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2008 President · TN

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2008-10-25 (10 days before the election) · 653 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 44% · Republican 53%

R+9.0

The certified result

Democrat 41.83% · Republican 56.90%

R+15.1

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 44 − 53 = -9.00
  2. Actual margin = 41.829 − 56.897 = -15.068
  3. Signed miss = -9.00 − (-15.068) = 6.068
  4. Absolute miss = |6.068| = 6.068

The poll overstated the Democrat by 6.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16478, race ID 746 (538 database).