"Poll Of Polls" .... Accuracy And Results With NC and IN Primaries Set For Tomorrow...

This is the final average of the Real Clear Politics average of all major pollsters for North Carolina and Indiana.


I have re-posted the RCP polling averages from the other primaries to give the current NC and IN results some scale.


Real Clear Politics has what it calls the “RCP” average for predict election results. It takes the latest polls and averages them together to get a consensus or predicted outcome.


This system is used frequently on Cable News and is often called the “poll of polls.”


Below is a look at the RCP “polls of polls” margin of victory prediction and the actual results.


The results are from Primary states. Caucus states are not included so that we can have (as much as possible) an “apples to apples” comparison to the polling data for North Carolina and Indiana.


There are no available “RCP Poll of Poll averages” for Primaries held in several states including Delaware, Mississippi, Vermont and Oklahoma. This was probably due to the lack of available polling for those states.
This left Real Clear Politics’ “polls of polls” available for 20 primary contests.


I separated the RCP results into the following categories.



RCP was extremely accurate (within 3 points) 45% of the time.
9 contests


Pennsylvania
RCP… Clinton +6.1
Results … Clinton + 9.2
(Technically the polling average was off by 3.1 but it wasn’t wildly inaccurate so the result was included here.)



New Jersey
RCP… Clinton +9.8
Results … Clinton +7.7



New York
RCP… Clinton +17.2
Results… Clinton +17.5



Illinois
RCP… Obama +33
Results… Obama +31.5



Arizona
RCP… Clinton+ 6
Results… Clinton +8.8



Tennessee
RCP… Clinton +13.3
Results… Clinton +13



Ohio
RCP… Clinton +7.1
Results… Clinton + 10.1



Maryland
RCP… Obama 22.3
Results… Obama 23.5



Texas
RCP… Clinton + 1.7
Results… Clinton +3.5




RCP predicted the correct winner but the margin of victory (outside of 3 points) was wrong 30% of the time.
6 contests



South Carolina
RCP… Obama + 11.6
Results… Obama + 28.9



Virginia
RCP… Obama +17.7
Results… Obama +28.2



Wisconsin
RCP… Obama + 4.3
Results… Obama + 17.4



Rhode Island
RCP… Clinton + 9.7
Results… Clinton + 18



Massachusetts
RCP… Clinton + 7.0
Results… Clinton + 15.4



Georgia
RCP… Obama + 18
Results… Obama + 35.3



RCP predicted a margin of victory for the wrong winner 25% of the time
5 contests



New Hampshire
RCP… Obama +8.3
Results… Clinton +2.6



Connecticut
RCP… Clinton + 4.0
Results… Obama + 3.1



California
RCP… Obama + 1.2
Results… Clinton + 9.6


Alabama
RCP… Clinton + 1.2
Results… Obama + 14.1

Missouri
RCP… Clinton +5.7
Results… Obama + 1.2

Quick take home points.


RCP’s average of the best pollsters in the country yields the right winner 75% of the time or 3 out of every 4 contests.


The average of the best pollsters in the country yields the wrong winner 25% of the time or 1 out of every 4 contests.


The 5 times the RCP predicted the wrong winner, 3 of the 5 contests (60%) were won by Obama.


In the 6 contests were the RCP (poll of polls) has the winning candidates margin off by 3 points or more, (30% of the time) again it was Obama’s support that was underestimated in 4 of the 6 (67%) results.


Only in Massachusetts and Rhode Island has Clinton exceed her RCP predicted margin of victory by 3 or more points. (Pennsylvania 3.1)


The RCP polling average had the correct winner and the correct margin of victory (within about 3 points) in 9 contests or 45% of the time. Hillary Clinton was the winner in 7 of 9 or 78% of the time.




Here are the current RCP averages for Indiana and North Carolina as of 6:30pm 5/5/08



North Carolina
Obama… +7.0
Results… TBA


Indiana
Clinton… 5.0
Results… TBA


You can find all of this information at Realclearpolitics.com

After such a bad week, media distortions and manipulating, Bill's double-teaming, I'm concerned about Obama picking himself back up, exuding confidence.

Also with 5% perceived lead, political machine hanky panky goes unnoticed.

This loss of black claim TV is claiming for Obama, why not just call it Bill, Stephanie and a bad Wright week. The black vote will come home.

sp.