I've had people say it's a hardening, actually ~ US presidential election 2016 part 9/11 never forget

"do I get to win this time?"

everything sopan deb posted tonight on trump's NH rally material was amazing btw

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CuIPPILVIAEkMqg.jpg

i mean how can anyone give an answer this long to anything and still not do the obvious thing of just spinning it around into an excuse to say great things about mike pence and the great vision they have for america and how great his kids are or fucking anything normal

also: "We had a guy inside the room, oscillating my mic."

"I used to say I think someday he'll be an anchor. Guess what, he's still doing the maps!"

That's actually pretty funny. I mean, I bet John King can't believe he's still doing the maps.

Nate Silver has admitted their model is volatile several times. He's also explained why he thinks that's been the right way to describe this election. Iirc it's because 1) There's been a shitton of undecideds/thirdpartyvoters compared to last election, meaning much more room for change 2) There's been so many explosive news stories, from Trump, but also scandals about Clinton, making voters more uncertain and 3) There's simply been more change in the polls. Which is of course the most important. It's also true. Hillary's lead almost disappeared in the polls until the debate, what kind of poll aggregator wouldn't say her chance was shrinking under that circumstance? Now there's been a big swing over this last week, and she's gained almost 30% in the forecasts. Which does seem kinda insane to me.

Their model has definitely behaved very differently than in 2012, and it might seem as if 2012 was simply an election extremely well suited to the data approach. But of all the things that Camaraderie mentioned as should perhaps have been included in the forecast: early voting, better ground game by Democrats, expected performances in the next debates, higher voter registration among minorities, high numbers of late deciders, etc. one of them is included - the late deciders, as in undecideds - and most of the others are guesswork. There isn't even enough demographic data amongst voter registrations to fully include in a model. Economic data, otoh, is objective data that can be put into a model and updated as new data comes in.

All of the aggregators reacted to the polls but 538 had the strongest reaction. Nate tells you not to overreact to individual polls and yet his model seemed to do that.

Trump's totally the type of dude that said "you can't study for the SATs, man. you either know it or you don't!"

this hurts my feelings a little

I'm sure someone would have posted this, but I won't wade through five days of posts to check:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1chlgN3Stxk

Has Silver accounted for this hidden unknown in polls-plus?

Nate's model reacted to the overall consensus. As they pointed out, even for the polls that kept Clinton comfortable ahead, the trendlines were awful. I think they've definitely suffered from overfitting and old ideas, with the most extreme example being them relying on endorsements in the primaries, which turned out to have almost no predictive value, but a lot of the critique of the models is overblown. Except for the now-cast, the now-cast sucks. But for instance, the predictwise guy that intheblanks linked to, he wants them to both be more selective in the polls they include, but then critiques them for 'adjusting' the polls. Even says 'Why not just average the polls?' a paragraph after complaining that they average too many polls.

if you're worried about the Sunday town hall debate just watch what he did in NH yesterday

at the end of the day Trump can't put together remotely coherent answers to questions he knows are coming in advance, and while this format may be a little more friendly to him b/c he doesn't have to engage with Clinton as much, she'll still be around to explain why every answer he gives is idiotic

not to mention all that's happened since Debate One

I wonder if Trump U is gonna get brought up at all in these debates. It's kind of a slam dunk since there's practically nothing Trump can do to make himself look good there, but we all know Trump will spend several minutes defending himself against what is an obvious fraud (compare to Hillary's email answer: "Yep, I did it, I regret it, and I won't do it again" - 10 seconds, done)

Seriously https://twitter.com/justinwolfers/status/784380522214461440

It raises an obvious question: Why has the Freedom Caucus, which built its reputation on promoting conservative principles through internecine conflict, quietly fallen in line behind Trump? According to interviews with a host of Freedom Caucus members — and a National Review analysis of demographic trends and voting patterns in their congressional districts — the explanation owes both to partisan self-interest and political self-preservation.

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/438984/donald-trump-house-conservatives-conquest-explained

x-post: Wow... That second debate is going to be something as well.

xxp that... is fantastic

that was one of the more composed answers i've seen trump give recently and it was still total rambling bullshit from start to finish

Beggars belief tbh.

The other thing to remember is the town hall is 90 minutes. The closest he's got to that in real world similar environments is like 30 minutes. He is going to need at least a couple of extra bumps.

Guessing Apple will make their iPods in the US around the same time Donald's Make America Great caps are made in the US

is Hillary allowed to respond to his answers? I can't remember how these town hall debates go.

i feel like i should be entirely inoculated against trump word salad by now but i still find myself trying to follow the logic of his responses and quickly getting a headache and a deep, unsettling sense of existential terror

well I *think* he's trying to say our college grads should work in US sweatshops but your guess is as good as mine

this election is so making me think of one of my favourite episodes of Cheers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUtyuOToM8o

xp and i guess that apple will write off the billions they've spent in developing manufacturing facilities overseas and then spend those billions again to set up in the us? sure, why not

that article about how difficult it is to transcribe Trump's speeches when he goes off-prompter is pretty good. you can kinda follow his train of thought when you're hearing him but on paper it's such a jumble

I've interviewed people like this and its very hard to translate their jumbled runaway-trains of thoughts to the page. But most of the people I interview are drug damaged rock musicians.

tbf the jury is still very much out on trump's drug damage

Sam has basically said, in very nice veiled words, that maybe Nate should look at his model.

