77 Comments

1. Forget Red or Blue State: Are You Wireless or Wireline? « Spicy Spiralia:

[...] read more | digg story [...]

Sep 26, 2008 - 4:36 am 2. Pajamas Media » Pollsters Still Don’t Call Cellphones:

[...] Read the entire post here. [...]

Sep 28, 2008 - 8:39 am 3. Tom K:

We’re old Republicans and we never answer our cheap VOIP land line. That’s just the number we give out to people/companies we don’t trust- we do check messages on it. So pollsters will never find us.

Sep 28, 2008 - 8:57 am 4. canuck:

The number I give out is the modem/fax line at the office.

I only have a personal unlocked cell phone. I even ditched my pager. FAX services at home are online for those that insist on return of correspondence in that format.

When traveling out of the country, buy a chip for the best plan of the country you plan to visit (I use Telestel.com but there are others). You will get the number in advance and give you number to those callers you want to be able to reach you. Almost always it is a lot cheaper than allowing AT&T to rip you off for unwanted calls.

Sep 28, 2008 - 9:30 am 5. Eilish:

My husband and I are young entrepreneurs. Most of our friends, many of whom are very conservative, do not have land lines. (So you can’t make assumptions about political leanings.) Further, the author is correct, we usually do not answer a call if we do not recognize the number unless we are expecting a business call. More and more of our older family members are going to the same system. It is simply much easier to only have one number to contact friends and family.

Sep 28, 2008 - 9:51 am 6. Self-hating boomer:

Seeing as how cell (and VOIP) numbers aren’t listed anywhere, it would be rather difficult for a pollster to call them. This isn’t a problem that can be “fixed”. It’s an inherent flaw with telephone polling that’s only going to get worse with time.

If the assumption is true that people with no land line are of that young demographic, it’s also true that they’re no where near as likely to vote as the demographic with land lines. So in the end, this might not be a big effect for this election. For future elections, it’s going to become more and more pronounced.

Pollsters may have to go back to stopping people on street corners.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:01 am 7. Jim D:

And as long as I have to pay for each and every minute of connect time on the cell phone they had better not be calling my cell.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:01 am 8. Steve K:

This is just an updated version of a problem that’s existed for a while. For over 20 years I’ve used an answering machine to screen my calls, so pollsters never reached me either. I’m sure I haven’t been alone in this practice.

Even if they had reached me, I wouldn’t have participated in their poll anyway. So the curmudgeon-American demographic has always been unrepresented. Yet we do vote.

The fact is that the polls only reflect the opinions of that subset of the population that is willing to answer polls. I’m not certain that the assumption that this subset is a representative cross-section of the voting popoulation is entirely valid.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:12 am 9. Lisa:

I know the Obamatons think that this means that Obama will sweep the election.

Don’t think so.

This former dem hasn’t had a real land line in years.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:23 am 10. Jack Herman:

Unless I’m expecting a call, I don’t answer my home or personal cell phone when the caller id reflects a number I don’t know. It seems I have a lot of friends who do the same. So our opinions are not counted either.
I think this example washes out the wireless by far.
I don’t know how the phone numbers are selected for polling, but if it is random, I’ve seen that more of these “cell-phone only voters-those young, tech savvy, largely Democratic (but not always) voters” seem to answer their cell regardless of the incoming number.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:25 am 11. Dave:

I’m 48 and have NEVER been polled as to my preferred candidate or party at election time. I have received lots of ‘pushpoll’ recorded calls, but those are mostly for local candidates and they have a limited number of thousands of people in their own cities to call.

I’ve never been the recipient of a national poll call, no Zogby, no Rasmussen, no Gallup, no CBSNBCABCWAPONYTNEWSWEAKTIMECNN no NOTHING.

I’ve been voting for thirty years.

What are the odds? I’m usually at work when they call, or else sitting down to dinner and the phone says ‘unavailable’ so I don’t answer.

I’m inclined to believe they reach a lot of unemployed people and housewives. Not a great sample considering ‘white men’ are the target demo of both parties this year.

Not to mention they always weight democrats higher than republicans, and they always overstate independents.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:52 am 12. Dave:

Battleground Poll question D3–

Do you consider yourself–

very conservative? 20%

Somewhat conservative? 40%

moderate? 2%

Somewhat liberal and very liberal added up to 36%.

This is a largely center right country, emphasis on right.

SO why do the polls always weight Dems 40% and Repubs 30% and independents 30%?

How will they EVER be accurate?

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:54 am 13. Dee:

It is so frustrating listening to one pundit after another cite the polls as evidence that Americans prefer Obama, who this week has revealed his role as poster child for our “do nothing” Congress. I want to believe Americans are smarter than this, but these d*** polls make it hard to stay optimistic. One can only hope that inaccurate polls, slanted in Obama’s favor, will galvanize McCain supporters to get to the polls in November.

Sep 28, 2008 - 12:01 pm 14. CR:

I’m with Eilish and Jack Herman on this one, except for the home phone. My wife and I have been entrepreneurs for 10 years and we haven’t had a home land line during that time. If I don’t recognize an incoming cell call, I don’t answer it and my wife is the same way. Our business lines are screened by our receptionists, so we always know who’s calling those lines. The only line coming into my home is a fiber-optic line - good luck trying to call that.

