Marquette University is still deciding how to proceed with what was arguably the most-watched political poll in Wisconsin during this election-heavy year. In the Marquette poll's first year, it had the distinction of being attacked by Democrats during the recall campaign and Republicans in the race for President and U-S Senate. It ended up being pretty close in all three contests, nailing the final margin in the recall and missing the U-S Senate and Presidential races by one to two percentage points. With those contests over, Marquette pollster Charles Franklin will return to the University of Wisconsin-Madison to resume his job as Political Science Professor. He's not sure what happens next. "What I hope happens is that someone in the state, and I think very likely the Marquette Law School, will be doing more polling in the future," he says. "Maybe with me, maybe with someone else, but there's nothing magic about me. It's doing high-quality polling and letting the public know about that. That's my interest and my goal." Whichever side was trailing in Franklin's poll would attack it for trying to drive down voter enthusiasm, but he says public polls serve a purpose. "The parties, the candidates, and especially the interest groups in the state and the country all have polls for themselves," he says. "They know what those data are showing. The one group that's left out of that information are the voters. The people of the state." Franklin credits a few factors for his poll getting it mostly right. It used live operators, not automated recordings. It surveyed large samples of voters. And, it included cell phones. All of that costs money. Marquette University spokeswoman Brigid O'Brien Miller says questions about the future of the poll are still under discussion.
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