TW: Many of you may be familiar with Real Clear Politics. I started following it during the 2004 election cycle. It is actually a useful aggregator of politically oriented information. It provides polling, tags columns on a wide array of topics and generates a limited amount of its own content. RCP's polling in particular is cited frequently in other media (e.g. MSNBC). The challenge with RCP is that it is biased toward the right.
Bias does not make them bad people or irrelevant, it is just something about which one should be aware. They edit the titles of the columns they feature to their own slant (see note below) and the original content although not exclusively conservative is most definitely oriented in that direction. They also elevate the columns of say the Weekly Standard or Reason (two very conservative rags) to sit side by side with the NYT, WaPo, CNN etc. Yes MSM has biases but the CNN's of the world are at least trying to maintain some legitimate balance.
Nate Silver in the posts below attacks strongly their polling choices.
At the end of the day, RCP can do whatever they wish but understand they are biased. I am obviously biased in what I post and how I post information, they very much are as well. I just want to make sure folks understand RCP has an agenda beyond the mere dissemination of information.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/09/real-credibility-problems.html
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/10/rcp-follow-up.html
*(good example was this morning- George Will wrote a column entitled "The Rough Rider's Collectivism" which was somewhat negative on Roosevelt and dubious of McCain's true affinity with TR, yet RCP on their blog entitled the column as "What McCain Learned from the Rough Rider")
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