Let’s just take a deep breath and realize that a final projection from a single polling shop – even a good one – is just a data point. It’s not magic knowledge, it’s a sophisticated guess on the basis of data that’s prone to error. So, no se me desboquen, but…
But it’s not me saying it … it’s Iñaki, over at YVPolis.
Finally somebody gets it. It’s not “Chávez is comfortably ahead in the polls.” It’s “while Chávez has a big lead according to plainly biased pro-government pollsters, serious independent pollsters show startlingly incompatible results.” Take it away, David Luhnow (behind the WSJ paywall, alas): The split pits Venezuela’s two most respected polling firms against each other.…
Make of this what you will: when Consultores 21 asks voters outright whether they will vote for Chávez or Capriles, 7.7% say they’re undecided. When, instead, they give voters a mock ballot and some privacy to fill it out, the number of undecideds falls to 4.8%, with nearly all of them going to Capriles. It’s…
It really is an extraordinary situation: I don’t think we’ve ever faced such a bizarre, contradictory opinion polling outlook less than two weeks ahead of a vote. The race is either neck and neck, or Chávez is easily ahead. At this point there’s no use torturing the polling tea-leaves for a better answer than that,…
It really is David vs. Goliath. I set the stage over at the FP blog.
Well-regarded pollster Varianzas says: Chávez 49.7%, Capriles 47.4%. The number of people that say the economic sitation in the country is “bad” goes up from 43.4% to 47.2%. To which of the pollsters should I send the medical bills for my ulcer? Massive HT: ookkty1.
It’s become the stuff of Latin American Legend, and a favorite Caprilista talking point of the last few months: despite trailing badly in most well-regarded polls, Nicaragua’s Violeta Chamorros trounced the Sandinistas in the 1990 Presidential Election by 54% to 40%. Lesson: in a highly conflict-ridden and polarized Latin American context, people lie to pollsters…
Reputable Venezuelan pollster Datanálisis has just leaked its final poll before the election. The results are jaw-dropping, but for the wrong reasons. Their poll, leaked to Bloomberg’s Charlie Devereux and Dan Cancel, has Chávez at 47%, Henrique Capriles at 37%, and get this … roughly 15% of voters are still undecided. So, let’s walk through…
Datanálisis says that Henrique Capriles leads Hugo Chávez in Miranda, the nation’s second most populous state, by 16 points. In the 2010 parliamentary elections, in which the opposition beat Chávez by 4 percentage points, the opposition beat Chávez in Miranda by … sixteen points.
Just got a couple of new polls. Let’s see…hmmm. Ever heard of Keystone Mercadeo Táctico? Of Top Data? No? OK, let’s look at their websites. Oh wait, they have no websites! Funny that… Well, maybe they’re down for maintenance. So, let’s see how have these firms done in previous elections. What’s that you say? Keystone…
Suppose you were the head of a multilateral bank, organizing a forum dealing with a crucial, upcoming election. When discussing what the polls are saying, do you ask someone who’s already made up his mind about who’s going to win to give you a speech? Or do you pick someone impartial, above the fray, who…
Venezuelan polling tends to diverge wildly until the last, say, month-or-so before an election, and then polls seem to converge. (Why this happens remains one of life’s little mysteries.) Anyway, here we are, a little over six-weeks out…so shit’s about to get real on the polling front. And in that context, Varianzas’s first-half-of-August poll, together…
On the heels of YVPolis’s latest, just a quick note on no-name, no-track-record “pollster” Predicmática. Although this new firm is apparently not entirely a Maletín-based undertaking – good sources tell me they actually do real field polling – their presentations fail catastrophically to demonstrate even basic competence. Besides the criminally misdesigned PowerPoint slides, the way…
Alejandro Tarre, echoing Tal Cual and Reporte Confidencial, has posted a great find: slides that suggest Hinterlaces’s Oscar Schemel is working for the government. If so, then more power to them. I hope he charges steeply for his services. But this creates a dark cloud over any claims of impartiality the guy may still have. Come…
Caracas Chronicles 