The American Spectator

Print Email

Text Size

The Spectacle Blog

This is as sober an assessment as I've seen about the NH polling. Once again media interpreted a final event( in Iowa the Huckabee presser, in NH the "cry") incorrectly. Ultimately voters(especially women) flocked based on real events -- well maybe on staged event -- to Hillary. I think this type of thing is more like to occur in a small state with fewer voters to persuade and where voters forge a more personal connection to the candidate voters but we'll see if it is duplicated as we move to larger states more dependent on paid media rather than retail politics. There also is much to be said for voters stampeding one way or another becasue of the speed of the news cycle -- which may occur regardless of the size of the electorate. It doesn't mean, I think ,that polls are useless (indeed candidates make decisions based on them which greatly impact the outcome of races, thereby multiplying the impact of polling). It does mean what others have articulated: they are only a snapshot in time. UPDATE: Kurtz sounds a harsher but perhaps well deserved verdict while Karl Rove explains what's going on with Hillary. (The WSJ opinon page is now fully accessible online thank goodness.)