Should Polls be regulated?

[Tea Party Patriot]

Rather than trying to outlaw/regulate polls (impossible what with the Internet and all) I would rather we educated people to be able to understand/critique them correctly.

I know iit won't ever happen though.

Actually what you would probably get with the internet and given the "death" of print media will come over the next 10 to 15years is newsgroups locating sites and staff outside Ireland and publishing anyway. Just wondering should I set up something like that to make money in the French election

[rockofcashel]

The only real problem I have with them.. is that they become self fulfilling prophecies.. I think that the large jump by Gallagher two weeks out, turned the campaign into a two horse race effectively.. and people moved away from MMcG in the end as only MDH was seen as being able to beat SG.. I reckon it cost him about 5% in the end

[Tea Party Patriot]

IMO, a reduction in strategic voting is exactly why a moratorium on polls would be a good idea. I would push it out a lot longer that two weeks, in fact. People should vote for their preferred candidate.
There is absolutely no reason why any vote should be 'wasted' in a PR/STV system. (Or any system, for that matter - the only vote wasted is a vote not cast). I find it astonishing that so people can't seem to grasp this. It shows mixture of complete ignorance of the STV system and a pathetic desire to be on the winning side.

Under the Irish version of PR STV a first and second preference vote are still worth a lot more than subsequent ones. You know where your first preference goes, you know that at least a proportional part of your second preference will transfer, but after that it is only a random chance that your vote progresses any further. We don't use a decimal voting system.

[Nolte]

Under the Irish version of PR STV a first and second preference vote are still worth a lot more than subsequent ones. You know where your first preference goes, you know that at least a proportional part of your second preference will transfer, but after that it is only a random chance that your vote progresses any further. We don't use a decimal voting system.

but if the person you had voted No. 1, 2, 3 4 etc etc for had been eliminated rather than elected, then the whole vote would transfer to your next preference.

on the topic at hand, my own personal view is that once the nomination papers close for the vote, there should be no more opinion polls.

[shiel]

Polls should be banned during the campaign. There is nothing wrong with our single-transferable-vote proportional representation system. It is superior to the alternative systems used in other countries.