So we should get off the Silver standard, and instead we should Feel the Wang?

I'm viewing 538 as more of a postmodern meta-type project. It's less about trying to be predictive or ueful and more about outwardly dramatizing how complex the world is and how difficult it is to ever say anything, ever, is at all certain.

It is an elaborate commentary on contemporary epistemology, with the ultimate point being that confused despair is actually an accurate and honest response to the state of contemporary politics. I am not sure I disagree.

538 was the only aggregator (major) that ever dipped below 60% for Hillary

Well, RCP doesn't do probabilities, just state-of-the-race. They had Trump leading (barely) in late May and again in late July (the between-convention trough). In the dark "dead heat" days of September, they got very close (<3 points), but Troomp hasn't led since the DNC.

As noted I look at RCP partly _because_ it's right-leaning and I want to avoid false hope.

So we should get off the Silver standard, and instead we should Feel the Wang?

definitely, he's been pretty spot on this whole election, and I believe he was just as good as Nate in 2012

i am a stan for predictwise, but betting market-based predictions serve a different purpose than polling-based, and the writing on predictwise is underedited verging on unhinged. i've met the guy a couple of times and he is indeed nuts.

imo nate silver's horse race political/non-stats punditry is pretty good, his explanations of difficult statistical ideas are outstanding (e.g. this is amazingly clear http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/election-update-maybe-its-time-for-ohio-and-pennsylvania-to-part-ways/) and the polls-plus models seems fine (if it little overcorrelated with itself at the state level).

but the other two models shouldn't be on the website, and everyone else who writes for that website is bad and hated, especially that harry enten guy.

here's one thing the aggregators don't really take into account:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2016/10/07/trumps_ground_game_footprint_remains_small_131994.html

As such, the campaign has begun to open offices in some key battleground states, while adding state and regional directors to the payroll. Advisers have also promoted efforts to register voters at Trump’s high-octane rallies across the country, in addition to cross-referencing rally attendees with state voter rolls in search of potential new voters to target and register.

But these tactics are only a fraction of the modern presidential campaign toolbox and pale in comparison to what Clinton’s campaign has built, with dozens of offices in crucial battlegrounds and a sophisticated analytics operation comprising 60 staff members.

“Somehow trying to act like this is groundbreaking stuff? It’s crazy,” said another Republican strategist with extensive national campaign experience. Trump’s operation is “literally so far behind, it’s not funny. They’ve taken us back 40 years.”

i really think Trump is gonna lose by a lot more in the real election, and that if the aggregators miss, it will be in that direction (I didn't always feel this way tho)

here's one thing the aggregators don't really take into account

this is the nominal attraction of betting markets. they supposedly price that kind of information in.

that trump town hall answer about how he's going to change the post-college job market is like his entire campaign boiled down to a rancid lozenge
try to imagine showing that to anyone in 2014 and saying that's the Republican nominee; you'd be laughed out of the room

It's true, imagine finding ourselves here without being able to see the build up.

I think I saw Rancid Lozenge open for the Residents

more hillary signs in my neighborhood this week and a hillary supporter came to my door to interview me + get me to sign a pledge card to vote for her. i wanted to tell him he was wasting his time since i'm already a sure thing.

also like 1-2 anti-mcginty mailers coming each week now

I saw a Trump bumper sticker in my own neighborhood -- which is otherwise inundated with Clinton signs -- for the first time yesterday. It was on a car illegally parked on a residential street while the driver was looking through his phone. So, you know.

On my way into work this morning I passed the Cleveland State U. dorms and there were about four windows in a row covered in Trump signs.

I ran another red with my Clinton sticker yesterday. I never drive like this. I feel like I'm cursed!

http://fb.me/1rYPJ0RTV (Yoko Ono says she had an affair with Hillary in the 70s)

This is a hoax site right? Seen the first serious Dutch papers copyright this already

OK didnt even have to ask that q lol

http://theslot.jezebel.com/donald-trump-assumes-hell-be-alright-at-the-next-debate-1787527396

most signs are for clinton in my neighborhood but the people w/ trump signs have like 4 of them in their front yards

this hurts my feelings a little

same

my town is awash in Clinton yard signs, with more and more popping up each day.

I haven't received any mailings yet, here in Pgh, Mordy - in the primary, we must had gotten McGinty mailings every other day, it seemed.

trump: central park five still guilty

TOPICAL

Just a cool guy with cool opinions

I hope they sue the shit out of him.

does Trump maybe have a terminal illness that is going to cause him to expire in two weeks or so and this is his long-developing "fuck you" to the Nation?