Indablog

The weekly online poll by Pajamas Media was recently reconfigured to exclude most of the candidates. It now allows votes for only the top 4 Democrats and top 5 Republicans, based on reporting from the poll aggregator, Real Clear Politics. That’s unfair, in my view, and it could also be risky in such a crowded field, with several months to go. PM folks (who clearly seem to lean toward Thompson) say they’re trying to block swarm voters. So, once again, they’ve blocked out Ron Paul. But another champion swarmer, Bill Richardson still has the lead on the Democratic side, and Chris Dodd, who’s been rising with a bullet, can’t be seen. Pajama’s Media has undercut its chances to show significant trends that might bubble out of the second tier.

Once again, the problem isn’t swarms, but lack of interest in participation. This is the Internet. Viral behaviors are a Good Thing. In any case, IRV voting is far better at dealing with crowded fields than plurality voting.

Last week’s polls saw the smallest turnout since the Tuesday Tracker began, and therefore won’t receive much discussion.

The Democratic Poll

The Republican Poll

Also, I changed the title of the series for ease of use.

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Filed under: Indaba Polls, Polling News

Once again, John Edwards prevailed in every dimension of the Tuesday Tracker poll for the Democratic candidates, held September 11, 2007. That week’s Democratic poll saw a large jump in turnout over previous weeks (though at 147 votes, it’s still pretty small). Ron Paul took the Republican poll in another dominant showing.

Edwards was stronger than ever. For most of the day he was sitting on a first round victory, but there was enough diversity of a turnout toward the end to force a brief runoff.

Only 3 (4%) of the 70 participants who gave Edwards their 1st rank voted indicated no 2nd choice. Dennis Kucinich followed with 32 1st rank votes in the DEM poll, with 7 (22%) of those supporters providing no 2nd rank choice. In the GOP poll, by comparison, Ron Paul received 73 1st rank votes, of which 28 (38%) offered no 2nd rank vote.

Relative willingness to grant 2nd and lower rank choices to other candidates in the same party can be taken as a measure of how readily a candidate’s supporters will participate in coalition building as a crowded field narrows, or during a brokered convention.

Though Kucinich took the 2nd highest number of 1st rank votes among the Dems, Barack Obama collected far more 2nd and 3rd rank choices, and thus beat Kucinich in the dimenson that measures depth of support. That behavior is one of the virtues of the ranked choice/instant runoff format. It’s also been displayed at the monthly poll here, where a 1st round lead by Gravel supporters was eventually overcome by Edwards as the consenus alternative.

Wesley Clark got a huge bump in the September Buzz poll (which includes popular but unannounced candidates) just before he endorsed Hillary Clinton. At the time of this writing, he’s still beating Al Gore. Who did Clark’s supporters prefer as their next choice? Out of 43 votes, 26% offered no 2nd rank choice at all. Gore picks up the lion’s share of the rest, followed by Biden and Obama. Edwards is back in the pack, and only one would have supported Clinton.

Only 16 Tuesday Tracker participants also voted in the Presidential Priorities poll. Edwards voters tended to rank the war in Iraq as their top priority, while Kucinich voters emphasized health care.

GOP Results

Read more…

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Filed under: Indaba Polls

As usual, John Edwards has prevailed in every dimension of the Tuesday Tracker poll for the Democratic candidates, reflecting a voting population drawn primarily from readers of DailyKos and myDD. Fred Thompson and Ron Paul split victories over the previous two weeks. Thompson’s strength reflects the preferences of voters attracted by the announcement links on RedState. Ron Paul dominates whenever one of his supporters provides a link within a campaign forum site.

The strength of support for Ron Paul was signiificant enough in the last pol to reveal political coattails. Though Tom Tancredo received only 5 1st place votes, he received so many 2nd place votes among Paul supporters that his depth score exceeded Fred Thompson’s, who received nearly triple the number of 1st place votes.

