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« Debates | Main | Uh, boss? We really doing this? »

Meta Polling

Ok, i promise this is my last Bernie Sanders post for at least... let's say an hour.

This is really more of a joke. I am reacting to this headline:

Poll: Democratic primary voters see Hillary Clinton as most electable

They are polling people to see how well they think politicians will do in polls. I demand they go one step further and poll people on how well people think politicians will do in the polls about which politicians people think will do well in the polls.

There is a serious element to this, though, as illustrated in this article: Bernie Sanders Doesn't Have A Chance Because People Think He Doesn't Have A Chance.

As i've said before, we are incredibly bad about guessing who people will vote for. Even professional pundits are really bad at it, and all we do is process and internalize what the pundits say. Primaries are our time to shape the state of the debate, not to pre-emptively capitulate on our policies because we think the rest of the country won't like them. And if you must make these kinds of calculations, consider that Sanders' positions are broadly popular (and it's not like Hillary Clinton's relationship with the general electorate is all that great).

By fnord12 | August 5, 2015, 8:37 AM | Liberal Outrage


Comments

You know, you might be interested in something that's happening across the Atlantic. The Labour Party in the UK is in the middle of a leadership election. There are three establishment candidates, whose philosophy is largely the same as Tony Blair's (that Labour needs to move to the political centre to attact enough votes to win). But there have been a number of polls of Labour members that show the fourth candidate (Jeremy Corbyn) - a genuine left-winger who still believes in socialism - having a very clear lead on first preferences (the election is held using preferential voting). He may not win in the end, but a month ago nobody saw him as anything other than a token left-wing candidate, there simply to widen the debate.

Thanks, Stephen. I've seen articles comparing the two in passing, but i will look into it more and keep an eye on how he progresses.