Content: Printer Friendly Page for The New Hampshire Polls Weren't Wrong, the Media Was

The New Hampshire polls weren't wrong. It was just that the Mainstream Media (MSM) didn't know how to read them.

Let's analyze rather than blindly follow the MSM make believe fallacies.

The results of the election were:

Clinton 39%
Obama 37%
Edwards 17%
Richardson 5%
Kucinich 1%
(unassigned 1%)
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/state/#NH

The Real Clear Politics (RCP) pre-election polling averages had for 01/05 to 01/07 was:

Obama: 38.3
Clinton: 30.0
Edwards: 18.3
Richardson 5.7
(unassigned 7.7)
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/nh/new_hampshire_democratic_primary-194.html

First, in the polling average there is only one figure (Clinton's) out of four that is outside an expected margin of error. Obama, Edwards and Richardson were within a reasonable margin of error. So how is that "completely" messing up? It's not.

Next, how do the numbers in the poll add up? 38.3+30.0+18.3+5.7= 92.3 leaving 7.7 unassigned going to either "undecided" or Kucinich or other candidates like write-ins.

Compared to the poll, the results showed that Kucinich got 1% leaving 6.7% unaccounted for. Those 6.7 added to the poll's 30.0 for Hillary gives 36.7% for Clinton. Then add the 1.3 from Obama and 1.3 from Edwards and the 0.7 from Richardson's (all three were within the margin of error but they went to Clinton) for 3.3 and then subtract the 1% not assigned and you have 39% which is the actual result.

So, the polls weren't wrong at all for Obama and Edwards, it was only that of the 7.7% of the "undecided" and "other" most of it went to Clinton and none to Obama, Edwards, or Richardson.. That is not a big mix up in the polls.That is a jump to a conclusion by the MSM reporters who don't know how to read polls.

If the media had analyzed the polls correctly instead of focusing on the number that Obama appeared to be ahead, they would have focused on the 7.7% of unassigned voters. Has that large number of 7.7% been correctly reported there would have been speculation about which candidate would get it. Even if people speculated that it would all go to Obama, or be evenly distributed, the only surprise compared to the polling is that this number went all to Clinton.

But under no circumstances if the polling was read correctly, should the media have reported that this 7.7% was a lock for any of the candidates and it should have been reported that the 7.7% was the wild card that meant the election could go any direction.

But because the MSM wanted a story, it created its own narrative of a big swing to Obama in the polls and totally ignored the 7.7% that was unaccounted for. By ignoring that 7.7% the media created the story instead of reporting it.

Now, the media and pundits of the MSM are once again creating a story, this time that the polls were wrong, when in fact it was not the polls that were wrong but only their mistaken interpretation of the polls.

Alternatively some pundits like Tim Russert are creating a story that the polls weren't wrong and instead the Clinton "victory" was stunning. This is just as mistaken and results in saying such absurdities as this.

No, Mr. Russert, this was not at all an upset, much less "one of the greatest upsets in American political history."

The polls actually indicated the race was close because there was an average 8.3% difference between Obama and Clinton bu there was 7.7% unaccounted for. Clearly if the 7.7% went to Clinton then the poll result was statistically too close to call. That is what happened, so it was not an "upset." Again, only by buying the crazy idea that the 7.7% should be ignored can someone like Russert believe that there was an amazing upset.

Lastly, let's look at the MSM fairytale that Clinton won New Hampshire.

In fact, New Hampshire was a tie. The MSM theme that Clinton "was behind" was an illusory fraud, so the new theme that she is now a "comeback girl" is also a fraud.

The media is misinforming voters about the very nature of primaries and their results. The candidate doesn't take away voted from the primary, he or she takes away delegates. "Winning" the popular vote is meaningless by itself becasue the delegates are usually apportioned among those with more than 15% of the vote. Thus a plurality win or even a majority win does not take all the delegates, only an equivilent percentage of the delegates.

Clinton was virtually tied in Iowa since she was in second place and only one delegate (out of 4,049) behind Obama (16 to 15). Contrary to the MSM reports, Edwards was in third place in Iowa wtih 14 delegates. (This is not counting superdelegates for any of them of which Clinton has the most.) So with 15 delegates meaning she was 1 delegate behind Obama's 16, Clinton was 6.25% behind Obama in Iowa. Not the "huge" win or the huge lead that the MSM and the Obama campaign made it out to be. In this picture of reality, Obama's campaign should never have allowed themselves to be sucked into that fairytale whirlwind of a "huge" win.

In primaries, the difference in the number of votes doesn't count at all if the % is less than the percentile needed to get a delegate. Thus in New Hampshire, where the 2% vote difference was not enough to award an extra delegate, the result between Clinton and Obama was actually a tie with 9 delegates each, not a win for Clinton. The so-called 2% "stunning victory" was an illusion since Clinton really needed about a 4.25% lead just to get one more delegate than Obama for a real win. Since New Hampshire was a dead heat tie for delegates and came off a virtual tie in Iowa, there was no great fall behind and no great upset win. Both sides of the Iowa-New Hampshire story of great ups and downs were made up by the MSM and pundits like Russert to create sizzle out of whole cloth.

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