We want to know who will win the presidency.
We become like sailors who choose “any port in the storm.” The phrase originated in his 1749 British erotic novel Fanny Hill, and entered American politics in 1841 as Winfield Scott’s presidential primary campaign slogan.
Today, we’re not looking for ports, but for any numbers that could help us predict the outcome of a general election, teetering in a sea of uncertainty.
Some have suggested that winning a state’s primary is a sign of a candidate’s strength in that state.
It may sound a bit sensible at first glance.
But even though President Biden did much better than Donald Trump in South Carolina, do you think Democrats have an advantage there? Nonsense.
Winning a state in a primary or caucus has little bearing on whether a party can retain the state in the general election.
In 1972, George McGovern (Democratic), a World War II hero and leader of the anti-Vietnam War movement, won the nomination contest in 21 states. He lost 20 of these states in the general election.
In the 2012 general election, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney (R) lost more than half of the states he won on his way to the nomination, and in 2016, Trump lost 17 of the states he won in the primaries. Lost the state.
It is foolish to predict the outcome of the general election based on the results of the primary election.
The next concern for those scrutinizing the tea leaves from pre-poll results for general election insights relies on pre-poll results within demographic subgroups. That’s equally difficult.
The most important political fact about who votes in a primary is not gender, age, education, or income. Rather, the central difference is the very fact that they chose to vote in a partisan primary.
Young people who vote in Republican primaries are very different from those who don’t. Assuming that those who didn’t vote in the primaries behaved the same way as those who voted when the generals rolled around ignores the most significant differences.
In 2016, Hillary Clinton lost primary voters under 30 by a 44-point margin. Was that an indication that she had a bigger problem with her younger voters in general? No, she won them over easily.
By contrast, among those with less than a high school diploma, Ms. Clinton led Sen. Bernie Sanders (R-Vermont) by 28 points. But overall, Trump won in this area.
The latest effort to find general election polling places during the storm is considering exit poll questions asking people how they would vote if a candidate were to vote in the general election. do not have Supporters in the primary election become candidates.
This type of question includes all the issues we discussed a few weeks ago when asking people to project themselves into another world and predict its behavior.
Additionally, they are also studied when they are voting for another candidate, the highest point of support for a rival.
Questions like these alone don’t tell you much. The Nation magazine, which unfortunately ceased to be a fountain of wisdom long ago, featured an article in 2016 with the headline:Relax, Donald Trump won’t win.”
In reaching this foolishly erroneous conclusion, the magazine used some of the key demographic analysis discussed above, noting that 47% of female Republican primary voters said they believed they would vote for Trump. It also cited an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll that found “people said they couldn’t imagine it.” ”
There were clearly limits to the imagination of these respondents. Such defections would have made it impossible for President Trump to win. Still, he won with 88 percent of Republican women and within one point of support among Republican men.
Nevertheless, smart prognosticators predict that 24 percent of South Carolina Republican primary voters are extremely dissatisfied with Donald Trump as a candidate and will not vote for him in November. I place great importance on the fact that he claimed that
Even if those voters just stayed home, it would be enough to turn South Carolina into a battleground state.
Is there anyone who believes that it is possible? of course not.
Our desire to read tea leaves is insatiable and we end up reading way too much of each number leaf we happen to come across.
However, in some cases, the tea leaves may just be wrinkled at the bottom of the cup.
Melman is president of the Melman Group, which has helped elect 30 U.S. senators, 12 governors and dozens of members of the House of Representatives. Mr. Mellman served as a pollster for the Senate Democratic leadership for more than 20 years, is president of the American Association of Political Consultants, a member of its Hall of Fame, and chairman of the Israel Democratic Majority Party.
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