Two polls on the presidential race in Minnesota came out this weekend. One, the Saint Cloud State poll, has methodologies that are as good as it gets, and it has Obama up by 8 in the North Star State:
But unlike many of the voter surveys sparking headlines recently, this one used gold-standard methodologies and appears to be quirk-free. Indeed, its principal investigators, political science professors Steve Wagner and Stephen Frank, have released a 25-page document [PDF] describing — in excruciating detail — how the numbers were obtained.
The important bits: The survey used a sample that was balanced on multiple levels. Forty percent of the numbers were for cell phones, the same percentage as Minnesota households without landlines. Live interviewers — trained students working under close supervision — alternately asked to speak with men and women and the oldest and youngest adult in the households that were called.
The other one, done for the StarTribune by the Mason-Dixon firm (which Nate Silver has noted skewed to the right in both 2008 and 2012), has Obama up by 3.
Guess which one local Minnesota GOP operative and Brodkorb buddy Ben “Artful Dodger” Golnik is touting? (Oh, and if anyone has bought into the local GOP’s constant yammerings that the Strib is historically liberal, check this out.)
But besides the political-leanings angle, the profit angle is also to be considered. With Google coming very close to (if not actually) destroying the Fourth Estate through sucking up ad and other revenues that traditionally went to traditional media outlets, political ads are more important than ever for Big Media’s survival. And you don’t get ads if the race isn’t close.