellow student, tried to force her to take epic bong rips, and then brought her down by a river, where, "They told me their god was 'Aqua Buddha' and that I needed to bow down and worship him," the woman alleged. In the attack ad, Conway suggests that Rand Paul's college behavior indicates an opposition to Christianity, and faith-based initiatives. Conway and Paul are nearly in a dead heat. Another debate is scheduled for later this month. The secret society that Paul was a member of during his college years has a Wikipedia entry and a Youtube page.

Tea Party and Me

reenum — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 12:53:54 -0800

Former president Jimmy Carter speaks about the similarities and differences between the political climate in the mid 1970's and the present rise of the Tea Party.

"If not now, when? If not us, who?"

mek — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 22:59:28 -0800

Kabuki Democracy: Why a Progressive Presidency Is Impossible, for Now. And what we should do about it. (one-page link)

"A Death Threat Magnet"

zarq — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 12:06:12 -0800

The FBI has released their extensive files on US Senator Edward M. Kennedy to the public, covering their relationship with him between 1961 and 1985. The seven files, totaling more than 2,200 pages of documents reveal (among other things,) the perhaps unsurprising news that the late Senator received "scores" of death threats from radical groups, including the Ku Klux Klan, “Minutemen” organizations, and the National Socialist White People’s Party. The release was initiated by a Freedom of Information Act Request from Judicial Watch on May 3, 2010, (Complaint pdf) but the FBI gave the Senator's family the "rare opportunity" to raise objections before releasing the file.

A rational conservative solution for health care reform

reenum — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 08:29:33 -0800

E.D. Kain with a moderate conservative solution to the health care crisis

Tom Davis Gives Up

schroedinger — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 12:52:15 -0800

Tom Davis Gives Up (SLNYT). “Tell them about the important work we’re doing while Rome burns,” he said. A candid accounting of American politics from a member of the GOP disillusioned with both sides of the aisle and an overview of how he became that way.

The Elephant in the Room: Market Prosperity versus Republican Administration

Brian B. — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 11:26:37 -0800

Americans pick stocks better than they pick presidents? It is no secret that the stock market does better under Democrats than Republicans. Some have speculated as to why the market does this, as if it's not supposed to work that way. Even when conceding the facts it is a bitter pill to swallow, as if the results confirm the benefit of a regulatory environment.

Voices of the Delegates.

clearly — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 21:26:21 -0800

Voices of the Delegates: Democrats : Republicans [via: NYTimes] " The New York Times has interviewed a wide range of delegates at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions. Listen to their concerns and why they believe their candidate is the best for the office of President. Sort the Delegates by State, Sex, Age, and Top Issues.

Final Days

djgh — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 21:46:26 -0800

"On the weekends, he favors two-hour bicycle rides at a Secret Service training facility outside Washington, where he sometimes asks companions and agents to ride behind him so that he can have the illusion of riding alone." With all the focus on the upcoming election, what of George W. Bush?

Greening the DNC

mattbucher — Mon, 19 May 2008 09:01:16 -0800

This summer in Denver, at the 2008 Democratic National Convention fried foods will be forbidden at the committee's 22 or so events, as is liquid served in individual plastic containers. Plates must be reusable, like china, recyclable or compostable. The food should be local, organic or both. It's all part of Greening 2008 Convention. They've filmed some webisodes to "peel back the curtain" on the greening process, but not many delegations have signed up for the competition yet.

A West Wing Writer Imagines a Deadlocked Democratic Convention

shivohum — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 07:46:09 -0800

A West Wing Writer Imagines a Deadlocked Democratic Convention