Also what means of party identification are you using? Did they check "Republican" in a box on the quiz or did they choose responses that "would be republican choices"?

Also how were the questions worded?

Do you support:
A: tax cuts to large corporations and across the bpoard to help stimulate the economy and create jobs?

B: raising taxes stifling revenue, cutting off income to big business resulting in fewer jobs, and helping Hitler. Do you like Hitler you commie hippie?

If the questions are worded this way chances are you got a republican result as well. Many of these polls are written this way, although I exaggerated the effect is the same.

I think, as my ex- recently said to me, the attempt by Dems to make McCain into Bush II was a serious mistake, because no one with an IQ over 6 (her words) will buy that.

I agree with her, how anyone can equate McCain with Bush is beyond me. Even if he supports some of the same policies, "more of the same" isn’t accurate enough of a description of what is going on to sway the voter into a "more Bush" scare IMO.

Doubtful. I’ve studied too much stats to doubt well-constructed polls. I just disrespect the scientific validity of these polls, or at least the reporting of these polls. With swings so large, a good statistician would be busily designing a new experiment to explain the discrepancy; but the reporters either ignore the swings, or else "explain" them without any real evidence behind the explanations.

I have pretty good confidence in Gallup and Rasmussen. Less in Zogby, because his swings tend to be wider and he’s more of an outlier (though that gives him cred when the outlier happens to be right, like in 2000). But I have less confidence in the reporting.

…it’s long been obvious that most Americans vote first and foremost for the candidate, not the party.

And then, or so it seems, they inverse cause-and-effect as it’s commonly reported. They seem to report party identification that lines up with their candidate choice. A lot of pundits assume the exact opposite.

I think, as my ex- recently said to me, the attempt by Dems to make McCain into Bush II was a serious mistake, because no one with an IQ over 6 (her words) will buy that.