The local SCSU Survey, run by three political science professors here including one regular reader of the Scholars, has issued its fall statewide survey. The headlines of the local paper and the campus paper trumpet the good (for them) news that Kerry is leading the poll 49-42. But looking at the survey itself indicates something a little curious. According to table 4, the sample was coded as 41% Democrat and 32% Republican with 12% considering themselves in the Independence Party. A Humphrey Institute poll released on the same day has 44%R and 42%D ... and shows Bush leading 47-44.

Steve Frank, one of the SCSU pollsters (and the regular reader, he says), says his poll "is not one of those quickie, overnight polls," and indeed they took the poll over a 7 day period 10/19-26(skipping Fridays and Saturdays.) Somehow that is supposed to be a better measure, yet Rasmussen's poll over 10/20-26, also has Bush up 3 here.

This poll is causing the RealClearPolitics number to show an average of Kerry 1.0%. Were the poll removed and the other three averaged, it would be Bush up 1%. I don't know what to think of the SCSU Survey, but I do have to wonder about a survey that has such a heavy weight of Democrats (and in a survey where the independent/Independence vote was 38-36 Kerry.)

UPDATE: You're welcome, Chumley. And this just in: Zogby now says Bush +1.