A thought-provoking article in The Washington Examiner explains polling accuracy.

And might reveal a HUGE point many Democrat operatives hope will get overlooked…

What happens when a poll so heavily weighted against one Party doesn’t yield what should have been a proportionately-weighted opinion skew?

The NBC-WSJ poll was heavily weighted Democrat (+11%) vs Republicans.

Let’s play WHAT IF…?

What if we leveled polling, with even numbers questioned in each Party? Let’s remove 5.5% from Democrats, add 5.5% Republicans, and adjust responses accordingly.

Q4 asked for Approve/Disapprove comments about how Obama’s doing his job. 48% disapproved, 47% approved. Re-adjusted: 53.5% disapprove, 41.5% approve

Q8 asked about congressional election preferences for Nov 2014. 47% said Democrat, 39% said Republican. Re-adjusted: 44.5% want Republicans, 41.5% Democrats

Q10 asked if gov’t should do more to solve problems, or less, leaving it to individuals and businesses to solve them. 52% said gov’t is the answer, 44% said businesses.

Re-adjusted: 49.5% favor businesses & individuals, 46.5% favor government

Q16 asked if Obama’s being a strong leader, or pushing his own political agenda ahead of what’s good for the country. 46% said ‘leader’, 51% ‘putting agenda before country’.

Re-adjusted: 40.5% strong leader, 56.5% Obama’s putting agenda before country 

Q21 asked if respondents thought the Obamacare law was a good idea (38%), or bad idea (43%). Re-adjusted: 32.5% good idea, 48.5% bad idea

Q22 respondents were asked if they agreed or disagreed with Obama refusing to negotiate with Republicans until the gov’t’s re-opened and the debt ceiling’s raised.

40% agreed Obama shouldn’t negotiate…43% disagreed, saying he should.

Re-adjusted: 34.5% agree, 48.5% disagree, saying Obama should negotiate!

Now, who’s REALLY in trouble here, when the playing field is level…?

• Obama’s disapproval rating 12% higher than his approval rating;
• Nov-2014 election preference: Republicans by 3% over Democrats;
• Big Government v Free Enterprise for solutions: Free Enterprise, by 3%;
• Is Obama putting his agenda before the Nation’s needs? Yes, by 15%;
• Is Obamacare a good idea, or bad idea? BAD IDEA, by 16%;
• Is Obama’s refusal to negotiate with GOP okay? NO, by 14%.

Some would argue more Americans identify as Democrat than they do as Republicans, so if polling is representational, it skews Democrat. But that’s 3%-5%…not 11%!

It doesn’t change the significance that much; when you add in the fact that those polled weren’t asked if they even knew the GOP position, the pendulum swings GOP.

(Besides, the poll’s +/-3% margin of error could wipe out a +4% Democrat advantage.)

Plus, in the shutdown-polled narrative, Democrats aren’t mentioned, just Obama. We’ve seen and heard first hand what happens when criticizing Obama’s policies.

‘Race demagogues’ go unhinged. Would being branded ‘racist’ sway opinion? You bet.

In the final analysis, Democrats don’t want people reading this ‘writing on the wall’.

From the BlueCollarPerspective, we kind of enjoyed this exercise.

We’ll call this new game ‘Screwing-the-Skew’, and look for more polling to play with.

After all, why should the Democrats have all the fun?

Now, if only some of those GOP Congressmen and Senators would get on board…