Barack Obama 51.0, Mitt Romney 49.0 (9/27)
Daily Tracking Average: Obama 48.0, Romney 45.0. Weighted Obama 50.3, Obama 49.7
National Media Average: Obama 48.8, Romney 44.0. Weighted Obama 51.7, Obama 48.3
Barack Obama 50.05, Mitt Romney 49.95 (9/20)
Daily Tracking Average: Romney 46.5, Obama 46.5. Weighted Romney 51.2, Obama 48.8
National Media Average: Obama 49.0, Romney 45.3. Weighted Obama 51.3, Obama 48.7
Mitt Romney 52.2, Barack Obama 47.9 (9/5)
Daily Tracking Average: Romney 47, Obama 46. Weighted Romney 51.7, Obama 48.3
National Media Average: Obama 46.7, Romney 46.7. Weighted Romney 52.6, Obama 47.5
Mitt Romney 51.1, Barack Obama 48.9 (8/29)
Daily Tracking Average: Obama 46.5 Romney 46. Weighted Romney 51, Obama 49
National Media Average: Obama 46.5 Romney 45.8. Weighted Romney 51.3, Obama 48.7
Mitt Romney 50.8, Barack Obama 49.2 (8/22)
Daily Tracking Average: Romney 46, Obama 44.5. Weighted Romney 52.2, Obama 47.8
National Media Average: Obama 48, Romney 45.3. Weighted Obama 50.6, Romney 49.4
Mitt Romney 50.5, Barack Obama 49.5 (8/15)
Our first popular vote analysis has the race for President in a statistical dead heat. As this is our first presentation, I want to take some time to explain our formula. One of the two primary components of our model is the daily tracking polls produced by Gallup and Rasmussen. These polls run daily surveys and average multiple days’ results for a final number released each day. Because of the multiple day combination the samples are considerably larger than the national media polls. In 2008 the final average of the two trackers was Obama 53.5 McCain 45%. The final result was Obama 52.9% McCain 45.6%. Rasmussen is currently polling likely voters while Gallup is polling registered voters.
The other component is the national media polls, which tend to be more varied and often offer a slight Democratic tilt, particularly in their polls of registered voters. To offset this we removed the best and worst poll for each candidate.
Because many pollsters are still using registered voter polls we added a net of +2 to Mitt Romney’s number. This is based on the historic trend of likely voter models leaning more Republican due to voting demographics. Given, that just over 60% of the registered voting population will vote in the Presidential election, it is crucial to know which registered voters will actually vote.
The final piece is the allocation of the uncommitted vote. Conventional wisdom, along with some electoral history indicates that the challenger will pick up the vast majority of the undecided vote. The reasoning is that the elections are usually a referendum on the incumbent so if voters have not yet committed, it is because they are not comfortable with the incumbent and are unlikely to pull the lever for him or her on Election Day. However, I think the internet and the constant barrage of attack ads have made voters more cynical of challengers as well as incumbents. It is for this reason that we only allot Mitt Romney a cautious 60% of the two-party undecided vote.
Daily Tracking Average: Romney 47, Obama 44.5. Weighted Romney 52.9, Obama 47.1
National Media Average: Obama 49, Romney 42. Weighted Obama 51.6, Romney 48.4
Formula
Average of the Gallup and Rasmussen Daily Tracking Polls and last five National Media polls minus the best and worst media poll for each candidate.
Polls not included from partisan polling groups.
Adjustment of +1 Romney, -1 Obama, in polls using Registered voters,
Votes not committed to either candidate are allotted to Romney 60/40.
Likely and uncommitted voter discussion.
FiveThirtyEight- Nate Silver
Huffington Post- Mark Blumenthal
Polling Report- Nick Panagakis
RealClearPolitics-Dick Morris
Washington Monthly- Ed Kilgore