Sebring touts poll numbers, will still lose by 20+

In a press release issued yesterday, the Sebring for Congress campaign released the results of an “independent poll” conducted by Persistence Consulting, the results of which seemed to indicate Sebring was gaining ground against incumbent Rep. Gwen Moore:

First polls show Gwen Moore with 54% of the vote, Dan Sebring with 32% of the vote, and 14% of the district as undecided. (sample size: 1,003 households, error rate +/- 2%)

Without knowing the location of the households called, it’s hard to say how accurate those numbers are, or how reflective they are of the entire Fourth District. After all, it’s likely the poll numbers would be much different if the households called were primarily located in West Allis, Cudahy, or South Milwaukee, as opposed to if those households were primarily in the City of Milwaukee.

Further, while there’s not much information on the intertubes regarding Persistence Consulting, I was able to glean this little gem from a page I found:

Jacob R. Dean
Owner of Persistence Consulting, Mr. Dean is the Grassroots Director of the Conservative Republican Alliance (CRA).

I don’t know for sure the Persistence Consulting owned by Jacob Dean is in fact the same Persistence Consulting used by the Sebring campaign (though I am attempting to confirm it), but if it is the same consulting firm, that would have to call into question the accuracy of the poll numbers, given the biases of the firm used to get the results.

However, putting aside the flaws and biases that may plague the polling touted by the Sebring campaign, I’m willing to put down cash money that Dan Sebring will lose to Gwen Moore in November 2010 by at least twenty points – if not closer to thirty.