MITOFSKY WROTE BACK TO ME!!!!!!

Dear Mr. *:
Your comment does not fit with what I said. What I said was that mid-day exit polls are not the final result of an exit poll. And that no one should expect exit polls in mid-day to be the same as the final results. Do you think the score at half time of a football game should be the same as the final score? Furthermore, the leaked numbers were not our best estimates as of the time they were leaked. The leakers had no idea what they were passing along and the bloggers had no idea what they were getting. EVERYONE DID NOT MISUNDERSTAND OUR NUMBERS. The proof of what I am saying is that neither Edison/Mitofsky nor any of the members made any mistakes in projecting winners AFTER the polls closed based on these same exit polls. Only the morons who leaked the erroneous numbers and the bloggers were misled. What is it that makes you think these same people would know how to interpret raw numbers?
warren mitofsky


After I correct him about my gender, what else would you like me to ask him based on this response??


Here was my original e-mail to him:

Dear Sir,

Your argument makes no logical sense. If you believe the “leaked data” or “mis-information” was incorrect or incorrectly misinterpreted by EVERYONE, then please, clear your name and your reputation and release the data. Get yourself off the hook. Prove to me that we can't read a list of numbers correctly. Also, prove to CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, MSNBC, Fox, Salon.com and Karen Hughes that the numbers they saw should have been "read differently". Just don't spit on me and tell me it's raining.

If these don't mean anything, if no one, including Hughes, can read or believe them, why do you have a job? What's the point of exit polling at all? Why bother? If not to predict the outcome, what were these polls intended to do? As you are the last link in the chain of “mis-information”, please do the right thing and release your raw data. Do it for your children and their children and the future of the country.

So wrong in fact that some were manipulated after the fact. How does he explain that?

if he is natural-born stupid or did he have to take lessons?

I MIGHT ask where Zogby got his exit poll numbers late in the evening to make his prediction, but I think the first response covers that one.

I might even ask "why the obfuscation?"

was academic. My inquiring mind wants to know. If he took lessons, I want to make sure I never get anywhere the place they give them.

What's that?

This forum. I do believe your post belongs in the General Discussion forum, or perhaps GD: Politics.

LBN is reserved for actual news stories, with links and quotes from articles. The news posted also must be less than 12 hours old.

"First off, the football game comparison is wrong, we are talking about percentages in this case, percentages can definitely stay the same throughout the day, even though people are still voting. If intermediate results are off, you still should be able to account for the fact that according to your poll the majority of democrats voted in the morning, while an even larger group of republicans voted in afternoon and early evening."

Examples below:
This being a percentage increase, this really is something that needs to be accounted for.

Suppose in the morning 53 percent voted Kerry, and 47 percent voted Bush. In the afternoon this is supposed to be brought to a 51-48 for Bush, so lets examine some numbers:
Suppose 100 voters in the morning, 53 for Kerry, 47 for Bush.
If the turnout remains constant throughout the day, expect 200 voters at the end of the day. For 200 voters, 51-48 to Bush would mean 102 Bush voters and 96 Kerry voters, or an afternoon in which 55 Bush votes and 43 Kerry votes were cast.

That is quite a swing, from 53-47 to 48-51 may seem like a swing of 5 points, but in the final exit poll, all results from the midday exit poll will be included, which means the afternoon has to go a lot more to Bush then to Kerry, in the case of equal votes cast before and after the midday poll. The midday swing would then be a 9 point swing, something to be explained.

Suppose turnout was larger in the second part of the exit poll (quite probable since this covers a larger time period, and all people returning from work), lets assume 200 afternoon votes were cast in our example.
The required vote totals would be 153 Bush, 144 Kerry, or 106 votes for Bush and 91 for Kerry. This still means in the afternoon and early evening, people voted 53-46 for Bush in the afternoon, still a reverse of the morning voting trend, still something to explain.



There is nothing erroneous about midday exit polling numbers. It shows what the standing is up until that moment. If the exit polling strategy is correct, then there should be some explanation offered as to why the morning voting trend and the afternoon voting trend were so different. Saying the midday exit poll is erroneous means the exit poll itself is erroneous.

And you might add that it is not actually that hard to get a percentage from raw numbers, but maybe that will lower your chances of getting a reply. ;)

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

Welcome to DU! And about the LBN, it's easy to make mistakes when you are new--I know I have made plenty. :dunce:

:hi: Good work! Good letter.

.. rather revealing. For starters he knows and we know that the data was not raw numbers. Nor was it leaked. The data was published on numerous NEP members websites. And finally of course it is not just the early exit poll numbers that predicted Kerry as winning, the final exit polls did too. It was only after they corrected the exit polls to conform with the election results that the polls came in line with the results - and that of course is rather an oxymoronic observation.

I would not hestitate to suggest to you how to reply to Mitofsky but I can't wait to see what you say. You have a great turn of phrase.

:yourock:

The leaked numbers were not our best estimates as of the time they were leaked. The leakers had no idea what they were passing along and the bloggers had no idea what they were getting.

A classic re-framing of the issue in true Rush Limbaugh style. What is called into question includes numbers published by CNN up until the wee hours of the morning of November 3.


The proof of what I am saying is that neither Edison/Mitofsky nor any of the members made any mistakes in projecting winners AFTER the polls closed based on these same exit polls.

Gee, is it possible that had something to do with the direct feed from actual vote tabulations and that no close states were called at all without first consulting those?


Only the morons who leaked the erroneous numbers and the bloggers were misled.

Still talking about unpublished data and refusing to acknowledge that published data at legitimate sources is in question. Naturally he completely ignored the suggestion that even Karen Hughes trusted the information.


What is it that makes you think these same people would know how to interpret raw numbers?

What is it that makes him think there would be a problem if someone else got the chance?


This guy is transparent