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2008 President · national

Scott Rasmussen (Rasmussen Reports) · fieldwork ended 2008-10-21 (14 days before the election) · 3,000 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 52% · Republican 45%

D+7.0

The certified result

Democrat 52.76% · Republican 45.36%

D+7.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 52 − 45 = 7.00
  2. Actual margin = 52.760 − 45.360 = 7.400
  3. Signed miss = 7.00 − (7.400) = -0.400
  4. Absolute miss = |-0.400| = 0.400

The poll overstated the Republican by 0.4 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 15424, race ID 38 (538 database).