Thread: LANDSLIDE? Hidden Vote?

Originally Posted by MaFioSo

ROFL I mean.....really? I know I'm not the only one laughing and shaking my head in disbelief to that comment. You don't wan't to give him an ounce of credit solely because he had to be "convinced" to go in? hahhahha Like I said, equally as biased as Forever.

I dont give him credit because he made the same choice everyone else would have made and he watched it on tv. I would have made the same call so thats pretty close to me taking credit for killing him. What irritates me is its a political talking point for him taking credit. Pass that shit where it needs to be and stfu.

Originally Posted by AetheLove

That's not a criticism of the method, that's just saying you don't trust liberals (however you define liberal).

Not trusting the source is legit. There's plenty of sources I don't trust. I think your use of the label "liberal" as a scarlet letter is misguided, but that's how you judge trust and anyone who wants yours will have to clear the bar you set.

No. What I'm saying is that since he calls himself a liberal and is also an activist for Obama on his blog, I suspect his methods from the start.

Originally Posted by AetheLove

I'm not sure I understand - you're not happy that Silver is saying that Michigan, Maine, and Minnesota are swing states? You'd rather he just assign their electoral college votes directly to Obama?

No I'm not happy with the fact that he designates states that are traditionally Democrat and have almost always voted that way as swing states. He does this to pad his analysis of battleground states, to paint a skewed picture of what is actually happening in swing states. I've been following him for a while and he does this sort of thing pretty regularly. Including these states, with a clear statistical lead, and calling states within the margin of error for Obama (even though the momentum may have been on Romney's side), Silver can and does paint a bleak overall picture of what the swing states will look like for Romney that doesn't match reality. For me, this analysis just doesn't hold water. In my opinion it represents a bias amounting to wishful thinking on Silver's part in this case. I respect the guy but I think he is biased.

Originally Posted by AetheLove

A 1% or 2% lead can easily be statistically significant. It might also be too small to matter. The Law of Large Numbers and the Central Limit Theorem are real things, and learning how to sort out when you have a large enough sample to make finer-grained predictions is important if you want to do this sort of work. Having one poll show candidate A with a narrow margin might not mean much. Having 10 different polls all show a narrow margin to candidate A and only 1 poll showing a narrow margin to B means a lot more.

I see your point but every one I those polls has a margin of error for a reason. To try and call a state and say that the polls are clear is disingenuous. Silver does this all the time, again in my opinion expressing more wishful thinking than valid statistical analysis.

Originally Posted by AetheLove

He is trying to find if the margin in the national polls and the apparent differential from 2008 can help him tease a bit more out of the current state polls. In particular, he wonders if Obama is underperforming in states we list as deeply blue. He's questioning Obama's lead in the states we all assume he's leading. He uses a few examples to illustrate the point; and he uses the examples that most clearly illustrate the differential.

That's what you want in an example - one that clearly shows the point.

But then he goes on to look at ALL the data.

This is how I read it:

"But what about the states we all think Obama will win going away? Is that so certain? For example, there was one poll out of Oregon in which he did poorly. Even if he wins the election, could he lose the popular vote?"

There are other ways to read it. I can't think of any way to read it where he's actually cherry-picking his data to skew his results.

He cherry picked the outlying Obama polls and then defended doing that with some arguments that I disagreed with. That's all I was saying there.

Originally Posted by AetheLove

Anyway, Nate Silver doesn't need me to defend him. Liberal or not, his future career as an electoral statistician depends on him doing a good job. Maybe he's trying to cash-in on his 15 minutes by purposefully singing a sweet song to Democratic voters in order to get a large, quiet, back-door Christmas present from The Liberal Conspiracy. Maybe it'll be 30 pieces of silver with a bow on it.

But I don't see it.

Or there could be no conspiracy at all and he could just be a self avowed liberal that really wants Obama to win, and sees the data through that filter to begin with... Along with doing dishonest things like calling clear Democratic states swing states in order to support his view of the numbers. For this reason he could just be "wrong".

