Purple poll shows Romney ahead in 2 of 5 swing states, all 5 are close enough that undecideds and debates can decide final outcome (rather than polls that oversample Democrats for fear of being sued by the Obama DOJ)

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 Cillizza and Todd don't seem to know that polls are skewed. Gallup is sued by Obama DOJ in 2012 following complaints by Obama personnel that Romney's numbers were too high.

9/21/12, "Mitt Romney likely win of five key swing states shown by Purple Poll surveys," Washington Examiner, Dean Chambers

"The bipartisan polling firm Purple Strategies has released today the latest Purple Poll surveys in five key swing states that show them all close. The surveys, conducted recently and released today for Colorado, Ohio, Virginia, Florida and North Carolina reveal data that show Mitt Romney will win these states over President Obama and is quite likely to win the presidency in November.

As always the analysis here is not merely a static regurgitation of numbers that assumes in a simplistic manner that a state favoring Obama by a 46 percent to 44 percent edge will necessarily be voting for Obama on election day as many of the non-thinking analysts choose to suppose. We know, and former Clinton political consultant Dick Morris reminds us, that the undecided vote swings overwhelmingly for the challenging candidate, or in this election, Mitt Romney. For the purpose of their analysis, precise calculations will be made from the polling data and the undecided voters will be calculated to go 80 percent for Romney. Odds are likely they will support Romney in higher percentages.

The five states, in dark red in the map above, are worth 84 electoral votes. Both candidate needs most if not all of these states to win the election. The light blue and pink states on the map above are all the other states not included in these five surveyed by Purple Strategies and covered in this article.

In Colorado the Purple Poll has Obama with a slim 48 percent to 45 percent lead in the presidential choice while Obama's job performance approval is 45 percent to a 49 percent disapproval.

Additionally, 52 percent in Colorado believe the country is going in the wrong direction, to 40 percent that say right direction. If the election was today Romney wins Colorado 50.6 percent to 49.4 percent by adding the factor of the undecided voters to the numbers reported by the Purple Poll.

In Florida, the Purple Poll shows Romney leading over Obama 48 percent to 47 percent, and Obama has an approval to disapproval rate of 46 percent to 50 percent. The right direction to wrong direction numbers for Florida are going 37 percent to 55 percent. There is little if anything in these numbers indicating any odds of Obama winning Florida. The calculation including the undecided vote indicated Romney will win this state 52 percent to 48 percent.

Purple Poll's Ohio numbers show Obama's best numbers of the five states, where he leads over Romney 48 percent to 44 percent but still well under the magic number of 50 percent. His job performance is disapproved by 47 percent and Obama is approved of by 46 percent. In Ohio, the telling right direction and wrong direction measure goes 37 percent to 54 percent. That 54 percent remain not good news for the president. The calculation of the undecided for Ohio indicates that Romney would win the state 50.4 percent to 49.6 percent for Obama.

President Obama has a 46 percent to 43 percent edge in Virginia but that leaves 11 percent undecided. Perhaps more telling here is Obama's 48 percent disapprove to his 45 percent approval in Virginia. The voters in this state responded 36 percent right direction and 54 percent wrong direction. With the undecided voters added, Romney will win Virginia 51.8 percent to 48.2 percent.

Mitt Romney has the strongest numbers of the five states covered here in North Carolina, and is most likely to win North Carolina of the five. Romney leads 48 percent to 46 percent over Obama while the president has a 50 percent disapproval to 45 percent approval rate. A full 57 percent of the state's voters say the country is going in the wrong direction while only 37 percent say right direction. While Obama received a small bounce temporarily in national polls, the decision to hold the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina appears to have done little or nothing to move poll numbers in this state in Obama's direction. With undecided voters added, Romney wins North Carolina 52.8 percent to 47.2 percent.

These numbers today indicate a strong chance that Mitt Romney will win the 84 electoral votes of these five states. But before the real votes are cast, we still have three presidential debates and just over six weeks of campaigning yet to occur. That's a long time and a lot of opportunities for a lot to happen and be done by both campaigns. There is time for polling numbers to change but fewer voters who may change their minds. In each of the states in the Purple Poll of those five swing states, at least 90 percent of the voters in each states reported they are unlikely to change their preferences between now and November.

Voter turnout and enthusiasm levels will be key and both of those are expected to at least somewhat favor the Republican candidates, including Romney for president, on election day. This analysis, based on the numbers reported by Purple Strategies in the Purple Poll surveys of these five key swing states, makes a strong case for Romney winning in November.

While the Purple Poll has proven to be a reputable and accurate series of polls, many of the poll conducted or commissioned by mainstream media outlets have proven to be skewed by over-sampling Democrats to skew the results in favor of Barack Obama. Last week, the latest CNN/ORC poll was similarly skewed. Last month on the Fox News segment “Campaign Insiders” today, Democratic pollsters Pat Caddell and Doug Schoen both confirmed their belief that major polls are skewed in favor of the Democrats by over-sampling of Democratic voters when the surveys are conducted.

So many of these skewed polls have been unskewed here in this column they are now averaged, in unskewed form, in the new UnskewedPolls.com UnSkewed Average of Polls that today shows Romney leading by 7.8 percent." via Free Republic

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9/6/12, "Justice Dept. Gallup lawsuit came after Axelrod criticized pollsters," Daily Caller, Matthew Boyle

"Internal emails between senior officials at The Gallup Organization, obtained by The Daily Caller, show senior Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod attempting to subtly intimidate the respected polling firm when its numbers were unfavorable to the president.

After Gallup declined to change its polling methodology, Obama’s Department of Justice hit it with an unrelated lawsuit that appears damning on its face.

TheDC is withholding the identities of the Gallup officials to protect them from potential retaliation from Obama’s campaign and his administration.

In April, Axelrod tweeted that a poll showing Mitt Romney with a 48-43 percent lead over Obama was “saddled with some methodological problems,” directing his Twitter followers to read a National Journal story criticizing Gallup polls showing a Romney lead.  

In that National Journal piece, Ron Brownstein wrote that the polls showing Romney leading the president had “a sample that looks much more like the electorate in 2010 than the voting population that is likely to turn out in 2012.”

Internally, Gallup officials discussed via email how to respond Axelrod’s accusations. One suggested that it “seems like a pretty good time for a blog response,” and named a potential writer.
In response to that suggestion, another senior Gallup official wrote — in an email chain titled “Axelrod vs. Gallup” — that the White House “has asked” a senior Gallup staffer “to come over and explain our methodology too.”"...


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