Reply #19: A small bias

[MarkusQ]

What does "small Kerry exit poll response" mean? Small WHAT (voter response to exit pollsters? low level of response from Kerry voters? ???). And then what does, "small Kerry exit poll response BIAS" mean? (--bias toward or against what? bias with what result? ???)

It seems crystal clear to me. A small response bias means that (as many others have suggested) there was a bias in the response to exit pollers (e.g., that Kerry supporters were more likely to answer honestly about who they voted for) but that this effect was small.

The meaning of "significant shifting of votes cast for Kerry to Bush" seems clear, but what does "a combination of" mean? How are you combining these things, and what does it mean that "the patterns in E/M" can "only be reproduced" by this combination?

Again, this is pretty simple. There were two problems, a big one (vote stealing) and a small one (Bush voters refusing to give honest answers to pollsters). It takes a combination of the two to explain the observed data--you can't just say that it was one or the other that did it.<P>

Try recasting it in an other situation and see if it helps:

I've been slaving away to understand the occasional funny smell in the second floor conference room and create a new automatic-sniffer that has allowed us to distinguish the odor of spoiled food versus the odor of serious plumbing problems. The paper that I'll be releasing in a few days clearly shows that the smell can only be reproduced by a combination of small amount of leftover food in the trash can and significant stench from the toilet in the bathroom overflowwing.

The paper is short and readable, full of graphical charts. All the technical stuff has been pulled into the Appendices which are much longer than the actual paper, for those who want to check or replicate our work.

There will also be a downloadable simulation kit that anyone can download, check our formulas, and play with to see what various amounts of spoiled food or amounts of poop on the bathroom floor smell like, and see how close they can come to replicating the smell. (Must do quite a bit of poop, plus small amount of leftovers, it looks like). All the programs will be made publicly available for our programmed simulation as well.

I hope that helps.

--MarkusQ