Reply #54: Yes, your data is incomplete [View All]

I have been questioning your work for weeks, now. Perhaps you should pay attention to replies instead of merely posting more and more of the same thing.

Yes, you are obviously not a polling expert. You don't appear to know much about them, and are jsut leading everybody up the garden path.

Those figures from SIMON/SCOOP only give figures state by state say nothing whatsover about what precincts were sampled, and you still have to justify your assumption that precincts were chosen randomly (contrary to normal commercial polling practice)

In answer to your questions:

You can use the numbers you used if you like, as long as you realise it is not telling us anything.
Mitofsky won't release the data because he is under contract to the people who paid him. It is also correct practice not to reveal which areas were sampled in order to avoid parties trying to distort the data. This is normally carried over for some months after the polling. It is just basic practice. There is nothing sinister about it.
I question the probability 'calculation' because, for the thousandth time, it is based on incomplete data: you don't know which precincts were measured.

Further:
1) Yes, you are using insufficient data to be able to make any sensible calculation

2) No, the Polling methodology was not flawed. It was probably basic methodology, which I have explained in past replies to you. As with most predictive polls, they were investigating not absolute numbers, but swing, so a 52% measurement in favour of Kerry could easily indicate a Bush win if that figure is less than the expected vote for Kerry in that sample

3) I would not say anything about the MOE as I don't know the sampling method. I'm sure it will probably turn out to be 2% or less. In other words, there is only a small chance that the measured value deviates from the actual IN THE PRECINCTS THAT WERE SAMPLED. But, as I said, we don't know which precincts were sampled.