Crowd Size vs Polling

At this point in the election we have once again gotten to the point where many people are claiming that crowd size is a more relevant election predictor than polling. And although our two wonderful candidates have made me almost indifferent to who actually wins the election, actual election prediction is still something I'm very interested in. Personally I think that picking crowd size is the rough equivalent of claiming that the Win is the most predictive stat for judging a pitcher. But I thought it would be interesting to see what DP thinks and if anyone can make a compelling case that this time will be different.

Some things to keep in mind:

Walter Mondale drew his biggest crowd of the campaign,...

Kerry rally bodes well for election results

Mitt drawing larger crowds

Hailed by Big Crowds, Dukakis Foresees an Upset

Great thread topic.

Well I love to go to rallies and see POTUS candidates of any party if they come to my city.

I am with her!

Yet I must say Trump puts on a funnier show so I might make more of an effort to go see him and his fans.

I do not live in a battleground state so not many visit.

I saw Hillary twice in 2008 in Southern Oregon and Bill Clinton. i saw Dick Cheney in 2004. I stood in line to see Obama and did not get in and skipped my gym work out and learned he came to my gym and worked out … had I kept my routine I would have seen him. Yea … I would go see anyone running of rPOTUS or former POTUS if in my city and not too many barriers to get there.

Also in my state … I am really sorry to say this yet I know the demographic really well due to the nature of my job - the majority of Trump supporters are on SSDI or unemployed and can stand in line of hours.

I know Clinton in detail on every issue so I might not stand in a long line to see her ever again.
I was hoping Trump at the last debate would speak on issues Health plans or SS or Syria yet he seemed confused and like a kid caught that had not prepared. yet his lurking and shouting and interrupting were so interesting to me … I would love to see it up close.



So if others are like me crowd size is irrelevant.

Yet I do not know if I am typical.

I can say where crowd size would make a different eis voter turn out. if a person is really riled up they are more likely to go stand in line for hours to vote.

In my state we vote by mail so i will vote next week.

BTW Anagam ... I noted your Huntsman sig and that is a Republican I could support!

Anagram said:

At this point in the election we have once again gotten to the point where many people are claiming that crowd size is a more relevant election predictor than polling. And although our two wonderful candidates have made me almost indifferent to who actually wins the election, actual election prediction is still something I'm very interested in. Personally I think that picking crowd size is the rough equivalent of claiming that the Win is the most predictive stat for judging a pitcher. But I thought it would be interesting to see what DP thinks and if anyone can make a compelling case that this time will be different.

Some things to keep in mind:

Walter Mondale drew his biggest crowd of the campaign,...

Kerry rally bodes well for election results

Mitt drawing larger crowds

Hailed by Big Crowds, Dukakis Foresees an Upset

Click to expand...

I agree, rally sizes mean nothing.

Too bad the republicans cannot nominate a guy like Huntsman. He would be a worthy candidate!

spending time and money to go somewhere.. DOES indeed help......shows how people could show up more at voting places


also at Rallies many new voters can get registered and that also will show up at the voting places

Also at Rallies .. many in the crowd gets energized and then talk about this to others at work and at home ..... that is another reason why it can help at the voting places

SailaWay said:

Also at Rallies .. many in the crowd gets energized and then talk about this to others at work and at home ..... that is another reason why it can help at the voting places

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I hear that they are doing IQ tests at the rallies....and women are breast feeding.

Are you as outraged as someone else might be?

beefheart said:

I hear that they are doing IQ tests at the rallies....and women are breast feeding.

Are you as outraged as someone else might be?

Click to expand...

people going to an energized rally will then tell people at work or home which will indeed help at the voting places

Dion said:

Too bad the republicans cannot nominate a guy like Huntsman. He would be a worthy candidate!

Click to expand...

I would have actually enjoyed voting for Gov. Walker and I wouldn't have been ashamed to vote for Gov. Huntsman. In general, I prefer voting for governors than senators or other professional politicians. Governors have actually done in a state what a President is supposed to do at a national level. You can see how a governor dealt with the legislature, dealt with the budget, dealt with the media. Senators have...well...they've voted. They've never actually done anything.

Of course, with Barack Obama, you elected a senator with no record who was a liar, a deadbeat, and a racist. And, guess what we got. All that and he hates America.

