What's with the polls?

by: Thurman Hart

Wed Sep 17, 2008 at 09:47:55 AM EDT

Take a look at the following chart where I compare September polling at Q-pac to actual results:

Year	Leader	Margin	Undecided	Final Margin
2008	Obama	3	6	???
2006	Kean	3	6	8
2005	Corzine	4	8	9
2004	Kerry	4	6	7
2002	Torricelli	4	14	10

If you notice, there's a pretty consistent pattern - at this point, the leader averages roughly 3.5 points ahead with an average of 7 points worth of undecided voters (I'm going to ignore Torricelli's 14 point undecideds as an outlier).  The only thing we have to note is that in 2006, Tom Kean, Jr actually turned a three point lead into an eight point deficit.  Wow.  That is quite the accomplishment.

In the 2002 election, we know what happened - Torricelli dropped out and Lautenberg stepped in.  So the unusually high number of undecideds jump on the bandwagon and hand Forrester a double-digit defeat.  

In 2006, we also had "something big" happen.  As I recall it, Kean built his entire campaign on showing that Menendez was corrupt and it came completely apart late in the season.  Kean burned his credibility, and not only did all of the undecided voters go to Menendez, but a good number of Kean leaners abandoned him as well.

That leaves us with 2004 and 2005.  Kerry faced 6% undecided voters in September with a 4-point lead.  He ended up with a seven-point victory in New Jersey - which means that Kerry picked up the undecided voters 4 to 1 (with one going elsewhere).  Corzine, the following year, would pick up the 8% undecided voters by an even larger margin - almost 7 to 1.

It isn't possible to say for sure the margin by which Obama will win New Jersey this year, but it's pretty much a slam dunk that he will win.  I expect those undecideds to slowly move over to the Obama column - by a margin of at least four to one.