The political polls that indicated that Gov. Sam Brownback would surely lose and U.S. Senator Pat Roberts re-election campaign was in trouble proved to be a joke.
Site-after-site gave challenger Paul Davis the apparent edge over Brownback.
While many didn’t give independent challenger Greg Orman a clear edge over Roberts, they did seem to indicate it would be a close race.
Brownback posted a 4-point victory against Democrat Paul Davis, who supposedly led in almost every poll since July. Roberts beat independent Greg Orman by 10 percentage points.
The political forecasting site FiveThirtyEight predicted both Davis and Orman would win based on polling data.
Fox News showed Davis and Brownback tied in early October, but then later in the month showed Davis with a comfortable six-point lead.
The New York Times’ Upshot foolishly forecast that Orman held a slight edge in what was supposed to be a close race for U.S. Senate.
Insight Kansas gave Davis a three-point edge going into Election Day. It showed Orman with a lead of less than a point on Roberts.
Fort Hays State political science professor Chapman Rackaway changed his guess that Brownback would win at the last minute based on faulty polling data.
A poll from Survey USA and KSN-TV showed voters over 65 would favor Davis over Brownback by a 10-point margin. But exit polls data indicated from the National Election Pool gave Brownback a 56-42 percent edge.
Mark Dugan, Brownback’s campaign manager, questioned the validity of polls, which showed the governor trailing. Dugan said polls underestimated Republican voters.
The age of mobile phones and caller ID make it impossible to predict what will happen in an election.
It’s all guesswork and your opinion or vote is just as important as the pollsters.
Actually make that more important.

Jim Misunas