[Lord Dave]

So, a thought occurred to me.

Right now, the GOP is distancing themselves from Trump. 
If enough people vote 3rd party or write-ins, the Republican controlled house chooses the president.
Would the house choose Donald Trump?

I'm starting to think they wouldn't.  I get the feeling that dealing with Donald has been very hard for them and they wish they had removed him somehow.  So maybe, just maybe, they'd vote for someone else other than Donald.  Probably make it a close margin between him and Hillary.  "Oh no, all those Democrats voted Hillary and a few of our retiring senators with generous severance checks turned traitor.  Oh no..."

[trekky0623]

So, a thought occurred to me.

Right now, the GOP is distancing themselves from Trump. 
If enough people vote 3rd party or write-ins, the Republican controlled house chooses the president.
Would the house choose Donald Trump?

I'm starting to think they wouldn't.  I get the feeling that dealing with Donald has been very hard for them and they wish they had removed him somehow.  So maybe, just maybe, they'd vote for someone else other than Donald.  Probably make it a close margin between him and Hillary.  "Oh no, all those Democrats voted Hillary and a few of our retiring senators with generous severance checks turned traitor.  Oh no..."

A third party candidate would have to win at least 1 electoral vote with neither Trump or Hillary getting to 270. It won't happen.

[Lord Dave]

So, a thought occurred to me.

Right now, the GOP is distancing themselves from Trump. 
If enough people vote 3rd party or write-ins, the Republican controlled house chooses the president.
Would the house choose Donald Trump?

I'm starting to think they wouldn't.  I get the feeling that dealing with Donald has been very hard for them and they wish they had removed him somehow.  So maybe, just maybe, they'd vote for someone else other than Donald.  Probably make it a close margin between him and Hillary.  "Oh no, all those Democrats voted Hillary and a few of our retiring senators with generous severance checks turned traitor.  Oh no..."

A third party candidate would have to win at least 1 electoral vote with neither Trump or Hillary getting to 270. It won't happen.

It's possible, if Bernie Sanders signs up as a write-in.
Right now, that's where I'm leaning towards: A write in. Because fuck them all.



Also:
So, Paul Ryan has denounced Trump, more or less.  Not only that but it seems Trump is going to "remember" all those who withdrew support.  I think Rushy's right, Trump is what his supporters say Hillary is.  They're projecting.  Or perhaps Trump is.  Either way, welcome to America 2016.  I hope this finally kills the Republican party and they can reform as something more like what they used to be: Less extreme and fear mongering.

[trekky0623]

It's possible, if Bernie Sanders signs up as a write-in.

What I'm saying is, though it's possible third-party could get significant portions of the popular vote, in order to be considered by Congress, a third-party candidate would have to either win a state, or win one of Nebraska or Maine's districts. That takes coordination and more than just a significant amount of people writing in or voting third-party.

[Lord Dave]

It's possible, if Bernie Sanders signs up as a write-in.

What I'm saying is, though it's possible third-party could get significant portions of the popular vote, in order to be considered by Congress, a third-party candidate would have to either win a state, or win one of Nebraska or Maine's districts. That takes coordination and more than just a significant amount of people writing in or voting third-party.

Fair enough.

Still gonna anyway.  Not like it matters.  At this point Hillary could win in a landslide victory. 

Hell, even the wiki leaks "surprise" was more of a bore than incriminating evidence.  Plenty of people thought it would doom Hillary.  HA!  All it did was prove she's a politician.
I think the Trump October surprise was far more damning.

[Rama Set]

It's possible, if Bernie Sanders signs up as a write-in.

What I'm saying is, though it's possible third-party could get significant portions of the popular vote, in order to be considered by Congress, a third-party candidate would have to either win a state, or win one of Nebraska or Maine's districts. That takes coordination and more than just a significant amount of people writing in or voting third-party.

Fair enough.

Still gonna anyway.  Not like it matters.  At this point Hillary could win in a landslide victory. 

Hell, even the wiki leaks "surprise" was more of a bore than incriminating evidence.  Plenty of people thought it would doom Hillary.  HA!  All it did was prove she's a politician.
I think the Trump October surprise was far more damning.

Which wikileaks surprise?

[Lord Dave]

It's possible, if Bernie Sanders signs up as a write-in.

What I'm saying is, though it's possible third-party could get significant portions of the popular vote, in order to be considered by Congress, a third-party candidate would have to either win a state, or win one of Nebraska or Maine's districts. That takes coordination and more than just a significant amount of people writing in or voting third-party.

Fair enough.

Still gonna anyway.  Not like it matters.  At this point Hillary could win in a landslide victory. 

