Yeesh, yeah, Nate’s model is jacked all to hell. When your model is producing obviously-erroneous results, it’s time to scrap it, not defend it.
Politics
Putin Worship
I find many people’s views on Russia and Ukraine terribly naïve and vile. Alas, many of these people are ones I formerly liked and respected.
It’s a terrible thing to realize that those you formerly appreciated as thoughtful and empathetic are just fine with the genocide of Ukrainians and the high likelihood of Russian invasion of Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. And then the concomitant multiple scores of thousands of deaths of US citizens as we will be fighting in those countries too.
I cannot say I understand and frankly, I do not wish to.
New Newfoundland
I’ve seen more than one person arguing that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is justified because Russia thinks that the Ukrainians are actually Russians1.
I think that Canadians are really Americans with worse haircuts and food. Ergo, that means we should invade Canada and correct their Tim Hortons- and poutine-worshipping ways.
See how insane that sounds?
Box Of
People who think Harris saw the questions before the debate, you are fucking idiots. Those are the same questions they ask during every presidential debate and have since rocks were new.
What are you, 11?
There’s actually quite a lot to criticize Harris on but none of the conservatives seem to have the intellectual capacity to do so.
Claims and Games
Trump’s or Harris’s chance of winning the presidency is 100% or 0%. The percentage that you’re actually measuring in a one-off contest that is not repeatable is the confidence in your model. So if you say, “Trump has a 55% chance of winning,” you’re really making a claim that you think your model has a 55% chance of being correct in that direction. These are two different things!
Yes, I know it’s pedantic, but in a single unique event what you’re confident about and what your actual claim is matters.
Para
Silver’s model is clearly bunk even if Harris ends up losing. It has no resemblance to reality, but only to itself. It is a model of that models only its own parameters infinitely.
Guffaw
This says a lot about the American psyche and is, alas, correct.
Cali Point
Voting for Harris while living in California is gonna feel pretty pointless, but I’ll do it anyway.
Dollar Bills Y’all
Oh yeah. This isn’t even directly political; the media just needs the election to be a neck-and-neck horserace. It gets them many more clicks, and makes vastly more $$. That’s all is it is.
Chamberlain
It’s still happening even with modern conflicts. Just today, saw some goober arguing that it’d be better (more “peaceful”) if Ukraine had just rolled over and surrendered to the Russians because Putin had very valid security concerns that justified killing tons of Ukrainians, and that the rest of Eastern Europe should also acquiesce when Putin comes calling (also for “peace”).
These people are terrible. But they are common.
Poll Lax
In an increasingly information-heavy age where news also spreads quickly, polls are self-influencing both directly and indirectly. Most likely, we should just not do them, or not release them publicly if conducted by campaigns.
Right Wrong
China is also paying the right-wing media and some of the more left-wing too. More to the righties, though. But Russia has been throwing absolutely huge amounts of cash at the republicans lately.
(P)Resident Evil
There are two things going on here. The article mentions one of them at the very end, but doesn’t really emphasize it. The first is that the media is beholden to the “both sides” narrative even when it makes absolutely no sense.
Imagine that someone powerful said, “I want to kill everyone with blonde hair, all 30 million of them. No mercy, no survivors.” And someone from the opposition said, “This is morally wrong and ethically unconscionable. I will do my best to prevent this genocidal atrocity.” The media would fact-check this into:
“The President says he wants to kill all the blonde people, but perhaps he was talking about the type of chocolate-free brownie. Since he hasn’t actually killed anyone, who can say? His opponent claimed that he was ‘genocidal’ and no blond person has been killed yet, so this is false.”
This absurd both-sidesing is inherent to our terrible journalism culture but there is also something else going on here. Even with Harris in the race, Trump still has a ~45% chance of winning it all. If he does win, these journos don’t want to be on the “enemies” list. And there will be an enemies list this time around for sure if Trump does take the prize.
Thus, part of this kowtowing is a very human, very understandable motivation. It is simply fear.
Poll Stacks
The reality is that the most likely outcome is that election will be so close all the polls are and will be nearly worthless. The “experts” will lie about them obviously after the fact as is their wont of late, but that’s just background noise these days.
The inevitable coup has a 50/50 chance of success following that if Harris wins.