Even if a pollster could reach me, my response to their queries would be a polite, “none of your business”.

Sep 28, 2008 - 12:24 pm 15. John B:

I haven’t had a conventional land line for years… No one has ever called me.

Does that mean my voice does not count? Trust me, on Nov 4th it will count.

Sep 28, 2008 - 12:35 pm 16. Peg C.:

We’re old conservatives, too, and we never answer the land line. It’s strictly for telemarketers and maybe pollsters (since we get 6 - 10 blank robo calls a day, who knows), and the only reason we have it is that I WFH and Time Warner cable in our area has iffy service, otherwise we’d have VoIP. Everyone we want to hear from is given our cell #’s. Our kids are wireless and use the land lines strictly for calls they don’t want to answer. They are also conservative. You think our opinions don’t count? We’re all voting on 11/4. I reject the entire premise that the wireless generation leans heavily Democrat. It’s simply not so.

Sep 28, 2008 - 1:02 pm 17. Self-hating boomer:

Even if a pollster could reach me, my response to their queries would be a polite, “none of your business”.

With the heavy handed tactics that the O-shirts have been using in MO, and PA, and OH, a conservative has a legitimate reason to be concerned about answering a poll with conservative/Republican answers. You just might find your cat hanging from a tree the next day. I think that causes some bias in the polls; people just don’t feel as safe telling a stranger that you’re for McCain as saying that you’re for Obama.

I think this goes a long ways in explaining the Bradley effect.

Sep 28, 2008 - 1:27 pm 18. Portia:

“We’re all voting on 11/4. I reject the entire premise that the wireless generation leans heavily Democrat. It’s simply not so.”

We don’t do much wireless. Then again, we don’t do much landline. We use Skype for long distance, and we communicate with clients/bosses via email. This has been our pattern for ten years.

I don’t know if we get poll calls. We don’t answer the phone unless we know the number.

We’re mid-forties. What the boomers like to call their own but aren’t. (Look, we never sat in at a protest. We’re the people who came of age in the eighties. Reagan’s kids. We are the ones PJ O’Rourke said took a look at their older siblings, cut their hair and got a job.) I have yet to vote Democrat though both my husband and I did vote Libertarian at one time, pre-nine-eleven. Occasionally.

They’re missing us. They’re missing the friends who are like us. I agree with Peg. It’s a mistake to assume we’re Democrat.

We are as a rule more educated and plugged-in than our elders (or younger.) And we DO NOT want Obama.

P.

Sep 28, 2008 - 1:42 pm 19. Mountain Girl:

I live in zero to one bar territory, so I still rely mostly on a land line, but I never answer it if I don’t recognize the number. Most of my neighbors do the same. About the only person I know who still answer all her calls is my 98 year old mother.

Sep 28, 2008 - 2:50 pm 20. Nine-of-Diamonds:

The belief that cellphone user = Pro Obama metrosexual youngster is questionable. One major group that uses cell phones is repair contractors. I used to communicate with hundreds of them a couple years ago, and many of them could only be reached by cell phone from 7AM to 7PM (or even later). Although it’s never safe to generalize, suffice it to say that some of them were major dittoheads - their offices would play Rush Limbaugh instead of hold music. Many of them were in the 40-70 year-old age bracket that is more likely to vote than young people. Therefore, contractors represent a marginal group that has landlines (and is thus not in the cellphones only category) but relies heavily on cell phones (and is thus excluded from any polls taken between 9AM - 7PM). Millions of people in the US work under similar circumstances in other professions. The net effect might negate the pro-Conservative bias produced by only sampling landlines.

Sep 28, 2008 - 3:23 pm 21. Gene:

Hey,

I am 61 years old and my wife and I and eligible voting children (3)all rely upon our cell phones exclusively.

Pollsters….put us down for McCain, will you please?

Sep 28, 2008 - 3:48 pm 22. Gozer the Carpathian:

I agree with the other comments that the idea that Cell Only people, or heck “tech savy” people are all “young, tech savvy, largely Democratic.” Sorry, I work with folks at JPL and NASA and I don’t think we get much more tech savy than that.

Sorry, we’re not all Dems, or young for that matter.

Now beyond that description (which I think should have been left out entirely) the article is valid that a large demographic (and growing) is being left out from traditional polling. Time will only tell how bad the polls get from “estimating” based off of it’s fraction of the public.

Sep 28, 2008 - 4:28 pm 23. ParisParamus:

Forgive me if this point is made elsewhere herein, but:

I don’t get how Obama supporters would be underrepresented by the “cell phone issue” overall the people most like to only have “traditional phones” are people of modest means, i.e., The poor. The poor are already most likely to vote Democrat, so that would lead to an oversampling of Obama voters. What am I missing here?

Sep 28, 2008 - 4:50 pm 24. locomotivebreath1901:

Not only all that jazz, but we’re such a transient, throw away society. Cell phones and carriers get changed like underwear.

It’s true. The mobile phone revolution is mainly happening in the under 30 crowd.

