This Poll Should Shake Up And Wake Up Democrats

This chart was made from a new SurveyUSA Poll that was taken on September 2nd and 3rd of a random national sample of 900 registered voters, and has a margin of error of 3.3 points. It purports to show that Donald Trump, if he was the Republican nominee, would beat all three of the top Democrats -- Hillary Clinton by 5 points, Bernie Sanders by 4 points, and Joe Biden by 2 points.

Before you get too upset, let me say I think the poll has a fatal flaw. The sample they used was 50% women and 50% men -- and that is not going to be that gender percentages that actually vote in the 2016 election. Since 1980, women have voted in significantly larger numbers than men in every presidential election. In 2012, women made up 53% of the voters while men made up 47%. And there is no reason to believe that won't happen again in 2016 (and if a woman is on the ballot, it might even be a bigger difference).

If the poll had been weighted in this way, both Clinton and Biden would have done much better (since both had a significant majority among women). Sanders however would still be an underdog (because women split pretty equally on his candidacy).

There is also a pretty large undecided group (14%-16%), which I think would break largely for the Democratic candidate.

But even though this poll is flawed, it should serve as a warning for Democrats. The 2016 election is NOT going to be a cake-walk at all. It is likely to be close -- and that means we will have to work harder, and make sure we have a very large turnout on election day. Special attention must be paid to getting women, minorities, and young people to the polls.