Here are the detailed results for the previous two sets of Tuesday Tracker polls:

Democrats, August 28, 2007

Democrats, September 4, 2007

Republicans, August 28, 2007

Republicans, September 4, 2007

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Filed under: Indaba Polls

John Edwards repeats win for DEM poll. Ron Paul crushes otherwise disinterested GOP.

John Edwards’ results declined just slightly since last week, after accounting for a tiny data glitch caused by your friendly application specialist (More on that below). Barack Obama held on to 2nd place, but his scores declined noticably, reflecting a boost of interest in Dodd, Richardson, Biden and Gravel. Kucinich and Clinton maintained their previous levels of support in first place votes, but Clinton dropped a rank in overall depth of support as Dodd advanced.

Source

For the Republicans, Ron Paul voters showed up this time, while the others effectively abandoned the field. Curious as to why, I asked some RedStaters (who’s site had been the force behind Thompson’s victory last week), why they had so little interest. That thread is here.

Once again, a large proportion of Paul voters (over 30%) offered no 2nd choice. For those who did, Mike Huckabee was favored by nearly 40%, while Tom Tancredo and Duncan Hunter were each favored by over 20%.

Source

Participation in DEMs increased by just a couple of votes over last week. By the numbers, GOP turnout increased significantly, but turnout was less diverse, and far less in synch with “meatspace” polls.

Neverthelss, that participation drew more votes to the issues and attributes polls, whch will make it possible to get readings on what kinds of issue-based consituencies might be possible.

Finally, your intrepid proprietor made a small error by accidently including Gore and Clark in the DEM nominee list when the poll opened. Since that poll was intended for only announced candidates, so I removed them. But, not wanting to cheat the people who had cast their votes during those first few minutes, I left the “bad” ballots in place.

Interestingly, but not surprisingly, Gore got 2 of 5 1st place votes before the list was corrected. The other 3 were split among Clinton, Edwards, and Obama. But Edwards won the IRV. It was an interesting snapshot of an accidental focus group.

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Filed under: Indaba Polls

John Edwards and Fred Thompson won the first Tuesday Tracker Poll at ChoiceRanker.com

The Tuesday Tracker is a new ranked choice Presidential straw poll that will be open each Tuesday in the continental US (The 28 hour balloting period opens at 11PM Monday and closes 3AM Wednesday, EST). Participants can rank their choices 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and on from the current pools of announced and officially-exploring candidates in the Democratic and Republican parties.

Results are presented three ways:
1 Simple plurality: Like current US elections, a tally of first place votes.
2 Depth: Like college football rankings, a weighted tally of all place votes.
3 Instant Runoff: Like current Australian elections, a systematic aggregation toward a clear majority winner as votes are transferred from defeated candidates by round. Victory in this dimension trumps the others.

The Tuesday Tracker for August 14, 2007 was announced on four well-known political blogs: DailyKos, MyDD, RedState, and Free Republic. Fred Thompson and John Edwards won their races in each dimension of the poll.

For further explanation, including views of the runoff and the underlying data, go to:
Democrats: http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=105
Republicans: http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=106

Turnout is so low that the results can be said to provide a little more that snapshot of the thinking within a few tiny corners of cyberspace. Moreover, participants in online polls are a self-selected group; they can not claim to accurately represent the views of the electorate at large. But the results do speak to the energy of a candidate’s constituency and to the character of the blogging communities where the announcements were posted.

ChoiceRanker.com also hosts month-long polls. At the time of this writing John Edwards leads the current August Democratic poll, but only narrowly, with Dennis Kucinich running a close second. Ron Paul dominates the August Republican poll with a first round victory and overwhelming depth. As usual, a significant portion of his supporters (nearly 40%) offered no 2nd place choice.

The August polls are here:
Democrats: http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=69
Republicans: http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=71

Thanks to those who participated. Please vote again next week… and invite your friends!

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Filed under: Indaba Polls

I just discovered that this feature is available through my YouTube channel.

