Twenty New House Polls Published     Permalink

Pollster Penn Schoen Berland just released a dozen polls of crucial House races. The polls were sponsored by The Hill and are just the first round of a larger series of 42 to be completed in the coming weeks. The Republican candidate leads in 11 of the races and the last one (MI-07) is tied. Clearly this is good news for the Republicans although in most cases the leads are not enormous.

In addition, other pollsters released results in seven congressional races (with two polls in DE-AL). Democrats lead in all of them. It should be noted that the districts Penn polled are all tough races for the Democrats whereas most of the other pollsters (by accident) happened to report on more Democratic-friendly districts today. All the results are given below.

Partisan Pollsters Disagree Wildly in Connecticut     Permalink

Merriman River Group (R) released a poll for CT-05 yesterday showing Rep. Chris Murphy (D-CT) trailing challenger Sam Caligiuri 44% to 50%. However, Gotham Research (D) polled the same district and concluded it was Murphy 50%, Caligiuri 37%. So the Republican pollster has the Republican ahead by 6% and the Democratic pollster has the Democrat ahead by 13%. That's a difference of 19%. There are two possible explanations here: (1) one of these outfits doesn't know how to poll, or (2) somebody is lying. This kind of result is why we do not report any partisan polls and do not put them in the data base. They simply cannot be trusted. It is very unfortunate that many news organizations and other political Websites treat these polls as though they were serious, which they are not.

Californians Want to Legalize Marijuana     Permalink

In addition to filling many elective offices on Nov. 2, the voters also get to have their say on numerous referenda. One of the more controversial ones is California's proposition 19, which would legalize the recreational use of marijuana in the state. Its use in medicine--as a painkiller--has been legal since 1996. If proposition 19 passes, it will become legal to sell and use pot, just as tobacco can be used and sold. The argument in favor of legalizing it is that enforcing the laws against it costs the state about $8 billion a year and distracts law enforcement officials from dealing with more serious crimes. In addition, if it is legalized, the state will be able to tax it and gain a new source of much-needed revenue.

Naturally, there has been polling on the proposition. SurveyUSA's most recent poll shows that 48% of California's likely voters want to legalize pot and 41% want to keep it illegal.

If proposition 19 passes--or even if it is very narrowly defeated--we may not have had the last word on the subject. Some Democratic strategists are thinking of trying to get similar propositions on the ballot in other states in 2012. The goal isn't to legalize marijuana, but to get younger voters, who strongly favor legalization, to the polls. In a sense, this would be the Democrats' answer to the Republicans' strategy of putting referenda on gay marriage on the ballot.

Today's Polls: CO CT DE FL HI NY OH WV + 20 House polls     Permalink

New Senate Polls

New House Polls

If you like this Website, tell your friends. You can also share by clicking this button