Is it just my imagination, or are we starting to see a pattern here? A set of election surprises ranging from mild to shocking, with the right always coming out ahead. Polls making modest or even large errors—in some cases even exit polls.
Thus the exit polls suggested that Netanyahu would lose last year’s election in Israel, but he won. Brexit did just over 4% better than the polls suggested, and it was a very heavily polled issue, in a country with sophisticated polls. For that matter the Conservatives did better than expected in the recent general election in Britain. A few days later the conservatives in Spain did considerably better than the polls suggested. And just a couple days ago we saw the biggest surprise of all—the peace accord being rejected in Colombia, despite polls showing 60% support. That would be almost like if Goldwater had beat LBJ. (OK, maybe Colombian polls aren’t that accurate. But if anything you’d think they might overlook the rural areas, which actually voted for the accord.)
Read Full Article »