What If We Banned Polling?

A Slate thought experiment.

By Daniel Engber
Updated Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2008, at 7:18 PM ET

We learned two things from Tuesday's Democratic primary in New Hampshire: First, the Hillary Clinton campaign is very much alive; second, the pre-election polls were virtually useless. According to the numbers, Barack Obama was on pace to win by a margin of five to 13 percentage points; instead, he lost by three.

But opinion polling might be much worse than inaccurate. It's easy to imagine that the polls themselves affect the outcome of the elections they're supposed to predict. Voters may be inclined to jump on the bandwagon of a candidate who appears to be cruising to victory. Or they may stay home if they think their favorite is either out of the running or coasting to an easy win. Many believe that ubiquitous horse-race coverage pushes second-tier candidates out of the picture—and that Joseph Biden, Chris Dodd, Bill Richardson, and Ron Paul are all suffering at the hands of meddlesome pollsters.

...

The possibilities go on and on. But now it's your turn: What do you think would happen if our election cycle were spared the endless opinion polls? Would campaign coverage look any different? Or maybe the candidates themselves would change their messages, and their approach. …

http://www.slate.com/id/2181838/pagenum/2

might have to work.

It might make them say less - they'd just have to sit and wait for the results, and, being unable to ask potential voters for their opinions, they might have to broadcast more of the candidates, but that would be less work from them, not more.

Oh yeah, great idea. I also love how the author automatically assumes it's the polls that must be wrong in an 82% Diebold determined election.

Let's think of some other great ideas. Maybe we should ban news media coverage of elections, so as to not sway opinion? Or let's make it mandatory to prove citizenship by fingerprinting in order to vote.

So many great ideas, so little time...

Exit polls are used for this purpose to make sure election aren't rigged, and even polls beforehand made Bush win in 2004 look suspicious--the only other president to get re-elected with such a low approval rating was Truman--and Bush aint no Truman.

...how then would the citizenry be distracted from the lack of discussion of actual issues & led into the mentality of a horse race or football game? I suppose the candidates could learn some song & dance routines, you know, with boater hats & canes, & spangly outfits... maybe Uncle Sam costumes. I'd suggest they could maybe work up some comedy skits, too, but I've got a sneaking feeling that might in fact be what they're showing us now, anyway.

was told to go piss up a rope.