Margin Of Error

VICTORIA L. SCHADE just paid $9,750 to find out that she undeniably lost her seat in the Maryland House of Delegates to Democrat Mary Rosso in the 31st Legislative District last month. Ms. Schade did learn one fact for her money: She lost not by 18 votes, as originally believed, but by 6. The recount did not change the outcome, but it was instructive nonetheless.We like to think that voting machines make election tallies less subject to error, but the recount demonstrates that machines, like humans, are capable of mistakes.

Each voter has his or her own reason for selecting a candidate for president. Some are loyal to their party. Some weigh a candidate's stance on all the issues or a single topic like the environment, education, the Iraq war or abortion. And it wasn't that long ago that many chose the commander in chief based on which person they wanted to drink a beer with. But if you had to choose based on which candidate would be better for your investments, then what? Would you vote for John McCain, who has described himself as "fundamentally a deregulator" and wants to keep the Bush tax cuts?

The Sun Poll is conducted by Potomac Inc., a nonpartisan, independent firm based in Bethesda. The company has completed 15 statewide surveys for the newspaper since 1998, and it has performed independent surveys for other media outlets since 1986. It is not involved in any of the statewide races for any candidate or political party. Potomac Inc. identifies likely voters by purchasing the most currently available data from a commercial vendor, which compiles information from county boards of elections, and creating a call list of those who have voted in previous elections.

WASHINGTON -- One-third of Americans surveyed want to deprive illegal immigrants of social services, including public schooling and emergency room health care, a new Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg Poll finds. Even among Democrats, traditionally a party more welcoming of immigrants, 22 percent of voters surveyed would deny illegal immigrants access to services even as basic as emergency health care and public education. Still, in a sign of the ambivalence among voters about the emotionally charged issue, a strong bipartisan majority - 60 percent - favors allowing illegal immigrants who have not committed crimes to become citizens if they pay fines, learn English and meet other requirements.

The Sun Poll is conducted by Potomac Inc., a nonpartisan, independent firm based in Bethesda. The company has completed 15 statewide surveys for the newspaper since 1998, and it has performed independent surveys for other media outlets since 1986. It is not involved in any of the statewide races for any candidate or political party. Potomac Inc. identifies likely voters by purchasing the most current available data from a commercial vendor, which compiles information from county boards of elections, and creating a call list of those who have voted in previous elections.

You dress up for job interviews and meetings with clients. That's a given. But making a good first impression isn't the only way your fashion style comes into play. Colleagues size up your outfits to decide whether you're stodgy or fun, among other things. That's according to a recent survey by TheLadders.com, a job site for executives. More than 70 percent of respondents said that employees dressed in suits are seen as more senior-level, while 60 percent believe those workers are taken more seriously.

Former Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gantt continues his strong bid in North Carolina to unseat U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms, according to a poll conducted this week.The poll indicated that Mr. Helms, a Republican, was statistically tied with his Democratic challenger: Mr. Helms' support rating of percent, compared with 45 percent for Mr. Gantt, was within the poll's margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points.In a year when few incumbent senators appear in danger of defeat, the ultraconservative Mr. Helms appears to be the most vulnerable.

U.S. Sen. Paul S. Sarbanes has widened his lead over his three main Republican challengers in the past six weeks, according to a recent poll.In a general election match-up, the Democratic incumbent would beat any of his potential Republican opponents by at least 24 percentage points, the poll showed. His margin against each of the three leading Republicans was larger than it was in mid-July.Meanwhile, with less than two weeks to go before the Sept. 13 primary, the race for the Republican senate nomination appears wide open with no candidate garnering more than 23 percent of the vote and 37 percent of GOP primary voters reporting themselves as still undecided.

More than four out of five residents of the Washington-Baltimore area support the effort to bring the Olympic Games to the region in 2012, according to a recent survey commissioned by local Olympic organizers. The poll also found that nearly seven of 10 area residents would attend the Games if they came to the region. "It just reinforces that the people in the region are excited about the Olympics," said Dan Knise, president and chief executive officer of the Washington-Baltimore Regional 2012 Coalition.

A string of recent surveys and economic indicators is revealing a bleak mood among workers, even though the labor market has been improving during the past several years. In a poll commissioned by the AFL-CIO and released last week, 55 percent of 803 registered voters said their incomes were not keeping up with inflation. Nine percent said their incomes were outpacing inflation. (The poll has a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.) "What we're seeing now is that a lot of factors are coming together to bring home the problems that workers are facing," says Thea Lee, the union group's policy director.