And did you know that the federal gub’mint has a subsidy that people can apply for to get a cell phone?? One guess as to what political party most of those folks vote for….

So how soon before the pollsters start polling via email?

diebolddiebolddiebolddiebol….

Sep 28, 2008 - 5:18 pm 25. USAF Captain:

There are many heartening responses here regarding this portentous question. I guess we’ll find out on November 5th. If it’s not close either way, then the pollsters (who have it as 6 to 5 and pick ‘em) had their heads wedged and we can disregard them in the future.

In reading the their web sites where they explain their methodology, one begins to understand the rationale for their weighting the samples. One must also concede that Obama is ahead in a most of the major polls. However, one does not have to concede that Obama will win the election.

I seem to recall that similar Democrat polls bespoke of The Blessed One winning versus Hillary in the denouement of their primary season only to have her win outside-the-margin victories because voters gave up their death grip on guns and religion only long enough to pull the lever for her.

Also, the recitations of past Republican victories (Reagan-Carter, Reagan-Mondale, Bush-Kerry, usw.) may be whistling past the grave yard, but I fervently would like to awake on the 5th and discover a McCain victory, if only to see the abject desperation on the hard left’s faces and their wild scramble to locate another Florida or Ohio.

Should Obama win, however, it will be almost transcendental to watch him ascend to office in January and find that he has almost no wiggle room to deliver on his bribes..er..promises. When the entitlements mob turns on him, it will be with pitchforks and torches and won’t be a pretty sight. Combine that with the already-disgusted mainstream Americans (like us here) and he will have congressional approval ratings inside of his first year.

It will be delicious — if tragic — to see the community organizer flail about ineffectually and the Democrats (with their hands on all three tillers) take a few laps around the bowl before heading into the sewer.

Is it 2010 yet?

Sep 28, 2008 - 5:59 pm 26. Bob's Kid:

I’m an old Republican too, and haven’t had a land line for anything but the DSL as long as it’s been available in these parts. I also do not answer if I do not know who is calling.

Sep 28, 2008 - 6:35 pm 27. Nine-of-Diamonds:

Well said. The problem with Obama is, he’s making promises that can’t be kept - no matter how deeply he digs into America’s coffers. Obama’s a superficially intelligent figurehead for dozens of grievance groups. He & his handlers abolished patriotism and replaced it with a seething cauldron of resentful victim constituencies.
Black supremacists.
Weatherman wannabes.
LA RAZA.
Environmental luddites.
“Peace” activists.
They might not care for this country, but they sure do care for our cash. Each is going to want their pound of flesh sooner or later. “Bleed the rich” is only a viable strategy for the short term. Once businesses relocate overseas and our tax base ceases to exist, I agree that it won’t be a pretty sight. When the bill comes due midway through his first term, let’s see where blaming Bush for everything gets him. It’s like the old Soviet Politburo joke about the two letters from a failed politician to his successor. They were to be opened the first time and the second time there was a major political crisis:

Letter #1 - Blame everything on the man who came before you.

Letter #2 - Sit down and write two letters.

Sep 28, 2008 - 6:56 pm 28. Montana_guy:

Count me in _ another independent voter who:
1) has no intention of voting for the Messiah
2) has, for all intents and purposes, a cell phone-only household. I have a landline for my remote business office, but caller ID allows me to screen and ignore just about all unrecognized numbers.

And thanks for the insight here. I’ve long wondered if cell phone penetration has skewed polling accuracy.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:00 pm 29. Polls: Even More Bogus Than I Thought « Buttle’s World:

[...] because they can’t even get a representative broad sample. Why not? They only get people willing to answer their land line. Nope, even if the political pollsters start calling the cell-phone only households right now, they [...]

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:06 pm 30. Stephanos:

Actually, I’ve always wondered how they account for folks like me who simply refuse to answer any political poll under any circumstance.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:15 pm 31. NOBAMA:

I turn 30 two days before the election, my wife and I ditched our land line 2 years ago when we purchased our first house. Both of us are voting for Mccain in Nov.

I work as a system admin in an I.T dept of 6 people. So I guess you could count me as one of those “tech savvy youngsters”. Out of the 6 people in my IT dept, 4 out of 6 only have cells. The other two have VOIP lines as a “land line”. Out of those 6, 5 are voting for Mccain this year, the 6th I’m not sure about but am pretty sure is going for Obamessiah.

The bad part? I live in Illinois so I’m pretty sure all our votes won’t count for sh** since the inner city voters of Chicago will vote 80% for Obama.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:17 pm 32. Stephanos:

@USAF-Captain

I think the more relevant election to your analogy would be Bush v Gore in which, if I recall correctly, Gore held similar leads this far out. In fact, Gore may have held leads nearly, and maybe until, the election itself. One sees a similar pattern to that earlier election in the Iowa Electronic Markets Winner Take All market. Past is not present, but, it’s interesting to note.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:21 pm 33. Sarah:

