While the Moose came in first in this poll, many students remained dissatisfied with the choice, and the moose lost a final poll to "no mascot".
The highly anticipated final poll from The Register was released, and it had some surprising news: Mr. Obama appeared to have widened his lead over his Democratic rivals, with Mrs. Clinton coming in second and Mr. Edwards a close third.
Two final polls from CNN and Time in Ohio and Georgia provide political junkies with more to chew on, but largely confirming what other surveys have been telling us: Ohio remains a very close contest between Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, while Newt Gingrich appears poised to win his home state of Georgia by a wide margin.
In September and October 1994, 2002, and 2006, Gallup's likely voter estimates showed larger margins for the leading party than what the final estimate showed (with the final poll in 2002 moving from a slight Democratic advantage to a Republican lead in the final poll).
The chart shows not just how far each final poll's estimate varied from Obama's current percentage of the two-party vote (ballots cast for either him or Romney), but also the range of each poll's margin of error.
That gave Clinton a giant margin in early returns, vastly at odds with what exit polls showed — and far bigger than the 7-point margin she enjoyed in the final polling average from RealClearPolitics.
Steve Shepard also pointed out that many of the most accurate final polls were from all-landline automated pollsters. .
Steve Shepard also pointed out that many of the most accurate final polls were from all-landline automated pollsters.
Similarly, a final automated telephone poll from the Democratic-affiliated firm Public Policy Polling PPPP), gives McAuliffe a 7-point lead (50 to 43percentt) but shows Sarvis winning just 4percentt of the vote.
Apart from Gallup's final poll not having been especially accurate in recent years, it has often been a wild ride to get there.
