World's Most Important Poll

by John Barta [courtesy of Blog for America]

We call this the World's Most Important Poll because it shows that one popular Democratic candidate also has many Democratic voters that find them to be their least favored candidate, thus raising questions about their ability to succeed in the general election if they get the nomination. It costs only a few dollars to create this poll and you'll end up registering lots of voters in the process. This has energized our voter contact activity!

The poll does many other things as well:

• It forces voters to think about all of the candidates, even those with whom they are unfamiliar. As wonks we are shocked to learn that some folks have no idea about some of the candidates. This gets folks thinking about all of the candidates.
• It forces voters to think about electability in the general election.
• It lets voters share their opinion about who they DON'T LIKE in addition to who they DO like. And, it demonstrates that these two things are very different. (The lowest "like most" candidate is NOT the same as the highest "like least" candidate. Some candidates ARE polarizing!)
• It engages voters in the election RIGHT NOW in a tangible way - boy, do they LOVE polking those pins in the chart!

How it works: Voters are given TWO pins, one for the candidate they like the most, and the other for the one they like the least. They cannot vote until we have confirmed their registration status as Democrats. We do the verification of status on the spot with a laptop computer loaded with current voter data. This thing draws crowds and gets results!

(Note: Photo was taken before end of evening poll. Results vary, but trends are discernable. Try your own!)

Here's a link to more information: http://www.victoryalliance.org/poll/poll.htm

Background, we run this poll every Thursday night at the San Luis Obispo, California, Farmer's Market. Patterns have emerged and have changed over time. One pattern which is consistent is that the same candidate always has the highest number of "Like Least" votes - and these are Democrats who are voting.