Several weeks ago results of a poll showing, for the first time, that support for the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative had fallen off dramatically were widely publicizized, such as in this gleeful account.
Many poll watchers were skeptical of these results, since they were so much at odds with all other polls, although of course it was possible that popular opnion had simply reversed as a result of the onslaught of opposition to MCRI from the major media and establishment figures in Michigan.
Now Chetly Zarko reports the findings of a new poll that seems to confirm the previous one really was an outlier.
Yesterday morning, Bill Ballenger of Marketing Resource Group, a Michigan political consulting group, disclosed additional information from the poll that has been making media rounds showing that Dick DeVos is in a dead-heat with Governor Jennifer Granholm in the gubernatorial race. Ballenger revealed deeper results of his poll in answer to questions on the Frank Beckmann Show host on WJR 760 AM radio. The additional information that the media has completely failed to pick up on (bias?) is that Ballenger’s results on the question of support and opposition to the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative (MCRI) are radically different from a poll release only a week earlier by EPIC-MRA’s consulting group owned by Ed Sarpolus. Ballenger finds that MCRI is healthy — holding a 55–36 edge. Sarpolus found that the race was a dead heat, with a 44–47 margin. Every other poll in the state for years has shown between 55 and 65 percent support margins for MCRI, using a number of different wordings including wording favorable to the opposition.
While I’m on the subject of polls (which I rarely am), it may be worth mentioning that, although most media buzz still revolves around a discussion of whether the Democrats will return to power in 2006, (or, if not, how close they will come), the news in the above poll — that Democratic governor Granholm is in serious trouble — is not unique.
Other recent polls suggest that the Republicans have a better than expected possibility of ousting incumbent Democratic governors in both Pennsylvania and Illinois and even picking up a Senate seat in New Jersey.
I don’t do polls, and thus am not predicting Republican wins in all or even any of these races. But it may be that the Democrats, their friends in the media, and others have been salivating a bit too soon at the predicted demise of both MCRI and Republicans generally.
“Many poll watchers were skeptical of these results, since they were so much at odds with all other polls, although of course it was possible that popular opnion had simply reversed as a result of the onslaught of opposition to MCRI from the major media and establishment figures in Michigan.”
Think exit polling on election day 2004. Kos and Atrios hammered the nation all day into falsely believing that Kerry had won by a landslide (to discourage voters from going to the polls to cast “futile” votes against him). Yet another fantasy of race preferentialists is about to bite the dust, big time. You’d think that they would have learned by now about the political benefits of realism.
UPDATE: More evidence of bias by pollster
A “cross” hat-tip to John Rosenberg’s Discriminations for pointing me in the right direction after he linked to my most recent post on the new poll showing MCRI at 54-36, which is newsworthy because of a poll a week earlier by Ed Sarpolus at EPIC-MRA, …
John, your link to the NOW copy (and you worried about copying whole articles) of the MIRS (insider-politics paid subscription Lansing, MI newsletter) story, caused me to catch a key statement by the pollster that did the March 9th “outlier” poll. I think it captures his bias perfectly.
Here’s the quote:
“What’s interesting there is that African Americans finally understand it’s not a pro-Civil Rights initiative,” Sarpolus explained.
Also, just yesterday, Accuracy in the Media penned this general piece on “Deceptive Polling”:
http://www.aim.org/media_monitor/4445_0_2_0_C/
The GOP win in NJ? Are they going to post guards on cementaries?
I love that. I think it would make a great political blog title “Guarding the Cemetaries”, especially if you were a conservative from Chicago (or even here in Detroit City).
A GOP Senate win in New Jersey? Could happen. When did Diebold win the contract for the voting machines here?
–Cobra