My mom keeps turning off the landline ringer — she answers her work cell and her personal cell only when she recognizes the number. So does my stepdad, and both of my sisters. Personally, I just don’t answer phones. None of us are voting for Obama, though I can’t make any promises about McCain (my stepdad in particular is likely to go third-party out of spite.) But last I checked, this particular collection of five never-reached-by-pollster types went from anti-McCain to pro-Palin-and-that-guy-she’s-with by a four-to-one-margin in late August. Meanwhile, my dad and stepmom do answer their home phone, and are Democrats. Given the number of graduate degrees (three) and undergraduate degrees (five) held and websites (six) operated by this collection of seven registered voters…

Suffice to say that stereotypes about the technically savvy (and well-educated) are highly overrated.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:23 pm 34. USAF Captain:

Nine-of-Diamonds writes:

“The problem with Obama is, he’s making promises that can’t be kept..He & his handlers abolished patriotism and replaced it with a seething cauldron of resentful victim constituencies.
Black supremacists.
Weatherman wannabes.
LA RAZA.
Environmental luddites.
“Peace” activists.”

Mr Diamonds, in other words, the perfect storm. If we can endure, I figure that in about two years the public (no matter how tuned out they were), will become so turned off from his and the Democrat propitiation and identity politics, that there will be a groundswell of resentment a la 1994.

I don’t know if you are old enough to remember the Carter years but — alone and isolated without the benefit of the Internet to communicate — I literally seethed while that man shilly-shallied, bargained us down the river, gave away the canal, ruined the middle class’s finances (20% interest rtes and a soaring COL), weakened our military, saw to the overthrow of Reza Pahlavi by allowing Khomeini to return to Iran, and cowered after those students overran our embassy and took the hostages for 444 days. I remember being the first in line at the pools to vote for Reagan and coming home that night, hearing ABC call if for him over that turd peanut-farmer at 5:01 PM on the West Coast.

He was a weak and incompetent president and there is no reason that the Blessed Community Organizer, The Most High Vacuous One, will be any different.

..may they both b consigned to the scrap-heap of history.

..now I gotta go back into my room and polish up my two M-1s.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:29 pm 35. USAF Captain:

NOBAMA writes:
“The bad part? I live in Illinois so I’m pretty sure all our votes won’t count for sh** since the inner city voters of Chicago will vote 80% for Obama”

..I feel your pain, my brother(?) because I am in the People’s Republic of Ka-ri-fon-ea. Nonetheless, I am working hard for Mac and Sarah just to get in the faces of these D-turds. My enmity is growing more white-hot as the day draws closer.

But, persevere. Remember, “tough times don’t last, tough people do!”

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:34 pm 36. Suzy:

My husband and I are in our early 40s and Republicans. He hasn’t had a land line since the mid 1990s and I ditched mine in early 2000 right before we got married. Most of our friends and neighbors (Republicans too) don’t have landlines. I have also never been called by a pollster.

Sep 28, 2008 - 7:43 pm 37. lee:

I use landline and a cell phone, but because (1) I live in California, a decidedly blue state, so there’s no active campaigning here by either party (2) I’m Asian American, and our vote has as much an impact as the “youth vote”, so no one bothered to poll me.

In my almost 20 years living in southern California, I don’t recall a single phone from a polling organizations.

Sep 28, 2008 - 8:03 pm 38. UnmooredLefty:

I agree in general with the comments. Since I teach polling and survey research from time to time I do answer phone polls, if only to (in my own mind) critique them.

Two things: 1) Pollsters (i.e. research firms like the one my wife works for) do try to poll cell phones. You don’t have to “get cell phone numbers” you buy blocks of number known to have at least some people using them. It is not illegal to call cell phones for many (maybe most) phone polls. However, all the difficulties you list are pretty real, and every time my wife’s firm tries to seriously poll cell phone only users (they got a butt-load of money a year or so ago to just test run some cell work) they have the problems of both low answer rate (i.e. they don’t get an indication that the number being dialed is not an assigned number but no one answers) and a low response rate (i.e. those who do answer agree to be polled at a much lower rate than on landlines).

2) Pollsters are desperately trying to figure out how to ‘weight’ the responses they do get in an effort to mimic reality. It looks to me like they’re failing.

We may well be back to the point where the polls are basically useless except for ’selling’ the results on MSM outlets.

Anyway, serious people I know who are Obama supporters say that unless Obama has a consensus 5 point lead on election day he doesn’t have much of a chance. They’re basing this on the hard-core paid political polling, not the crap that gets put out by the MSM.

Sep 28, 2008 - 8:31 pm 39. Yaakov Watkins:

I’m 57 Republican and we have only cells and a voip in the house. However I am listed with directory assistance. I get calls from people who identify themselves as pollsters.

I found an wonderful tactic for dealing with them. I lie. The last pollster I talked to thinks I am 98, female, make 500k a year and I’m a registered Libertarian.

The one before that thinks I’m a racist Democrat.

I object to polling. Politicians use polling data to choose their positions. Being a “man of conviction” used to refer one’s beliefs. Now it refers to a court record.

Sep 28, 2008 - 9:13 pm 40. Donna B.:

Today is my husband’s 68th birthday. We’ve been cell phone only since 2004 because we were only getting telemarketing calls on our landline.

We usually cancel each other’s vote. But this year, we’re both voting McCain.