Hell, even the wiki leaks "surprise" was more of a bore than incriminating evidence.  Plenty of people thought it would doom Hillary.  HA!  All it did was prove she's a politician.
I think the Trump October surprise was far more damning.

Which wikileaks surprise?

http://www.politico.com/live-blog-updates/2016/10/john-podesta-hillary-clinton-emails-wikileaks-000011

[sandokhan]

[Lord Dave]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2016/10/11/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-paul-ryan-republicans-shackles/91891944/

Because I saw it and thought it amusing.

[Lord Dave]

And one more!
http://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/nation/2016/10/10/91882548/
So, Trump things the polls are crooked.  Ok, so I decided to see what the Fox News polls had cause, you know, Fox News is crooked for Trump.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/elections/2016/presidential-election-headquarters?intcmp=subnav

And he's still losing.
Well... I guess the only polls that Trump is winning, is the one his company funds. 

[Lord Dave]

http://secondnexus.com/politics-and-economics/wikileaks-falsified-documents-trump-russia/2/

And... no idea if this is false or not.  I'll have to poke around at the actual e-mail later.

[trekky0623]

Maine Governor Paul LePage, everyone:

[W]e need a Donald Trump to show some authoritarian power in our country and bring back the rule of law because we've had eight years of a president, he's an autocrat, he just does it on his own, he ignores Congress and every single day, we're slipping into anarchy.

"We need an authoritarian because the previous president was too authoritarian." 

[Rushy]

Well, the polls may not be rigged, but the demographics of the polls is meant to reflect the 2008 and 2012 voter turnout numbers. e.g. they assume Hillary will receive the same turnout percentages that Obama received. Therefore, the only thing polls tell us is that if the same percentages of voter demographics come out and vote, Hillary will receive somewhere close to the poll percentages in each state. Although I do not consider myself having the ability to peer into the future, I have a hard time seeing an election cycle where Hillary receives the outstanding voter turnout that Obama did in 2008 and 2012. It's certainly possible, of course, and there's no sense in just blatantly guessing, which is why it'd be dumb to poll based on what you guesstimate the demographics. Trump is currently winning the early voting in Florida, if that's anything to consider.

Maine Governor Paul LePage, everyone:

[W]e need a Donald Trump to show some authoritarian power in our country and bring back the rule of law because we've had eight years of a president, he's an autocrat, he just does it on his own, he ignores Congress and every single day, we're slipping into anarchy.

"We need an authoritarian because the previous president was too authoritarian." 

Tyranny is fine as long as the tyrant agrees with me, duh.

[trekky0623]

Well, the polls may not be rigged, but the demographics of the polls is meant to reflect the 2008 and 2012 voter turnout numbers. e.g. they assume Hillary will receive the same turnout percentages that Obama received.

According to this article on 538, most polls do not weight results based on party-affiliation. They weight for demographics, and estimated turnout is going to be determined by the questions they ask to score your likelihood to vote ("likely voters").

[Rushy]

Well, the polls may not be rigged, but the demographics of the polls is meant to reflect the 2008 and 2012 voter turnout numbers. e.g. they assume Hillary will receive the same turnout percentages that Obama received.

According to this article on 538, most polls do not weight results based on party-affiliation. They weight for demographics, and estimated turnout is going to be determined by the questions they ask to score your likelihood to vote ("likely voters").

Polls weight based on certain demographics, e.g. they'll reflect 2008/2012 numbers by estimating roughly 45% of voters will either lean or be registered as Democrats. (also, Nate Silver's idea that party affiliation is an attitude, not a demographic, is utter nonsense.) A key problem with Nate Silver is that he gained popularity by averaging out polls during 2008 (which a blind monkey could have cobbled together). He didn't recognize that Trump was going to win the primary even when the exceedingly accurate Primary Model predicted it to be so. Now he is constantly switching up his polls and ruining his reputation when the very same Primary Model predicts Trump will win in a landslide. At this point, Nate Silver is no different than any other pundit. His own inherent bias against Trump is causing him to ruin that mess he calls a political model. What's funny is that Nate Silver apologized for screwing up on Trump and then turned right around and started doing the same thing in the general election. Also, Nate Silver is hardly one to be writing articles about reweighting polls when he does that very thing on a daily basis.


Trump got a record number of votes in a primary season that also had a record number of Republican voters (and this was against several other relatively popular opponents). I can almost guarantee we'll see a surge of people who don't normally vote coming out and voting for Trump. Is it enough to swing the polls into his favor? I suppose we'll find out.

[Ghost Spaghetti]

Maine Governor Paul LePage, everyone:

[W]e need a Donald Trump to show some authoritarian power in our country and bring back the rule of law because we've had eight years of a president, he's an autocrat, he just does it on his own, he ignores Congress and every single day, we're slipping into anarchy.