Originally Posted by WickedTribe

Romney was at +1% nationally when you were declaring a landslide for him. So yeah, you will do that.

I was honest about my reasons. My prediction was about the toss-ups and the intangibles. I didn't point to Romney being +1% and use that as my reason. That was my point Wicked.

You know, I gotta hand it to you Laz, you have had the same narrative all along. You haven't wavered since you first called a landslide, and now that polls show this race in a dead heat (a far cry from the overwhemling advantage Obama had when you first called it a win for Romney), you very well could not only see a victory for Romney, but a landslide as well.

If the polls are so close in those battleground states, one, or all of them could go to Romney. I think its safe to say it'll be a toss up, but still.

I got to hand it to you, you have defended your points several times with some pretty solid reasoning. It may not be solid to those who only see smoking guns, and dead bodies as "concrete", but you have presented enough that a reasonable person would need to consider it.

I still think Obama is going to win by the narrowest of margins, but I continue to hope I'm wrong.

Just remember Laz, those who attack you, call you names, and insult your intelligence don't want to see Romney win because that would mean you, with all your "insane ramblings", knew more about this scenario than they did. That's where the animosity comes from.

Anyway...

And now this:

Beatin' Barack - Obama wanking toy - YouTube

Originally Posted by -Lazarus-

No I'm not happy with the fact that he designates states that are traditionally Democrat and have almost always voted that way as swing states. He does this to pad his analysis of battleground states, to paint a skewed picture of what is actually happening in swing states.

But you don't say how the picture gets skewed. Unless the label figures in to how he does his calculations, then it's just a label. He could call Michigan a LOSER state, or say that Wisconsin was part of the Blocque Du Fromage; but unless he has some special cheese-biased algorithm, what does it matter?

Originally Posted by -Lazarus-

I see your point but every one I those polls has a margin of error for a reason. To try and call a state and say that the polls are clear is disingenuous. Silver does this all the time, again in my opinion expressing more wishful thinking than valid statistical analysis.

So then why are we even having this conversation? You keep going on about things like "valid statistical analysis", but you haven't said what part of his analysis is invalid. If you don't think polls are useful, then that's fine with me.

Originally Posted by -Lazarus-

He cherry picked the outlying Obama polls and then defended doing that with some arguments that I disagreed with. That's all I was saying there.

I can't tell what you're saying... where is the cherry-picking? The polls he used as examples were ones where the result was very different from what we'd expect. The examples went both ways.

Originally Posted by -Lazarus-

Or there could be no conspiracy at all and he could just be a self avowed liberal

You use that word a lot, and in ways that don't quite make sense to me. I think I've passed some sort of event horizon where the density of the word "liberal" has become large enough to warp space-thought.

So I might be done.

Cheers,


AetheLove

Originally Posted by Fovezer

Sticking to your beliefs is one thing, sticking to your beliefs when they fly in the face of the evidence is another. For instance, I believe Obama will be a far better President than Romney ever could hope to be, but I don't believe he is going to win because of that. I believe he is going to win because the polling data shows he is going to win. If it showed Romney ahead, my belief that Obama was the better option would remain but I wouldn't believe Obama was going to win. That's where the fundamental disconnect comes in.

So it's not admirable to hold a belief that flies in the face of the evidence. That's how we get creationists and conspiracy theorists, and I don't think you'd say that those positions are admirable. If I'm wrong, it's because all the pollsters were wrong. Every single one of them. And that's a small possibility, I suppose, but not one I'm willing to bet on. If Laz is wrong, what's his reasoning?



Hey, that's fine. You can see me however you want, but I don't base my views on made-up wishes and feelings. I have data that supports what I believe and why. I'm not asking you to ever agree with my evidence or my conclusions, but there does come a time when the evidence is pretty conclusive one way or the other and it becomes foolish to deny it. That's when I think it becomes crazy and out-of-touch.

I disagree. There is something to be said for instincts and following your gut.