Polling will begin in earnest this week for the midterm election. The problem is some companies are dishonest and skew the results. They know what the companies that pay them want to see, and it's not hard to get preordained results.
Consumers rarely know who, exactly, is being polled. This is called "methodology." I almost always have my producers call the polling agencies to get the data, which they assemble.
The biggest con is simple: poll far more Democrats than Republicans. That often happens.
But there's another way to skew results - using self-proclaimed independent voters. The polling operators do not put out exactly who these "independent" voters are. So it's easy to flood the zone by overweighting independents in Seattle, for example. Those folks are much different from independents in, say, Oklahoma. The deceit is a snap. Okay
Be very skeptical about the polls.
See you beginning at six eastern tonight for the No Spin News.
