It’s not quite what you’d think, but it is amusing.  Mind you, I’ve never been a Birther.  I’m a Competencer.

It shows Romney at 46% and Obama at 43%. But get this: It also has the president’s approval rating at 50%. (How is Obama’s job approval at 50%, but his head-to-head number is 43%?) And given that this poll was a “call-back survey” — with the respondents first interviewed back in April — it feels like we need more poll data to make sense of all the events of the past two weeks.

Note the ever-so-slight undermining of the poll’s methodology (echoing the White House – hey, it’s MSNBC).  Who knows?  The methodology could be an issue.  Things happen.  But questioning the fact that Obama’s approval numbers do not match his head-to-head numbers vis a vis Romney is a newbie mistake.  The fact is that in comparing both figures, MSNBC‘s crack team of political analysts is making the proverbial ‘apples and oranges’ comparison: both numbers cannot be expected to be similar because they were not asked of the same group of respondents.

Proof?  The PDF of the NYT/CBS Poll document itself spells it all out on the front page: “Asterisk indicates registered respondent only.”  Registered what?  Registered to vote, I suppose. But it doesn’t matter.  What matters is that the document includes figures derived from two different groups of respondents and distinguishes between them using an asterisk.

Take a look at the results for Question 1 – concerning Obama’s approval rate – on Page 2 of the document (just select page 2 at the poll document site, here).  No asterisks next to the respondent headings to be found anywhere.  Then go to Question 3 – which we can sum up as “would you vote for Obama or Romney if the election were held today?” – on Page 5.  The question is preceded by another one.  Essentially, “are you registered to vote”?  The respondent headings each have an asterisk next to it.

There’s your answer, guys.  That’s how.  Two different groups being polled about 2 different things: (1) approval and (2) preference compared to Romney.

Via Political Wire, where they are equally baffled by how Obama can be behind Romney when his approval rate is 50%.

Now that I think about it, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by instances of poor reading comprehension at MSNBC…

Keep pushing, though.  You get cocky now, you’ll throw it all away…

UPDATE: Related: Some comments on the latest Obama Poll-mageddon, from TOM.

Odds are it’s really more than two candidates, actually…

Now all they need over there is a state prison and Marin County will finally be representative of California state government’s three main constituencies: “the very rich, the very poor, and the public employees.”