It’s odd that 3 out of 5 of our children have landlines, isn’t it? 2 out of those three are definitely voting McCain. The other, probably, but they haven’t told me for sure.

The 2 without landlines? Definitely McCain votes.

Polls are meaningless.

Sep 28, 2008 - 9:29 pm 41. Mudpie:

I moved five years ago from the primarily
republican suburb, to a part of the city
with private schools and lots of Land Rovers and the like. The only thing I have
different is the local prefex on my phone
number is the same as the primarily democrate area to the south. When I lived in the suburb, I never was called by an election poller. Since I received my new
phone prefex, I was called several times a week. As I gave a very conservative responce, I was very often accused of lying
or the call simply ended. I must be on a “do not call him as his responce will not be what we want” list as I have not had a call from a poller for more than two years.

Sep 28, 2008 - 9:35 pm 42. Nan:

I do not have a regular phone in my house. Broadband and reasonable pricing plans on cell phones have rendered a landline obsolete.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:10 pm 43. bc:

Given that I’m pretty sure Obama is a lying left wing sociopath bent on the destruction and subsequent marxist reconstruction of our economy, this makes me feel better. Friggin Brown University shuttles fifty million to Chicago where Bill Friggin Ayers uses it to literally create Obama the candidate like pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Is anyone besides me worried stiff about this guy winning?

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:34 pm 44. USAF Captain:

Stephanos writes:
“..if I recall correctly, Gore held similar leads this far out. In fact, Gore may have held leads nearly, and maybe until, the election itself.”

Stephanos: Would that it were so; at least I hope your memory is better than mine. Very respectfully, my recollection is different. I recall GW having a +2-3 point lead going into the DUI flap on the last weekend and having Gallup and/or Rassmussen (the two biggies back then) shrink to zip or maybe even +1 for the Bloated EnvironMENTAList. And then we had that month-long nightmare.

But, you’re dealing with a seriously old and frail man here (me) and I have an imperfect memory..wait..what were we talking about?

But the empirical evidence proffered above is heartening.

Sep 28, 2008 - 10:45 pm 45. chrisa798:

I have no landline and got polled on my cell phone — I didn’t look at the number before answering and because I was worried about something and thought that was what the call was about. I’m pro-McCain but much more heavily anti-Obama.

Sep 28, 2008 - 11:34 pm 46. Adjoran:

Those pollsters who have attempted to sample cell phones have found the results closely follow those from land lines.

The biggest problem modern polling faces is the response rate, the % of persons reached who agree to participate. In the mid-’80s, response rates stayed close to 80%. By the mid-’90s, they had declined sharply, with those pollsters who disclosed those numbers showing 50% as a baseline. Nowadays, none of the pollsters disclose their response rates, rather considering those numbers “proprietary information.”

At the best, polls show a snapshot of opinion of a moment in time. If that moment happens not to be the moment of decision for the voter (excepting those who would never alter their vote anyway), the reading is of informational interest, but hardly predictive of the outcome.

Sep 29, 2008 - 12:55 am 47. lee:

Did Gore really have a lead until the day of the election? I was fresh out of high school at that point. I never followed the election.

That would be a welcome precedent for Mccain, who’s keeping the race close but can’t seem to rise to the top. I don’t think he’s ever led outright outside of the one week following the GOP convention.

If he somehow closes the gap within a point or two by early November, what are his chances? I REALLY don’t want Obama to win. I recall left leaning South Korean president Roh Moo Hyun skyrocketed to popularity by appealing to anti American leftists. He left office with a 20% approval rating and South Koreans ended up replacing him with a moderate conservative.

Sep 29, 2008 - 1:30 am 48. Mountain Girl:

Polls rely on the twin assumptions that people first answer their phones and then feel free to give an honest answer. For decades almost everyone dropped whatever they were doing whenever the phone rang. Caller ID, voice mail and cell technology changed that behavior for good. As a result, pollsters increasingly have to massage their raw data. At some point the inability to complete all but a small fraction of calls is going to call the entire methodology into question.

In a free society it is also assumed that people will give honest answers. When I read a recent Florida newspaper story in which the reporter cites an anonymous pollster as reported that a particular person whose name was in the story said that she could never vote for a Black man, I have to wonder how many people will be willing to speak their mind to any pollster in the future.

Sep 29, 2008 - 1:55 am 49. Chris:

I’ve been working the poll calling from my local McCain victory center. If I call 100 people, I might get 5 to actually answer the polls. And these are supposedly R or R-leaning households we are calling. It’s very frustrating, but I guess the higher up powers feel somehow it’s effective. I’m thinking of a better way to reach these potential voters!!!????

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:01 am 50. Jamie:

My husband and I have used cells only for the last four or five years. Why? We are a military family, and it makes a lot more sense to keep cells, which can have numbers that are not long distance for our families to call, numbers that never change no matter how often or far we move - at least CONUS. We are far from the only military family who do that, and my oldest son, a Marine, also uses a cell phone exclusively (if he hasn’t lost another one).

If a lot of military families are being excluded from polling because of this, their polls are very skewed indeed. Shouldn’t someone be surveying different demographics to see how many are falling through the cracks, and correct polls accordingly?

