Dems Rip Rasmussen Reports for Low Obama/Dem Numbers

03 Jan

Posted by MacRanger as Election 2010, Election 2012, democrats

Democrats aren’t happy about Rasmussen Reports - one of the most accurate of polling firms.

“Democrats are turning their fire on Scott Rasmussen, the prolific independent pollster whose surveys on elections, President Obama’s popularity and a host of other issues are surfacing in the media with increasing frequency.

The pointed attacks reflect a hardening conventional wisdom among prominent liberal bloggers and many Democrats that Rasmussen Reports polls are, at best, the result of a flawed polling model and, at worst, designed to undermine Democratic politicians and the party’s national agenda.

On progressive-oriented websites, anti-Rasmussen sentiment is an article of faith. “Rasmussen Caught With Their Thumb on the Scale,” blared the Daily Kos this summer. “Rasmussen Reports, You Decide,” the blog Swing State Project recently headlined in a play on the Fox News motto.

“I don’t think there are Republican polling firms that get as good a result as Rasmussen does,” said Eric Boehlert, a senior fellow with Media Matters, a progressive research center. “His data looks like it all comes out of the RNC [Republican National Committee].”

“Whether intended or not, Rasmussen polls have been used by conservative voices as talking points, and when that happens on one side it inevitably produces a reaction from the other,” explained Mark Blumenthal, a polling analyst and the editor and publisher of Pollster.com. “Rasmussen produces a lot of data that appear to produce narratives conservatives are promoting, and that causes a reaction.”

Of course this is pathetically laughable. As the Politico rightly points out there has been no more accurate polling by any other firm since 2004. Rasmussen correctly predicted the 2004, 2006, 2008 elections, and has an accurate pulse on the low approval ratings of the Democrats as well as Obama’s ever sinking numbers.

I’ve never really been a fan of polls, the proof they say, is in the results and how accurate they turn out to be in the end. Democrats would do well to stop trying to take over American’s lives if they hope to see a reverse of fortune and shooting the messenger won’t help.