"We need an authoritarian because the previous president was too authoritarian." 

"We need an authoritarian to bring about authority to the anarchy which we have as a result of an authoritarian."

[George]

Polls weight based on certain demographics, e.g. they'll reflect 2008/2012 numbers by estimating roughly 45% of voters will either lean or be registered as Democrats. (also, Nate Silver's idea that party affiliation is an attitude, not a demographic, is utter nonsense.)

Are you making an argument here, or just contradicting the article?  The author (who wasn't Silver, by the way, rendering the bulk of this paragraph irrelevant) explained his reasoning in detail, and made a very convincing case.  Handwaving it away by calling it "utter nonsense" isn't exactly a compelling counterargument.

Trump got a record number of votes in a primary season that also had a record number of Republican voters (and this was against several other relatively popular opponents). I can almost guarantee we'll see a surge of people who don't normally vote coming out and voting for Trump. Is it enough to swing the polls into his favor? I suppose we'll find out.

He also had a record number of votes cast against him.  For all we know, there'll be a surge of people who don't normally vote coming out to vote against him.  Also, you're assuming that increased turnout for the primaries will be reflective of the turnout for the general election.  How do you know these extra voters for the primaries weren't people who already vote in the general elections?

[garygreen]

i don't think rushy read any more of that "apology" than the headline.  it actually says the opposite of what he's claiming it does.

speaking of absurd statistical weights: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/13/upshot/how-one-19-year-old-illinois-man-is-distorting-national-polling-averages.html?_r=1

[Rushy]

Are you making an argument here, or just contradicting the article?  The author (who wasn't Silver, by the way, rendering the bulk of this paragraph irrelevant) explained his reasoning in detail, and made a very convincing case.  Handwaving it away by calling it "utter nonsense" isn't exactly a compelling counterargument.

Nate Bronze is under the impression that as an attitude, party identification changes a lot. The problem is that is, as I said, utter nonsense. While yes, quite a few people change their party line during election season, the vast majority of people do not. They vote exactly the same way each and every time. Hence, they are a demographic. What matters is whether they show up or not, not necessarily which way they vote.

He also had a record number of votes cast against him.  For all we know, there'll be a surge of people who don't normally vote coming out to vote against him. 

And you think all of those GOP voters will vote for Clinton? Your best bet is that they don't show up at all.

you're assuming that increased turnout for the primaries will be reflective of the turnout for the general election.  How do you know these extra voters for the primaries weren't people who already vote in the general elections?

...primary turnout always predicts the winner. Hence why I mentioned the primary model, a model that predicts the winner based on primary turnouts and has been correct every year for the past century. Though, to be fair, the model was created in 1996 and "backtracks" in order to predict the winners since 1912.

i don't think rushy read any more of that "apology" than the headline.  it actually says the opposite of what he's claiming it does.

Oh, really? What part?

[garygreen]

i don't think rushy read any more of that "apology" than the headline.  it actually says the opposite of what he's claiming it does.

Oh, really? What part?

"He didn't recognize that Trump was going to win the primary even when the exceedingly accurate Primary Model predicted it to be so. Now he is constantly switching up his polls and ruining his reputation when the very same Primary Model predicts Trump will win in a landslide. At this point, Nate Silver is no different than any other pundit. His own inherent bias against Trump is causing him to ruin that mess he calls a political model."

538 didn't post a primary model until january, and when they did it showed favorable numbers for trump. 

But why didn’t we build a model for the nomination process? My thinking was this: Statistical models work well when you have a lot of data, and when the system you’re studying has a relatively low level of structural complexity. The presidential nomination process fails on both counts. On the data side, the current nomination process dates back only to 1972, and the data availability is spotty, especially in the early years. Meanwhile, the nomination process is among the most complex systems that I’ve studied. Nomination races usually have multiple candidates; some simplifying assumptions you can make in head-to-head races don’t work very well in those cases. Also, the primaries are held sequentially, so what happens in one state can affect all the later ones.

their general election model is different.  his apology wasn't for ignoring his model, it was for not having a model at all.

i also dunno where you got the idea that silver modifies his model every day.

To be more precise, it’s the output from a computer program that takes inputs (e.g., poll results), runs them through a bunch of computer code, and produces a series of statistics (such as each candidate’s probability of winning and her projected share of the vote), which are then published to our website. The process is, more or less, fully automated: Any time a staffer enters new poll results into our database, the program runs itself and publishes a new set of forecasts.4 There’s a lot of judgment involved when we build the model, but once the campaign begins, we’re just pressing the “go” button and not making judgment calls or tweaking the numbers in individual states.