Oh, and read this about polling skew due to weighting, which is usually left out of the reported poll results (I guess it confuses people?). It will make lots of people feel better.

http://wizbangblog.com/content/2008/09/24/obamas-weight-problem.php

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:15 am 51. Mike M:

Even if cell phones were used for polling there is no guarantee that a given person is registered to vote anywhere near that original area code’s location. My son lives 800 miles away in another state and still has his Massachusetts area code.

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:40 am 52. BillD in Iowa:

I’m 51 and have never ever ever been asked about politics on a phone or otherwise.
I’m VERY computer savvy (since 1987) and an IT geek. We have a land line simply because where we live, cell phones of ANY type or brand or service don’t work. Black hole of cell service. Even our SATELLITE Internet connection gets lost when it rains down there.
I am Republican AND conservative for most issues.
I do agree, most young folks, ESPECIALLY those going to a UNIVERSITY, lean very heavily left in this state and few have a land-line so in this state, the polls will be skewed.
But I look at it this way - those who will answer polls are most often Democrats. Just like those who most often own a certain car will be more likely to have a certain personality. Just ask Madison Avenue…… it’s the human mind. AND how you ask questions can determine the reply you get.
Think about it all……..

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:47 am 53. BillD in Iowa:

Just keep in mind - do you value a society where you can openly criticize ANYONE and get away with it, even be encouraged, or where you fear for your family and job if you do, and if you disagree, your WEB SITE may be hacked. Yup, another one went down in the last couple days! Hacked with a SQL bomb…… How many sites for each side have been hacked… you guessed it. Only one side has had their blogs and web sites hacked (and email, too!)
I’m sorry, but I’m SCARED! Ask the Missouri governor…..
And someone has no clue about negotiations…. I mean, START negotiations with your highest ranking person - then have nowhere to go if that fails?? No country has ever done that! Even Nixon has his people spend 2 years with lower level meetings before HE went to China.

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:54 am 54. Are You Wireless or Wireline?:

[...] Pajamasmedia [...]

Sep 29, 2008 - 5:57 am 55. Sioux Lady:

I’m 67, my husband is 75, my brother is also 75, my bro-in-law is 83. We all have landlines. (My husband and I have cells, too for long distance calls. Our tribe pays for our local service from our tribal telephone company.) Being retired, we all are home most of the time to answer the landline - none of us screen our calls. I’m wondering if we are typical of most old folks - reachable by pollsters - and Obama is still ahead, does that mean that most AARPers will vote for Obama? Since we are more likely to vote than the 20 somethings does that mean anything? I sure hope not!

Sep 29, 2008 - 5:58 am 56. wlpeak:

I think the posts here point out the obvious. That it is problematic to assume the political leanings of cell only users when the most likely way to determine it is with a “POLL”.

Sep 29, 2008 - 7:27 am 57. hp:

ditto sorta @ Tom K

my phone is not answered to strangers so basically he and i and OUR undocumentable, unpollster-harrassed legions match your landlineless peeps tit for tit.

nice (blatant) shot at attempting to skewer people’s political mindsets, though.

Sep 29, 2008 - 7:45 am 58. Richard:

I remember back in the 1950’s when everyone used to run to the phone and answer it as if it was always good news at the other end. That died in the 1970’s with the growth of telemarketing. The only reason I have a cell phone is to call the auto club if my car breaks down. It’s off nearly all the time. I still have an answering machine attached to a land line phone and I’m still listed in the phone book. I have caller ID so I use it to screen phone calls. But, I wouldn’t participate in a poll except maybe to lie to them.

So, in a funny way, the pollsters have not escaped the fallacy of the self selected sample. Not only are their samples not random, they seemed to have forgotten that if they claim a plus or minus 2.5 per cent error rate, when you have one candidate at 46 per cent and one at 48 per cent, neither candidate is ahead. Yet, even news anchors who are not otherwise dopes (Brit Hume) will report that the guy at 48 per cent is ahead.

Sep 29, 2008 - 8:15 am 59. DStill:

I have been Cell only for over 10 years, I’m 48 and do computer support, so I consider myself quite savvy. After reading all the comments, I’ve got to say I also assumed that the majority of individuals who had tossed their land lines were like me. I regret to say I was wrong.

I’ll be voting for Obama in November.

The comments about Obama being socialist, the messiah, his supporters being Obamabots and Obamatrons, just reinforces my choice. Immaturity will not help McCain at all, and if those few supporters do want to sway people who are on the fence, perhaps they should use different tactics.

Sep 29, 2008 - 8:42 am 60. mike smith:

The only poll that called me this year was on my cell phone, so go figure.

-M

Sep 29, 2008 - 8:51 am 61. just pixels:

Some polls do include cell-only phones. Those who responded heavily favored Obama (by 2-to-1, I think). By far most people still have landlines so the cell phone effect, is 1-2 points.

Zogby (maybe some others, like SurveyUSA) are trying to bypass the telephone via internet surveys. As best I can tell, the weighting model is still in flux and results are hard to assess. The internet approach is to counter telephone resistance. Like most people, I’m reluctant to answer an unknown caller.

