that only your candidate can win and you want to freeze things in the status quo if you candidate is currently leading, then you have to argue that the current polls are as they will be a year from now.

Just posted the same thing is this thread.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/1287199440

Sid

She went out and built it up. People forget how spectacular a candidate she was in the first 9 months of 2007.

Then the media began to manufacture mini-scandals against her. The most significant moment of that race IMO was when other candidates were saying that she had been running for president her whole life--and ironic thing to say about someone who gave up her political ambitions to support her husband--and she finally pushed back on the narrative. She pointed out that Barack Obama had wrote something in kindergarten about wanting to be president.

It quickly became known as "the kindergarten attack." She was portrayed as a monster who viciously attacked people over anything, even what they did in kindergarten. It devastated her campaign and opened the door for future manufactured mini-scandals.

She really did have to be perfect in order to win. She couldn't be--no one could. But damn...those first 9 months of the race she came awfully close.

And he didn't "forgive" her, he asked her to help him win the election by campaigning hard for him, which she did.

The supers could have actually flipped that race if they wanted to (which is what a lot of people were freaking out about here on DU at the time, which I predicted wasn't going to happen).

It didn't help her cause to be accused of being "hysterical" and to have her laugh (Cackle) made fun of.

I will guarantee Obama and his team used them to direct his campaign in a number of areas. Far too many people talk about polls when they really don't understand how to read them or the value they provide. To the public as well as politicians and the private sector.

They are so much more than indicating trends. Most polls we are reading do not even attempt to claim they are predictors of future events. That is a fatal flaw of the novice poll aficionados.

With respect to trends, that is what most of us look at political polls for. This also leads to another fatal flaw of the novice. Using different polls to claim to see a trend when the basic statistical model used between polls is often not even the same.

You also can't fully understand the billion dollar anti-clinton and media industry from polls. It's not what they are for. People try to make polls out to be whatever they feel they want. Statistics be damned.

Even though some here seem to argue that current polls are a predication of what will happen in the general.

Yours and those you are referencing.

Including speaking directly about the question you asked.

Convincingly.

On the GOP side, the early frontrunners won their nominations in the elections of '00, '96, '88, '80, '68, '60

This constant repetition that early frontrunners never win is hogwash. The truth is early frontrunners have have pretty good odds of winning.

Or why single out 2007 alone?

No one seems to be saying Biden is inevitable. But it's a weird dynamic at play here. For months, we've been told polls don't matter - and then there was a rash of polls that showed Biden's lead slipping...only to have a few more polls come out that show his support leveling off and we're back to this narrative that polls don't matter.

But polls do matter. Especially right now. Polls solidify who the real threat is as we head into the last leg of the primary season before the Iowa Caucus - and you better believe that jockeying is important because, despite there being exceptions (2004 and 2008 are good examples of this), once we get to September, the race heats up significantly heading into the end-year, and positioning going into the end year will prove very important because it dictates final momentum before the first votes are cast (and once that happens, all bets are off).

Polls also matter because they drive fundraising. If a candidate is not polling well, or they lose a bulk of their support, a narrative starts to set in that they're struggling, or losing momentum or not viable. There's no better example of this than Elizabeth Warren. In the first financing report, she didn't do too hot. But as her poll numbers started to rise, the narrative shifted ... and what do you know, she pulled in a pretty decent fundraising haul this past go around. Likewise, though in the opposite direction, Bernie pulled in the best fundraising numbers in early April's release - besting Harris, O'Rourke, Mayor Pete and Warren (who was a very distant fifth and just barely above Klobuchar and Booker). But as his poll numbers took a hit after Biden entered the race, and Warren's rise ... his comparative numbers dropped significantly. He was out-raised by Mayor Pete, Biden and Warren.

Polls are not just for entertainment. Even in 2007, they weren't just entertainment.

At this point in 2007, it was clear the face would be between Clinton and Obama, as no other candidate was generating anywhere near the numbers either did. And what do you know, the primary went down to the wire.

In the 2012 Republican Primary, Mitt Romney was the front-runner at this point in 2011, and, really, he remained the front-runner for most the contest. Santorum surprised in Iowa ... but it wasn't enough to really change the race significantly.

In the 2016 Republican Primary, Trump took his first lead in national polling on 7/19 - and he wouldn't relinquish the lead again.

Even in the 2004 Democratic Primary, at this point, Kerry was second at 14% in a Harris Interactive poll. Kerry was also second in a ABC News/Washington Post poll. The difference? The candidate leading in those national polls, Lieberman, was only pulling in 13% and 16% in those respective polls.

Lieberman cratered, and maybe Biden will too, but polls at least are a pretty good indicator of who is likely to be the nominee - even this far out.

my vote because she had gone super negative and I didn't like what I was hearing from her and her supporters. I can't remember the specifics now, but I remember being turned off. Her supporters (at that time) were very rude as well and would later be known as PUMAs.

Of course, by 2016, Hillary had a clean slate again (at least with me) and I fully supported her.