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2008 President · KY

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2008-10-19 (16 days before the election) · 535 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 41% · Republican 54%

R+13.0

The certified result

Democrat 41.17% · Republican 57.40%

R+16.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 41 − 54 = -13.00
  2. Actual margin = 41.168 − 57.399 = -16.231
  3. Signed miss = -13.00 − (-16.231) = 3.231
  4. Absolute miss = |3.231| = 3.231

The poll overstated the Democrat by 3.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16777, race ID 721 (538 database).