As for weighting Dems 40%, Reps 30% … reputable pollsters base that largely on party registration figures. They then weight responses accordingly to account for people — list almost everyone who commented on this post — who won’t answer the phone or the questions, the self-selection factor.

Election polling on prominent races and questions is very accurate. Because people typically have well-formed opinions they tend to answer honestly, rather than saying just anything out of embarrassment. And election polling techniques get tested on election day, then revised as lessons are learned. Pollsters have nothing to gain from inaccuracy.

I realize this is a conservative blog and posters are looking for comfort in the polling statistics. So consider this: Just before the 2000 election, Al Gore was polling several points below George Bush. But Gore won the popular vote.

Sep 29, 2008 - 9:09 am 62. nlcatter:

Dems also use answering machine on land line
YOU MORON

so that is a wash!

Sep 29, 2008 - 10:34 am 63. just pixels:

(I’m not sure nlcatter is responding to my post. He refers to “YOU MORON”, which doesn’t describe me at all!)

The question whether those who don’t respond to pollsters — for any reason — materially biases the results. In this thread many people proudly proclaimed they refuse to answer the phone or talk to pollsters or have only a cell-phone.

Pollsters have a clear interest in accuracy. But social and technological forces are constantly changing the landscape they work in. Finding the right people to ask in the right way will always be both art and science. Sometimes the art obscures the science and vis-a-versa.

Rudeness, on the other hand, is always obvious.

Sep 29, 2008 - 1:08 pm 64. Marc Malone:

DStill - I get what you mean about the name-calling, but it happens on the liberal blogs, too, so don’t just fault the conservatives.

Labelling someone a socialist (or a Liberal) is NOT name calling. It’s a political belief system. It’s truly indicative of how someone will legislate/govern. Socialists should run on the Socialist party ticket, but they’d never win, so they run as Dems. We have to identify them as the Socialists they are. Fair cop.

I think a fair point I saw in another article/blog was that young people tend to answer their phones regardless. The older people get, the more they screen and the less they take calls. Obama does better among the young. Some polls are done including cellphones. The respondents will therefore tend to be Obama supporters.

Obama doesn’t do nearly as well with the over-40 crowd. They’re not as easily swayed (read:duped) by high-sounding rhetoric. That’s a big clue as to which way one should vote if one is (amazingly) still undecided.

One last point: maybe this refusing to respond to pollsters by conservatives is the real cause of “the Bradley effect”? I dunno.

Sep 29, 2008 - 1:23 pm 65. nick:

TOM K is the moron who mentioned GOP dont answer phones

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:11 pm 66. nick:

Obama

realpolitics leads by +4.6%!!!

Sep 29, 2008 - 4:12 pm 67. Ranger:

CONCLUSION:
POLLS ARE NOTHING TO US.
DON’T BELIEVE IN THE POLLS
Th

Sep 30, 2008 - 5:30 am 68. smg45acp:

Don’t forget the “I don’t want to be thought of as a racist” factor.

Lots of people that are polled answer that they are going to vote for Obama because they don’t want the person on the other end of the phone think they are a racist and are not voting for Obama simply because he is black.

But when it comes time to actually pull the lever or punch the ballot, they will vote for McCain because they know Obama is just another lying two-bit scum elitist socialist politician.
But they can’t say so publicly because they will be accused of just thinking that way because he is black.

As always, the only poll that counts is the one done on election day.

Oct 1, 2008 - 6:52 am 69. dave:

Did you ever look at the percentages of polls? It is usually 40% dems, 35% repubs, and the rest Independents, and Obama only leads by 6 points. It looks like the Polls are skewed to favor the Idiot!

George Bush has been in office for 7 1/2 years.
The first six the economy was fine.

However, a little over one year ago:

1) Consumer confidence stood at a 2 1/2 year high;
2) Regular gasoline sold for $2.19/gallon;
3) the unemployment rate was 4.5%.
4) the DOW JONES hit a record high–14,000+
5) American’’s were buying new cars, taking cruises, vacations overseas, living large!…

But American’’s wanted ”CHANGE”! So, in 2006 they voted in a Democratic Congress & yes–we got ”CHANGE” all right!…..

1) Consumer confidence has plummeted ;
2) Gasoline is now over $4 a gallon & climbing!!;
3) Unemployment is up to 6% (a 20% increase);
4) Americans have seen their home equity drop by 12 TRILLION DOLLARS & prices still dropping;
5) 1% of American homes are in foreclosure.
6) as I write, THE DOW is probing another low~~11,300–$2.5 TRILLION DOLLARS HAS EVAPORATED FROM THEIR STOCKS, BONDS & MUTUAL FUNDS INVESTMENT PORTFOLIOS!

*YES, IN 2006 AMERICA VOTED FOR CHANGE!…AND WE SURE GOT IT!!!….NOW the DEM”S CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT–AND THE POLLS SAY HE”S GONNA BE ”THE MAN”–CLAIMS HE”S GOING TO REALLY GIVE US CHANGE!!….JUST HOW MUCH MORE ”CHANGE” DO YOU THINK YOU CAN STAND???*

Oct 1, 2008 - 12:46 pm 70. FreedomLover:

DH and I aren’t young or liberal, but we’re connected enough to have ditched our landline years ago. It is correct to say that polls miss cellphone users; it is incorrect to assume that all these folks are Obama voters.