Why are those two videos in my vlog? Part of my Ph.D. dissertation examined the relationship between communication, reciprocity, and status alliances in primate communities; that discussion helped me generate hypotheses about the emergence of sacrificial cultural practices in human proto-religions.

And I’m also a close observer of Russian history and politics. My MA thesis compared the hegemonic practices of the superpowers during the cold war, examining their approaches to technology transfer as an empirical case. See my comment as flywheel here.

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Filed under: Development Chronicles, Musings

USA Election Polls posted a nice blurb about ChoiceRanker

Do Second Choices Matter?

Everybody votes for their favorite candidate… so does it matter if you feel strong affliction for a second candidate or not? Will voting for two candidates improve the process or make it worse?

By voting on two candidates, you no longer have to worry about only supporting candidates you think that can win. By doing so, you will feel more free to vote your conscience and heck maybe even a Dennis Kucinich would be a front runner.

Rank Your Choices at ChoiceRanker.com

* Choice Ranker

Do you have a strong affliction for your candidate, or just a simpler sentiment of affection?

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Filed under: Development Chronicles, Indaba Polls

I just sent this letter to the operator of USA Election Polls.

Hi,

Thanks for providing the link to Choiceranker last week. Quite a few ballots were posted because of it, and I thought you might be interested in the results.

First off, I should point out that you linked to a May 2007 poll that I keep open for testing and QA purposes. There are links for some fresher polls down below.

There was an overwhelming response from Ron Paul supporters. That strength has been typical for online polls so far this year.

Two observations stand out about the response of the Paul supporters.

1. In the pre-August polling, nearly half of the Paul supporters were unwilling to state an alternate choice. That ratio has dropped precipitously, to less than 25 percent. I consider this to be an imprtant score in ranked choice polls, because it shows the extent to which voters are comfortable as “team players” within their party. My preliminary conclusion is that Paul supporters are starting to learn more about which other candidates can satisfy their most pressing concerns.

2. Among those Paul supporters who do provide a 2nd choice, there’s been a dramatic shift: Mike Huckabee has lept past Tom Tancredo. Newt Gingrich and Duncan Hunter also make showings.

Of course, this poll isn’t “scientific.” Participants in online polls are a self-selected group. But the results to speak to the energy of a candidate’s constituency. Just as some candidates have an advantage in the money race, some show their strength online. Other signs that tell how the race is going include the turnout at public rallies, the shifting judgments of the chattering class, and the elbow-throwing among the candidates themselves.

Though Paul continues to do extremely well in Republican online polls for now (in fact, dominating many of them), I believe this is likely to change by the end of the year. Interest in online straw polling will probably get a significant boost from showcase projects like the MySpace primary. The publicity will prompt other campaigns to mobilize more participation.

For now, frankly, turnout is so low that the results can be said to provide a little more that snapshot of the thinking within a few relatively isolated corners of cyberspace.

Still, the Paul supporters may represent the avant-garde of a movement toward a more vibrant, representative, and even authoritative online democratic community.

To see if this is right, I’ve started a series of weekly polls called the “Tuesday Tracker.” It will be open for 28 hours, from 11 PM Monday night till 3AM Wednesday EST.

This week’s current Republican poll is at
http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=106

There is one for Democrats at
http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=105

And another for Unity08 at
http://www.choiceranker.com/election.php?eid=107

Month-long polls are accessible throught the front page at
http://www.choiceranker.com/

I don’t know if you can post this in time for today’s poll, but if you can use this text and the analysis, perhaps you can help me announce the polls for subsequent weeks.

Thanks again,

Craig Simon

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Filed under: Indaba Polls

This launches a new series of ChoiceRanker polls targeted to a few key blogging sites of the self-proclaimed left, right, and middle.

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Filed under: Indaba Polls

For discussion of polls covering the 2007 PrimeTime Emmys over at ChoiceRanker.

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Filed under: Indaba Polls