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 d-usa wrote:
That blog is awesome...

The election of Barack Obama was the biggest con ever perpetuated on the US Public, the polls the media is reporting these days is a close second.

I like FiveThirtyEight. They include a buttload of data and explain their methodology frequently.

I know! (a Rush fan tho )

FiveThrityEight is pretty good...

Don't think the polls really mean Jack now. Probably the best time is after the first debate.

I hope I don't have to work that evening.

whembly wrote:
Methinks you just don't like rich people....

And yes, you're providing a perfect example of Romney's perception problem.

To you, he's "Scroge on Steriods".

Methinks I don't really care about how much money someone has in the bank. I judge people based on their actions and on their views. And in all honesty, I really cannot find anything redeeming about Romney, nor his wife. In his case, it's not just that I dislike his platform, but from what I have come to understand of him (granted, there is the bias of what is presented to me during a campaign season) I dislike him on a personal level. And it has nothing to do with his wealth, other than the fact that he has the viewpoint of a millionaire and is bankrupt of empathy, yet claims that he speaks for the poor.

To me, he's not "Scrooge on Steroids"; he's just a living avatar of hypocrisy and old-money-entitlement.


EDIT: I don't actually like Obama either, but he is the lesser of who evils because he at least seems to have some modicum of social conscience. Such is the drawback of a two-party system.

 MrDwhitey wrote:
I don't like steak.

Heretic! Blasphemer!

Easy Frazz....calm down....no don't call the weiner posse...its 2012 not 1850's...lynching people over the cottonwood branch might be bad juju...yes yes I see the silver badge that say Sheriff but its plastic...Your not Apaio...

 dogma wrote:

gorgon wrote:

In short, his campaign's done a poor job for him, and Mitt's done a poor job for himself. I still say Mitt is completely electable if a) his party would let him run as the moderate he is, and b) you give him a campaign team capable of playing up his strengths and downplaying his weaknesses.

Speaking from my personal experience with political consultants that lean either way:

They tend to believe the narrative put forward by either party, and further believe that other people believe it. They will dismiss neutral information if it does not agree with their preferred narrative, and advise their client as though such information does not exist. I'll give a liberal example so that its clear I'm not picking on Republicans or conservatives. I've seen well paid professionals claim that the percentage of people who claim to be Pro-Life is much lower than it really is because they don't understand what it means to be Pro-Life. This is a bad argument because, while it may be true that they don't understand the term as an analyst does, the term still has obvious resonance and, therefore, political significance.

As I implied this happens in firms dedicated to both parties, but for whatever reason it seems more pronounced in those dedicated to Republicans.

Working in advertising, it's interesting to me that bias would be so prominent at the consultant level. But then I guess with politics you get morality, religion, etc. traveling in the same cart. There are no diet soda true believers.

 azazel the cat wrote:

whembly wrote:
Methinks you just don't like rich people....

And yes, you're providing a perfect example of Romney's perception problem.

To you, he's "Scroge on Steriods".

Methinks I don't really care about how much money someone has in the bank. I judge people based on their actions and on their views. And in all honesty, I really cannot find anything redeeming about Romney, nor his wife. In his case, it's not just that I dislike his platform, but from what I have come to understand of him (granted, there is the bias of what is presented to me during a campaign season) I dislike him on a personal level. And it has nothing to do with his wealth, other than the fact that he has the viewpoint of a millionaire and is bankrupt of empathy, yet claims that he speaks for the poor.

To me, he's not "Scrooge on Steroids"; he's just a living avatar of hypocrisy and old-money-entitlement.


EDIT: I don't actually like Obama either, but he is the lesser of who evils because he at least seems to have some modicum of social conscience. Such is the drawback of a two-party system.

Fair enough dude... Romney have things you don't like... Obama have things I don't like...

At least we're not fighting wars over this... (unless... you'd like a friendly 40k game... eh? GREAT! I'll bring the booze, you bring the babes! )

Oh... and I completely agree that a two-party system sucks.

What be funny is Ryan plays 40K or Battletech. I would laugh my arse off because some here probaly rethink their view of the guy

gorgon wrote:
The issue, of course, is that it makes the Romneys lack credibility when they try to claim empathy for the middle class, etc. That narrative was never going to work for them -- Mitt is a smidge awkward personally and has made far too much money. He needed to stay on message about being Mr. Fixit for the economy. He didn't, and importantly he hasn't done a good job of explaining *how* he'd be Mr. Fixit, which is the first natural question you'll receive if you run with that narrative. And that's why he's going to lose, barring some large unforeseen event.

I think that's the problem - that he's been unable to articulate how he might fix it.

I think 'vote out that other guy because the economy sucks' is a pretty solid campaign strategy. It's a reliable, dependable emotional reaction that we've seen used to overthrow Chinese emperors thousands of years ago. The problem is that it's an emotional response, and one that's got no real basis in logic because there simply isn't a plan out there available to any president that will turn the economy around.

