Garbage In, Garbage Out

Any operative who has ever worked campaigns beyond their home state borders can see this is a garbage poll. As more reputable pollsters will tell you, garbage in, garbage out.

Polling is both an art and a science. The science enters when random samples are drawn from a qualified source file, and then again when cross-tabs are pulled. Top line numbers rarely reveal anything, especially 10 months before an election and with the holidays rapidly approaching.

The art of polling is having insight into the political environment of a given state, and being able to intuitively know whether the poll results are within reasonable parameters.

Again, interpreting crosstabs is critical.

Wisconsin is a notoriously difficult state to poll in primaries because of same day voter registration, no party registration, combined with the cost of adding a battery of screening questions to drop all but the frequent, partisan voter. Most clients cut the screening questions from the cost of the poll and simply ask, do you plan on voting?

Response - ahh, yea, sure.

But less than 2 on 10 voters will vote in the GOP primary for govenror next September. And roughly 4 in 10 of all previously registered voters will bother to vote in the general election.

Note the difference is discussing eligible voters (those 18 years and older) and registered voters.

Bottom line is, I don't need a poll to tell me Governor Doyle is vulnerable, as the poll below suggests. But I do need a poll to tell me among which voting subgroups (demographics) he is vulnerable with.

Good thing neither Walker nor Green commissioned this poll. It is good for nothing but a door-stop at campaign HQ.

-- A new poll from Atlanta-based Strategic Vision shows Doyle with a 46-44 approve-disapprove rating from likely state voters.
The poll included 272 self-identified as Democrats, 216 who self-identified Republicans, and 312 who identified themselves as Independent or another party affiliation.

In head-to-head match-ups between Doyle and his likely GOP opponents, the governor beat U.S. Rep. Mark Green 45 percent to 43 percent, and Milwaukee Co. Exec. Scott Walker 46 percent to 39 percent.

Republican voters asked their choice to challenge Doyle responded 47 percent for Green and 40 percent for Walker.

“At this time Doyle is definitely vulnerable against both Green and Walker,” said David E. Johnson, CEO and co-founder of Strategic Vision. “Both hold Doyle below the critical 50 percent mark which this early in a campaign indicates serious trouble for the incumbent. Additionally, in the match-up with Green, the race is statistically tied.”