- Will The Undecided's Please Take One Step Forward

Posted:10:52 AM on March 2, 2011
With Harper 16 points up in poll, do Liberals need ‘a head transplant’?
Jane Taber
Globe and Mail Update
Posted on Wednesday, March 2, 2011 8:09AM EST
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/with-harper-16-points-up-in-poll-do-liberals-need-a-head-transplant/article1926273/


There is no indication of undecided.

The number of undecided and their distribution is the key to understanding the underlying message to pretty much all these polls.

Also, we have no idea of what the questions were or each in what context.

For example a question like
"do you feel there is a need for a general election right now"

followed closely behind by

"which party would you vote for, Con, Lin, NDP, Green, Block, other"

Could give biased results towards Con.

Would Ipsos Reid makes such a mistake?

These result may be a reflection of the general feeling that an election is not wanted as opposed to support for the Con's.

The fact that they are not touting that 43% real support for a party in Canadian politics not only pretty much guarantees a majority, but a landslide of seats; and,

Instead they are saying " Tories Knocking on Majority’s Door" to me a clear indication of a lack of confidence in the degree of the result.

It could also be a reflection of the current media blitz by the Con's with no offsetting response by the Liberals. This would include the unknown quantity element as well.

It may also be indicative of trend towards consolidation of the Moderate Majority. During such one might expect a large undecided, otherwise one would expect the numbers to be much closer if not the other way around.

It is well established that Harper and the Con's have a die-hard core of manifested in 33% that will, firstly answer such polls and secondly choose 'Con' as the % undecided goes up, the % decided goes down this group represents a larger % of the decided.

During an election things would solidify and so the Con's support go back down to the 33 - 36%, ^or not (left it out - an Oda'rian slip)

excerpt: Lloyd MacILquham cicblog.com/comments.html