WTF, MSM?

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Well, it has happened again. Forum Communications, a Fargo based company that owns 22 MN newspapers has endorsed Coleman and McCain. Sadly, these endorsements are only evidence of the rising irrelevance of the current corporate structure/strategy/ethos of print media. Get a load of what passes for editorial logic in the age of media conglomerations:

John McCain is not the perfect presidential candidate.
But he’s a better choice than Barack Obama.
-Forum Communication endorsement as printed in the Stillwater Courier, October 22, 2008

Flawless.

Let’s deconstruct Forum’s arguments for endorsing these candidates. The following is a bullet point list of the main issues given for each.

McCain

* Embodies traditional conservative values
* Streak of independence
* Experience
* Obama has socialistic platform with unlimited government control
* Obama would plunge the country into an economic hole
* Obama not jingoistic enough
* McCain will be a check to a Democratically controlled Congress

Coleman

* Coleman will be better able to work across the aisle
* Franken is hard-edged liberal
* He was there for MN when the 35W bridge collapsed
* He voted in favor of the bailout
* He is not a Bushie; He voted against ANWR drilling and the farm bill
* Franken will shame the state like Ventura did

Any level of thought past the purely partisan would show that all of these arguments are red herrings. Forum Communications is simply giving credit to McCain and Coleman for having the tools to get us out of the situation they put us in.

The entire argument for endorsement is a farce. Are we not already in an economic hole? Did Coleman go above and beyond by securing Federal funding for the 35W bridge or was he just doing his job?

Not to say that Obama is entirely blameless nor has all of the answers, but to call him a socialist when Coleman and McCain presided over and supported the greatest period of government expansion since FDR is an insult to their readers. Moreover, they both recently pushed for the US government to take equity stakes in private companies as a part of the economic bailout. If that isn’t socialism, then I have an efficient private health insurance plan to sell ya.

There are many reasons Forum had to endorse Coleman and Franken. And I understand it’s a scary time for print media and they are looking for a predictable hand at the till. Sadly, however, I don’t think any of these reasons are based on coherent logic or sense of progress. The Forum Communications endorsements were based on short-sighted fear.

Really??

Taking a page from the Democratic playbook of the mid-1990s, the Republican National Senatorial Committee has enlisted the help of some stars from that era to urge Minnesotans not to vote for Franken.

Maybe this video was meant to be funny or ironic. It is neither. Minnesota is so much more than ice fishing and the Vikings. It’s also about drinking like Wisconsinites and testing the boundaries of what qualifies as proper public attire.

The coasts tend to view Minnesotans as Jack Pine Savages. This ad treats us as such. Having Cliff Claven tell me who to vote for will not work. Everybody knows he was always full of bull shit anyway. Now, if they got Woody, that would be a different story.

More Polls, Please!!

New shit has come to light…man. - The Dude

There have been seven new polls since our last post on MN’s Senate Race. People apparently have a lot of money to spend on these things. Anyway, instead of me telling you about them, just look at the pictures (after the jump).

Notice anything? Franken is trending higher. Looking at the graph of candidate’s spread advantage (the difference between poll numbers) Franken is trending an easy five points ahead. Many pundits (make spitting sound here) pick the state as a moderate Franken victory. I would get behind that, but now that we see the mighty Star-Tribune backing Coleman we will see what effect, if any, that has. I suspect little to none.

The polling methodology is missing cell phone only households and individuals with limited voter histories. In short, poll numbers are missing the youth which, as a group, are less likely to be swayed by mainstream media.

If pollsters want to maintain relevance in a world of web 2.0 they must devise ways of accounting for increasingly active young voters. Uncovering the political sway of this perennially ignored voting bloc is the key to getting at more accurate data. More importantly however, it would bring increased gravitas to a generation that is proving itself as one that values pragmatism over partisan affiliation. Something, I would say, this country (and state) really needs.

The Most Competitive Senate Race in the Country is Right Here (with graphs)

With only a few weeks left until the election, many of the races are hotter and nastier than Tila Tequila’s MySpace page. In Minnesota, the premier showdown is the Senate race between Norm Coleman, Al Franken, and Dean Barkley.

Although Coleman is the incumbent and has generally enjoyed comfortable approval ratings over the last six years, his Republican brand and association with the Bush Administration are heavy weights on his campaign.

Al Franken comes to the race with high name recognition and a large war chest. However, his campaign has been plagued by staff turnover, criticisms of his failure to pay taxes in 19 states, and his racy satirical background.