If it's played smart then it can form the background for a series of claims about how the incumbent needs to be booted out, but if it's played poorly then all it does is draw attention to how you also lack a plan for recovery.


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 Seaward wrote:
I wouldn't exactly count Mitt out yet. He is, after all, a moderate,

That's one of the funnier parts of this campaign. You have two moderates running for president, and two party bases desperately pretending the other side's candidate is a radical.

The polls are tied, nationally, but they're also, as near as I (and others) can tell, massively oversampling Democrats; the models that show Obama with the tie or a slight edge appear to be based on even better turnout than 2008, which is extraordinarily unlikely to occur.

The polls aren't tied. Obama's lead is slight, but it's major because the polls are almost unchanging. It seems everyone had their minds made up months ago on this one.

The claim you make there about using turnout models better than 2008 is unlike anything I've seen. The best results on turnout always come from questionaires that are built in to the survey (did you vote in the last election?, do you have a strong conviction towards a candidate?, that kind of stuff). And those surveys are showing Obama is holding a modest lead, but one Romney has made no ground on throughout the election.

We're at the point where it has to be said 'something will have to happen for Romney to win this election'. It may be something Obama does, something Romney does, or some outside factor, but there will have to be something. If thing drift until election day then Romney will lose.


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 Seaward wrote:
Rasmussen has them even, Gallup has Romney back by two - within the margin.

Rasmussen used the 2010 turn out figures. When that only gives tied results... that's a bad sign for Romney.


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 whembly wrote:
However, lemme say this here... the past weekly polls are sorta worthless. Start paying attention now...
Check this dude out (http://datechguyblog.com/2012/09/17/demoralized-as-hell-the-poll-the-media-isnt-talking-about-edition/)... he really goes into the details of the splits in some of the polls.

But...really guys... it's all a guess.

That guy is taking month by month registration figures, and claims they're excellent because they synched up with the results of 2010 (everything lines up with the 2010 election - that's how it works in landslides) and then trying to use that rather than actual polling data.

I mean, there's something to be said for looking at alternate data, but come on.

 whembly wrote:

Look at the D/R/I splits...

Oh, you mean in terms of response error. Yeah, that's unavoidable and actually becomes a pretty big problem in a climate where the polling agencies themselves are politicized.

I assumed Seaward was talking about an actual, and intentional, distortion due to the method by which respondents are chosen.

 whembly wrote:

However, lemme say this here... the past weekly polls are sorta worthless. Start paying attention now...
Check this dude out (http://datechguyblog.com/2012/09/17/demoralized-as-hell-the-poll-the-media-isnt-talking-about-edition/)... he really goes into the details of the splits in some of the polls.

I stopped reading when he confused partisan identification with registration.

He does have a point about sampling though. However his argument would be stronger if her looked at the response bias in polls taken around the elections he's using as comparisons. The whole party identification thing is just a sideshow.

gorgon wrote:

Working in advertising, it's interesting to me that bias would be so prominent at the consultant level. But then I guess with politics you get morality, religion, etc. traveling in the same cart. There are no diet soda true believers.

Part of it is just professional necessity. Most consultants don't actually interact with the candidate, they interact with the guy that interacts with the candidate. So, because they want their data to be seen by the candidate (and thereby improve their chances of obtaining future contracts), they present data that is likely to make it past the candidate's handlers to the candidate himself. This leads individual consultancies to hire ideologically desirable employees so they don't have to let low level people in on the game being played.

I remember when I was finishing up my doctorate I started looking for jobs. I applied to a firm in DC with a conservative reputation, not my preference but I figured a job in the field is a job in the field (that's when I was naive). I get a phone interview, do well enough to be flown out for a face to face interview, and we're in there for about 15 minutes when one of the managing partners asks me "Where are you from?" I told the truth and said "Chicago." he sort of chuckled, got up and walked out and the interview ended a couple minutes later.

I didn't get that job. And later figured out that not only is where you grew up important in this industry, but that being employed by a firm that favors one side basically means being blacklisted by firms that favor the other.


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 sebster wrote:

The claim you make there about using turnout models better than 2008 is unlike anything I've seen. The best results on turnout always come from questionaires that are built in to the survey (did you vote in the last election?, do you have a strong conviction towards a candidate?, that kind of stuff). And those surveys are showing Obama is holding a modest lead, but one Romney has made no ground on throughout the election.

Moreover, determining what a person actually did in the past is extremely difficult, particularly regarding voting, as the people who tend to respond to surveys also tend to vote at a higher rate than the general population. Turnout projection, more than just about anything in political analysis, is as much black magic as it is statistical analysis and this is a discipline that wears a pointy hat and a blue coat.

 sebster wrote:

That guy is taking month by month registration figures...

No, he's taking month by month identification figures and calling them registration figures.

 dogma wrote:
No, he's taking month by month identification figures and calling them registration figures.

Well that's even sillier then. It doesn't even have the supposed advantage of being somewhat hard data.