The Likely Voter

If you've been paying attention to the election polls, then you have probably heard the term "likely voters" used in reference to these polls.

Democrats are performing worse in polls that involve likely voters as compared to polls of all voters.  In fact, in the latter Democrats are about dead even with Republicans.

One of the problems in determining which voters are likely to vote and which are not is that all the polls use different methodologies.  And those methodologies often change as we get nearer to the election.

Generally the polls ask people a series of questions to determine whether or not they are likely to vote. As you can imagine, answers to these questions can change over time.  In reality, early polls are not very good at determining voter turnout.  Even polls later in the race are only moderately accurate in predicting how many voters will go to vote.

Thus, in close races the actual voter turnout can really make a big difference.

Each side will remind and attempt to persuade their supporters to vote.  These efforts are especially important with supporters who do not vote in every election. Of course, neither side makes any direct effort to remind non-supporters to vote.



About 26,000 people showed up to support President Barack Obama at a rally yesterday in Madison, Wisconsin.