The Brown Bear & State Polls

The Brown Bear holds state polls to a much less stringent standard than national polls.

1. Polls may be partisan.

2. The midpoint of the date range of any poll must be Sept. 1 or later.

3. More than one poll from a polling company may be used.

4. It must not be an internet-based or online poll.

5. If it is a tracking poll then two iterations will be used. Most tracking polls use rolling three day averages. In that case the Brown Bear combines results to obtain a rolling six day average. For a tracking poll with a rolling four day average, the Brown Bear uses a rolling eight day average. If the information necessary to make this calculation is not available, the available information is used.

6. If a poll uses both a Bush vs. Kerry question and a Bush vs. Kerry vs. Nader question, the three or more option result will be used.

7. Presidential Job Performance polls are not used.

8. Only the seven most recent polls in each state are used.