Oct 1, 2008 - 12:52 pm 71. Apollodorus:

Heh. Yea, yea, I’m another cell-phone only conservative, etc. etc.

But don’t kid yourselves. I am a mid-twenties technophile. Most of my friends are Obama supporters and cell-phone only. That is representative, I think.

We would be lucky– LUCKY– to get a 70-30 split (Obama-McCain) amongst the wireless-only. That’s my guess.

They’re young, they’re “educated,” (translation: they’re indoctrinated and stupid), and they are excited about Obama.

Oct 1, 2008 - 2:10 pm 72. ice:

we dumped the landline 3 years ago, the two of us and the three kids have cells. we tried and liked skype and buy an incoming line and unlimited outgoing calls to us and canada for $66 dollars a year. we love it. the telemarketers don’t have this number and no pollsters calls us. I love the skype number. if i want to take a nap I just shut skype off, it has voicemail and don’t have to run around the house and shut off the 5 extensions of the old landline.

we tried skype alongside out landline for 6 months and realized that the only people calling us on the landline were telemarketers at dinner. even though we were on the do not call list loopholes they wrote in the law allowed us to receive at least 1 a day.

now….blessed silence. when the phone rings it is someone we know.

why did we not go all cell?

1 daytime minutes can be eaten up very quickly if not careful
2 talk on a cell phone too much and your brain my heat up
3 the call quality on skype beats cell and landline
4 skype can do video calls to another computer
5 skype can do computer to computer call that are scary clear, all digital sound, unreal quality
6 skype can do 128 bit encrypted calls to another computer
and if you consider the fact that all cell and landline calls are interceptable (and probably are by the NSA) it is nice to have a little privacy nowadays
7 business contacts, banks etc need a number and if you give all these people your cell then your number can get out into the wild and its junk call time again. so we have a number, a local number that rings on the computer.
8 everywhere my laptop is, so is my phone, i just sign in and I can make and receive calls, very handy for traveling
9 international calls very cheap
10 conference calls super easy and free in the US

Oct 1, 2008 - 3:06 pm 73. Doubting the Polls… | Pirates! Man Your Women!:

[...] Edgelings.com » Forget Red or Blue State: Are You Wireless or Wireline? (No Ratings Yet)  Loading … [...]

Oct 1, 2008 - 8:09 pm 74. Believer:

It doesn’t really matter what the polls say, or who they poll.

This election is going to be stolen.

On the radio today I heard a mother say her very tall, 15yr. old son, was approached at a shopping center and, though they knew how old he was, they registered him to vote, telling him he was old enough. When he told his mother, she set him straight. Now that he won’t show up to vote, they’ll probably have someone else vote for him.

Tonight I read at gatewaypundit.blogspot.com that Ohio’s Secretary of State - Democrat - is prohibiting ‘observers’ of the early voting. Those would be the voters who can both register and vote on the same day. No way to know if they’ve voted elsewhere.

BO won the nomination by winning most caucuses. In those, I read he drove in groups of supporters - from out of state - sometimes a week before to participate and vote for him.

Anyone here who doesn’t know his history with ACORN, or their activities, had better get educated.

We’re screwed.

Oct 1, 2008 - 9:49 pm 75. Dr. Mark:

Hey DStill,
–Obama is a socialist, by any measure. he has NEVER held a real job that was not at the public teat. He has NO “real world” or military experience. You can vote for anyone and in Obama’s case be in the good company of ACORN,Gay Marriage, pro-Abortion, anti-military, appeasing, pacifist, pro-affirmative action, and many other so-called Americans.
By the way, here is something else to consider…a “conservative” African American like Ward Connerly or Justice Thomas (and many more) are considered “sellouts” by many blacks. So, how do we label all those smilin’ white faces at the Obama rallies? OOps! I forgot, that would be rascist…

Oct 2, 2008 - 10:03 am 76. Josie:

I’m a 52 year old conservative woman with a cell phone only. When I had a land line I never answered if I didn’t know who was calling or thought it was a telemarketer or pollster. I’m spending the money that I’m saving by not having a land line on conservative media such as talk radio podcasts for my ipod so I can listen to my favorites that air while I’m at work.

Oct 4, 2008 - 10:43 pm 77. JA:

“Seeing as how cell (and VOIP) numbers aren’t listed anywhere, it would be rather difficult for a pollster to call them. This isn’t a problem that can be “fixed”. It’s an inherent flaw with telephone polling that’s only going to get worse with time.”

This is a pointless criticism. It does not matter if a phone number is listed or not because any decent survey researcher is going to use random digit dialing (RDD). No one is taking the white pages and selecting their sample from it.

Non-sampling error for those with cell phones only will not be a significant problem until this number reaches 20% of the population. Right now, we’re at just over 10%.

The real problem is sampling error. Cell phone users can move without changing their number, so where geography is a concern, that must be adjusted for.

Oct 7, 2008 - 11:30 am

Write a Comment

Name:	(required, displayed)
Email:	(required, not publicized)
URL:	(optional, displayed) remember personal info?
Comments: