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2008 President · VA

American Research Group · fieldwork ended 2008-11-02 (2 days before the election) · 600 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 51% · Republican 47%

D+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 52.63% · Republican 46.33%

D+6.3

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 51 − 47 = 4.00
  2. Actual margin = 52.629 − 46.331 = 6.298
  3. Signed miss = 4.00 − (6.298) = -2.299
  4. Absolute miss = |-2.299| = 2.299

The poll overstated the Republican by 2.3 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16394, race ID 749 (538 database).