Is it wrong again?
Conventional Wisdom Often Wrong
>Will a funny thing happen on the way to Washington?
By Edward Luce, ft.com, October 17 2008
Conventional wisdom is often wrong. For a start, as any property analyst can attest, it tends to be self-affirming. The media has leapt on recent polls that show Mr Obama with double-digit margins. But until Friday, when the conservative Drudge Report led on the much narrower two-point lead that Gallup gave Mr Obama, those polls that have not hinted at a landslide have been downplayed. And there have been quite a few.
The RealClear Politics website’s average of polls, which gives Mr Obama a lead of 6.8 per cent over Mr McCain, offers a better guide to the situation. It compares to John Kerry’s lead just a few weeks before he lost the 2004 election to Mr Bush. It is also slightly lower than Mr Obama’s lead over Hillary Clinton shortly before she bested him – and the media – in the New Hampshire primary at the start of the year.
Even were Mr Obama’s average lead to hold up on election day, which would produce the largest Democratic victory since 1964, the one-way bet might still look rash in hindsight. InTrade, the most cited online political betting site, gives Mr Obama an 84 per cent probability of victory – as safe a bet as there is. Can that really be accurate? Or do those who punt on elections read the same newspapers as everybody else?
Then there is the so-called Bradley effect, which is named after a black gubernatorial candidate for California in 1982 who was predicted in the exit polls to win by a double-digit margin only to lose it by 50,000 votes. The Bradley effect describes a problem with polling methodology rather than racism as such, since many respondents were clearly embarrassed to admit they had not voted for the black guy.
Political scientists have found little evidence for the Bradley effect over the past 15 years. But there have not been many opportunities to test it either. Most black politicians in the US represent heavily urban and preponderantly African-American districts and cities. None has ever been nominated for the presidency.
On Thursday, Mr McCain also wrapped this Democratic spectre in humour. “I come here tonight knowing that I’m the underdog,” he said. “But if you know where to look, there are signs of hope. Even in this room full of proud Manhattan Democrats I can’t shake that feeling that some people here are pulling for me. I’m delighted to see you here tonight, Hillary.”
The writer is the FT’s Washington bureau chief< |