Anagram said:

At this point in the election we have once again gotten to the point where many people are claiming that crowd size is a more relevant election predictor than polling. And although our two wonderful candidates have made me almost indifferent to who actually wins the election, actual election prediction is still something I'm very interested in. Personally I think that picking crowd size is the rough equivalent of claiming that the Win is the most predictive stat for judging a pitcher. But I thought it would be interesting to see what DP thinks and if anyone can make a compelling case that this time will be different.

Some things to keep in mind:

Walter Mondale drew his biggest crowd of the campaign,...

Kerry rally bodes well for election results

Mitt drawing larger crowds

Hailed by Big Crowds, Dukakis Foresees an Upset

Click to expand...

Polling matters most, especially in an election like this where both candidates have high unfavorables, and so many voters are Never-X voters.

Those sorts of people won't be going to anyone's rally, but they feel strongly ethically obligated to vote, so they will.

Crowds probably don't mean much even in less dire election years, in my opinion. Having more people show up at your rally could be down to something as simple as having better transit links to your venue. Ultimately, the scale of votes that decides an election is too large to be accurately predicted based on how many people they can get in a room for a few hours -- inevitably nothing more than the tiniest sliver of the voting public.

SmokeAndMirrors said:

Polling matters most, especially in an election like this where both candidates have high unfavorables, and so many voters are Never-X voters.

Those sorts of people won't be going to anyone's rally, but they feel strongly ethically obligated to vote, so they will.

Crowds probably don't mean much even in less dire election years, in my opinion. Having more people show up at your rally could be down to something as simple as having better transit links to your venue. Ultimately, the scale of votes that decides an election is too large to be accurately predicted based on how many people they can get in a room for a few hours -- inevitably nothing more than the tiniest sliver of the voting public.

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these energized people go back to work and tell others.. a big help

Anagram said:

At this point in the election we have once again gotten to the point where many people are claiming that crowd size is a more relevant election predictor than polling. And although our two wonderful candidates have made me almost indifferent to who actually wins the election, actual election prediction is still something I'm very interested in. Personally I think that picking crowd size is the rough equivalent of claiming that the Win is the most predictive stat for judging a pitcher. But I thought it would be interesting to see what DP thinks and if anyone can make a compelling case that this time will be different.

Some things to keep in mind:

Walter Mondale drew his biggest crowd of the campaign,...

Kerry rally bodes well for election results

Mitt drawing larger crowds

Hailed by Big Crowds, Dukakis Foresees an Upset

Click to expand...

The part that is left out is that the opponents for each of four those examples you give also had huge (usually bigger) campaign rally crowds. Trump constantly filling sports stadiums would mean nothing if Hillary were doing the same or even coming close, but she consistently leaves High School Gyms half empty. When she does get a crowd it's students from the local HS or community college being bussed in.

In addition to needing bed rest, the embarrassment of this is why she disappears for weeks at a time.

Almost every poll where people have to be motivated to participate Trump destroys Hillary by double digit landslide numbers. Hillary only wins polls there a machine or person calls and talks to who ever happens to answer the phone. In most of those Dems are over sampled.

To vote most people have to take time out of their day and stand in line for sometimes hours at a time. Even filling out a mail in ballot takes initiative and no one has it for Hillary.

Turin said:

Too bad the republicans cannot nominate a guy like Huntsman. He would be a worthy candidate!

Click to expand...

he's too intelligent. the people who like trump cling to a loathing of education.

Casca XV said:

The part that is left out is that the opponents for each of four those examples you give also had huge (usually bigger) campaign rally crowds. Trump constantly filling sports stadiums would mean nothing if Hillary were doing the same or even coming close, but she consistently leaves High School Gyms half empty. When she does get a crowd it's students from the local HS or community college being bussed in.

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That's not true. Romney and Mondale at least were drawing bigger crowds than their opponents. The other two I couldn't find anything for either for or against them.

Almost every poll where people have to be motivated to participate Trump destroys Hillary by double digit landslide numbers. Hillary only wins polls there a machine or person calls and talks to who ever happens to answer the phone. In most of those Dems are over sampled.

