Immigration - A Santorum Personal History

It strikes me as odd how strident Rick Santorum is against illegal immigration given his background as the first generation in his family who was born in America. It seems that it is possible that his grandfather got to America just before (or perhaps not so legally) just after the draconian Immigration Act of 1924 and that his father had to wait until he was 7 years old until he could join his dad. I'm not sure why Rick Santorum talks about 5 years. This immigration act was targetted at Italians and Jews, cutting down Italian immigration from 200,000 per year to 4,000 a year (while increasing immigration quotas from "favored" nations).

I wonder if someone did some real investigating whether they would find out some detail, perhaps embarrassing or perhaps some deep psychological wound, that would explain why Rick Santorum is so unforgiving of people wanting to move to America, despite the roadblocks put up by this generation's bigots. When his father was born, the Italians and Jews were the target of bigots in America. Today it is Mexicans. The target changes, and "legal" means of enforcing the bigotry changes, but fundamental bigotry is still there.

Solid Demographics + Most Recent Poll = Best Prediction

Reviewing the SC primary results, the poll closest to the actual voting date that had good demographics was the most accurate. That poll was PPP.

Virtually every primary has at least 10% of the vote being decided on the day of the election. Voters who decided on the day of the election or within a few days make up at least 20% and in SC it was a whopping 55%!

So trying to predict a vote within a couple percentage points, which is important when you have 4 to 7 viable contestants, seems to require some sort of mysticism to be accurate.

But if you simply poll in those last few days, and model your demographics based on past demographics, taking into account any obvious reasons for a significant change from the most recent election or two (e.g. voters can reasonably easily switch from one primary/caucus to another... even in a so-called "closed" primary, or a prior contest was moot because the party's nominee was clear by the time that prior year's contest was held, etc.

Anyway, looking at the just released PPP poll for Florida and reviewing the exit poll data, I see no reason to consider any major change in demographics from the 2008 exit poll and for the most part, the PPP poll deviates very little from that.

But here is one outlier: it says 40% of voters describe their political philosophy as 40%. That is WAY off the mark. In 2008 it was 27%. In 2000 and 1996 the Florida primary was preceeded by two dozen contests, so voter interest is low. How that affects political philosophy is not yet clear to me. However, the very conservative % in those two contests was even lower at 20% and 21%. Even though Florida is a state with higher growth than most other states, a demographic shift statewide seems virtually impossible.

So how would this affect the results?
Let us assume that the conditional probabilities crosstab reported by PPP is not significantly affected by any other demographic anomalies (one I noted was the much lower hispanic sample of 7% vs. 12% in the '08 primary).

So the conditional probability of choosing a candidate based on your political philosophy is:

Political Philosophy	Newt	Romney	Santorum	Paul	Other
Very Liberal	42%	34%	9%	5%	10%
Somewhat Liberal	44%	23%	9%	20%	5%
Moderate	30%	39%	6%	17%	9%
Somewhat Conservative	35%	42%	9%	9%	6%
Very Conservative	44%	23%	20%	8%	5%

If one assumes the exit polling in the 2008 primary is reflective of the 2012 exit polling, then the % of voters for each political philosophy is 2% very liberal, 8% somewhat liberal, 28% moderate, 34% somewhat conservative, and 27% very conservative.

For Newt Gingrich, 2%x42% + 8%x44% + 28%x30% etc... you get 36.5%.
The numbers for Mitt Romney calculate to 33.9% which cuts the 5 pt lead from Newt in half.
The numbers for Santorum and Ron Paul reverse their positions from a 3 pt lead for Santorum to a .7 pt lead for Ron Paul.

Now consider what the media narrative is when the pollsters say someone is leading by 2.5 % vs. the 8% lead reported by Insider Advantage (who gives ZERO demographics, ZERO polling methodology).

The best scientific research is open and relatively easily reviewable by anyone with the time and inclination to do so. Mistakes are found, and corrected. This is in stark contrast with the majority of media polls put out every week during election season.

The Myth of SC's Importance in choosing Presidents

1) Somehow, the SC GOP has gotten a lot of pundits to believe that the choice of SC voters is what determines the nominee of the GOP.

Related myths of political significance are
2) No one has won the first two contests (and until last week when the IA win result was changed, Romney was believd to be the first)
3) There has never been a different winner in the first three contests (which presumes that SC is always in the first three contests)

Myth 3)
2012 is the first year that SC was in the first three contests. In 2008, besides IA and NH, the Michigan primary and the Wyoming caucus preceded them. Huckabee, Romney and McCain won the first three events.
In 2000, the Delaware primary and Alaska caucus also preceded SC. In 1996 the first three events were the Alaska, Louisiana and Iowa caucuses and Buchanan's win in Louisiana was a major factor to his performance in Iowa.
In 1988, Bush, Robertson and Dole won the first three events with Roberton's Hawaii caucus win being a major factor in his performance in the 4th event (the Iowa caucus).

Myth 1 and 3)
In 1996, it was the NINTH contest of the year.
In 1988, it was the THIRTEENTH contest of the year.
After 8 or 12 contests, the winner of the nomination is clear. Whatever SC has to say about it is irrelevant.
In 1980 it was the 5th primary of the year (6th election including caucuses). Even then, it would be 2 months before the eventual nominee stopped losing primary/caucuses.
Prior to 1980 they had no vote (caucus or primary) so it had zero relevance.
No event had relevance in 1984 or 2004 when incumbent presidents were reelected president. Possibly in 1992 it was of minor significance though Bush Sr's competition was effectively over after the New Hampshire primary.

Myth 2)
In 2000 Bush won both the Alaska and subsequent Iowa caucuses (NH was the 3rd election that year). In 1996, Alaska was joined by Louisiana as pre-Iowa caucuses, and both were won by Buchanan.
In 1980, Bush sr won the first two contests, the Iowa Caucus followd by another primary that was NOT New Hampshire. It was Puerto Rico.
In 1968, Nixon one the first two contests (Wisconsin being the 2nd primary after New Hampshire). Iowa did not begin its caucuses until 1972.