Dean Barkley, the Independence Party candidate, served a short stint as MN Senator in 02-03 when Jesse Ventura appointed him after the death of Paul Wellstone. Barkley, the veritable dark horse in this campaign, does have the real potential to play spoiler for either Coleman or Franken.

From the latter part of 2007, public opinion polls have been released tracking the electability of both candidates. In total, 35 polls have been taken from February 2007 to October 2008. Can these polls tell us anything about the possible outcome of the election in November? In a run of the mill race, these polls usually show the general sway of the electorate. But this isn’t your daddy’s senate race. The economy is crap and Beverly Hills Chiuahua spent multiple weeks as the highest grossing movie in the US. Quickly put, people are acting jittery, which is putting the Senate race up for grabs.

From May 07 to October 08 Coleman has experienced rocky approval and ultimately polls lower now than he did late last year. Franken rose in the polls early on, but stumbled in June when his tax issues came to the fore. Since that time however, Franken seems to have rebounded and through October has been leading Coleman. The latest Quinnipiac poll has Franken ahead by 2 points and several pollsters put Franken winning the race by 4+ points. Let’s look into this further.

The polls reported in this analysis come from multiple sources. Each source uses a different methodology and has different margins of error. The methodological discussion is one best saved for another day. For now, let’s just say each has their own issues and assume the random sampling conducted for the polls was sufficient.

The reported numbers stated in the media from each poll are simply estimates. To get the full story, you have to look at the margins of error calculated for each poll. The margins of error in these polls range from +/- 2.8% to 4.5%. In addition to the margins of error is the associated confidence interval or the reliability of the estimate. For most polls, this interval is 95%, which means that 95% of the time the estimate will be within the margin of error. For more on these topics go to:

http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Info/polling-faq.html

Adding the margins of error from the Senate race polls and graphing them on top of each gives us a deeper level of analysis.

According to poll data, Coleman had consistently outpaced Franken until September. The points on the graph where the lines do not intersect are points where each candidate could have a clear victory. Coleman, has 10 of these points. Franken has just one, occurring a few weeks ago in October.

Alright, so we’ve looked at all of the polls. Let’s look at data from one poll source. Since Rasmussen consistently conducts polling, they provide the most data points. Using Rasmussen only polls we get a consistent survey methodology and more comparable data across time. This time we see that Franken opened up a wide lead in October. The interesting thing to note is that both candidates are descending.

According to poll data, Coleman had consistently outpaced Franken until September. The points on the graph where the lines do not intersect are points where each candidate could have a clear victory. Coleman, has 10 of these points. Franken has just one, occurring a few weeks ago in October.

Alright, so we’ve looked at all of the polls. Let’s look at data from one poll source. Since Rasmussen consistently conducts polling, they provide the most data points. Using Rasmussen only polls we get a consistent survey methodology and more comparable data across time. This time we see that Franken opened up a wide lead in October. The interesting thing to note is that both candidates are descending.

If we again look at all polls, Franken has never sustained a spread advantage. That is, he has never pulled ahead of Coleman and held it over time. Franken has come on strong in October, but the trend line suggest that lead is slipping. Why is this happening?

Considering the current state of things, there are many reasons why polling data would show that the major party candidates are losing ground. Where are they going? It appears people are turning to Barkley. Barkley has been included in the last 10 public opinion polls. Pulling these points out an interesting trend appears. Barkley’s ascension has come with Franken’s decline. Even more interesting, Franken is falling faster than Coleman, who has seemed to level out.

The wild card in all of this is the rising level of support for Barkley. Given the blow back of the negative ads Coleman has run against Franken and the sinking ship of the GOP party in general, people are looking toward other choices. The strength of the Independence Party candidate, Dean Barkley, and the 30% showing for Priscilla Lord Faris in the recent DFL primary election evidence that neither Coleman or Franken have this wrapped up.

Throwing even more data onto the pile, favorability ratings for Franken suggest that he has a lot of work to do in order to shore up some votes to win the election. His very unfavorable ratings are 8 points higher and his very favorable ratings are 6 points lower than Coleman’s. It seems, however that voters are unsure of what to make of both candidates since somewhat favorable and unfavorable ratings are opposite.

So, with all of this data all we are left with to make an educated guess are trends. Combining all poll data and doing some fancy month the above graph represents the trends of public opinion. If you trusted in the polls, Franken has a good shot of winning. Coleman is descending and Barkley has topped out. As we all know, however is that elections are won on the intangibles. The biggest key to victory for either Coleman or Franken is if they can get a few more people to believe them. This will be difficult for Minnesotans to do however, between a satirist and a carpet bagger, who can you trust??

-Allen Springvale