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The only polls where Trump is winning are the online, self selecting, non-scientific polls. There are mountains and mountains of evidence these polls mean literally nothing, not least of which is that Ron Paul won all of them in 2008 and 2012.

To vote most people have to take time out of their day and stand in line for sometimes hours at a time. Even filling out a mail in ballot takes initiative and no one has it for Hillary

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Seems unlikely that this is true either, for which one reason is that people seem to be very motivated to vote against Trump.

Anagram said:

That's not true. Romney and Mondale at least were drawing bigger crowds than their opponents. The other two I couldn't find anything for either for or against them.




The only polls where Trump is winning are the online, self selecting, non-scientific polls. There are mountains and mountains of evidence these polls mean literally nothing, not least of which is that Ron Paul won all of them in 2008 and 2012.



Seems unlikely that this is true either, for which one reason is that people seem to be very motivated to vote against Trump.

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Recheck your sources both Reagan and Obama drew much bigger crowds than Mondale or Romney.

The polls are only declared none-scientific after Trump wins, if they are worthless why do them at all? Todays internet polls are set up to make it hard to vote more than once.

Ron Paul did well during the 2008 & 2012 primaries because his Libertarian base were the only Republicans who used the internet to any great degree. Today Info Wars has a larger audience than MSNBC and CNN together.

You are rite about one thing: No one is voting for Hillary just against Trump or the D by her name. But most Trump voters are excited to see him as president.

It's not 1948 anymore, Trump voters.

Wait, that's too esoteric for Trump voters.

Wait, the word "esoteric" is too hard to understand for Trump voters.

I will try again.

Polling has been much improved since it was a failure in 1948 when that guy held up that newspaper while smiling.

Crowd size isn't an accurate description on who's going to vote, rather, who has the enthusiasm.
I've been to many rallies including Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, and Ted Cruz this past election year.
This doesn't mean I'm voting for one or the other if I go see them live.

Militant_Vegan_ said:

he's too intelligent. the people who like trump cling to a loathing of education.

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trump wins the wise vote...... because he wins the more higher incomes vote without the monstrous debt to go with the lower incomes of those college grads with the FRAUD value education

Based on past performance, the polls have been wrong nearly as often as they've been right.
'WHO' are you interviewing, 'WHERE' are you interviewing them (with others around, shame is a big factor)
and 'HOW' are the questions posed. Differently put, polls are very easy to rig, and their success ratio is no better
than a dartboard and a monkey with a handful of darts.

From a personal perspective, I don't believe that crowd size or polling are reliable when it comes to who and how many go to the polls on election morning. In a country the size of the USA, with weather a major factor in many of the jurisdictions in early November, turnout can be badly hampered particularly when the electorate is as indifferent to the two main choices as they are this time around. I can't imagine there are too many people who are ardent supporters of either main candidate - seems the majority are grudgingly opposed to one or the other and that's the primary basis of their support.

As I've said in other threads months ago, I believe this election will be the lowest percentage turnout of all Presidential year elections and quite possibly it will be the lowest actual number turnout in this past century. These candidates are just that bad. As a result, it's likely that the Democrat's get out the vote apparatus will win the day over what appears to be a Trump cluster **** of disorganization.

Anagram said:

At this point in the election we have once again gotten to the point where many people are claiming that crowd size is a more relevant election predictor than polling. And although our two wonderful candidates have made me almost indifferent to who actually wins the election, actual election prediction is still something I'm very interested in. Personally I think that picking crowd size is the rough equivalent of claiming that the Win is the most predictive stat for judging a pitcher. But I thought it would be interesting to see what DP thinks and if anyone can make a compelling case that this time will be different.

Some things to keep in mind:

Walter Mondale drew his biggest crowd of the campaign,...

Kerry rally bodes well for election results

Mitt drawing larger crowds

Hailed by Big Crowds, Dukakis Foresees an Upset

Click to expand...

I have no idea which metric is better at prediction, but I do know one thing: polls are easy to manipulate to get desired results...crowd sizes are not.

In any case, neither polls nor crowd sizes will affect my choice and I'm content to see how it shakes out on Nov. 8th.

Turin said:

Too bad the republicans cannot nominate a guy like Huntsman. He would be a worthy candidate!

Click to expand...

Huntsman would be pummeled by the rigged system worse than Mr. Trump.