Resigning. Giving two-weeks notice. Whatever you call it, it's imperative that you quit your job gracefully. I was recently reminded of this when a colleague received an e-mail forward of a resignation letter of a lawyer, who detailed how much he hated his job. This lawyer provided a list of tasks he found tedious and went on to say why. (The fact that this resignation letter got away from the recipient and spread via e-mail to outsiders is another story.)...

It's one of those rare times when you can be totally anonymous and honest about your workplace: the good and the bad. I'm talking about the employee survey. At one time or another, many of us have taken an opinion survey to gauge, among other things, morale, job satisfaction and changes we'd like to see in our organization. But do you ever wonder what exactly happens with our opinions and suggestions? Not much, according to a recent survey by Opinion Research Corp., a research and consulting firm based in Princeton, N.J. Of 807 workers, 51 percent of them said their organizations conduct employee surveys.

When it comes to benefits that attract and retain workers, bosses and their employees are wide apart on what matters. Two surveys released last week found that workers put more emphasis on pay, while employers believe promotion opportunities and career development are top reasons employees join or leave the organization. A survey of 1,100 workers by Watson Wyatt Worldwide and WorldatWork found that 71 percent of top-performing employees rank pay as the primary reason they would leave a company.

The Maryland governor's race is a virtual tie less than a week before Election Day, as Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.'s relentless attacks on Mayor Martin O'Malley's record on crime and schools have eroded the Democrat's support in the Baltimore suburbs, a new poll for The Sun shows. O'Malley, who led by 6 percentage points in The Sun's September poll, has seen his advantage drop to just 1 point, well within the survey's margin of error. Ehrlich, who has spent months trying to convince voters that O'Malley's record as mayor makes him unqualified to lead the state, appears to be consolidating the base of support that in 2002 made him Maryland's first Republican governor in a generation.

You dress up for job interviews and meetings with clients. That's a given. But making a good first impression isn't the only way your fashion style comes into play. Colleagues size up your outfits to decide whether you're stodgy or fun, among other things. That's according to a recent survey by TheLadders.com, a job site for executives. More than 70 percent of respondents said that employees dressed in suits are seen as more senior-level, while 60 percent believe those workers are taken more seriously.

A string of recent surveys and economic indicators is revealing a bleak mood among workers, even though the labor market has been improving during the past several years. In a poll commissioned by the AFL-CIO and released last week, 55 percent of 803 registered voters said their incomes were not keeping up with inflation. Nine percent said their incomes were outpacing inflation. (The poll has a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.) "What we're seeing now is that a lot of factors are coming together to bring home the problems that workers are facing," says Thea Lee, the union group's policy director.

Sen. John F. Kerry enjoyed at best a modest uptick - if that - in a batch of opinion polls taken after last week's Democratic National Convention, findings consistent with the forecast of most analysts heading into the event. One survey showed President Bush gaining slightly on his Democratic challenger. And the samplings all indicate the presidential contest remains close. Strategists for the two candidates worked to put their own best spin on the latest surveys, but analysts said the results were in line with a political climate in which a great number of voters have already dug in behind their candidate.

Resigning. Giving two-weeks notice. Whatever you call it, it's imperative that you quit your job gracefully. I was recently reminded of this when a colleague received an e-mail forward of a resignation letter of a lawyer, who detailed how much he hated his job. This lawyer provided a list of tasks he found tedious and went on to say why. (The fact that this resignation letter got away from the recipient and spread via e-mail to outsiders is another story.)...

A wide-ranging study of bloggers, the chattering class of the Internet, concluded that a mere 5 percent of them use news as their primary topic - a figure at odds with perceptions that blogging is remaking journalism. The study, released yesterday by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, reported that 37 percent of those surveyed cited their own life and experiences as primary fodder for their blogs. Eleven percent of the respondents said they blog regularly about politics and government; 7 percent about the entertainment world; 6 percent about sports, and lesser fractions on business, technology and faith.

Howard County is up for grabs in this year's gubernatorial election, a Sun poll shows, and the results locally could be crucial statewide. "We know we fought the JV team" in 2002, when then-Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend carried her party's banner, said state Republican Party Chairman John Kane. This year, he said, Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, the expected Democratic candidate for governor, will "run harder and stronger. Howard is a major battleground for us." Both parties have state staffers working in Howard, and both plan to turn out as many voters as possible.