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@antipodean said in US Politics - election predictions:
@Donsteppa I don't know how pollsters could account for the shy voter. Either way, if Biden wins by one or a landslide, the nutbags will have a conspiracy theory to account for it.
I'v never dug into it much beyond Wikipedia and a marketing paper 20 years ago, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shy_Tory_factor is interesting on the face of it.
Post 1992:
The report found that 2% of the 8.5% error could be explained by Conservative supporters refusing to disclose their voting intentions; it cited as evidence the fact that exit polls on election day also underestimated the Conservative lead.
After the 1992 election, most opinion pollsters altered their methodology to try to correct for this observed behaviour of the electorate.[1] The methods varied for different companies. Some, including Populus, YouGov and ICM Research, have adopted the tactic of asking their interviewees how they had voted at the previous election, and then assumed that they would vote that way again at a discounted rate.[2] Others weighted their panel so that their past vote was exactly in line with the actual result of the election. For a time, opinion poll results were published both for unadjusted and adjusted methods. Polling companies have found that telephone and personal interviews are more likely to generate a shy response than automated calling or internet polls
... until they again got it badly wrong in 2015
The British Polling Council subsequently launched an independent enquiry into how polls were so wrong amid widespread criticism that polls are no longer a trustworthy avenue of measuring voting intentions.[6][7] This enquiry found that, contrary to the popular reporting, there was no Shy Tory Factor in the election, and the polling had been incorrect for other reasons, most importantly unrepresentative samples.[8]
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@nzzp said in US Politics:
I'm fully expecting to be wrong, but I am interested in getting some posters on record with predictions so we can all laugh about it in a few days
I heartily second that.
I have looked at the polls.
Carefully taken on-board the advice of this forum of people who know more about statistics than me.Economist.
96% chance of Biden winning electoral college.
Nate Silver 538
Biden wins in 89 of 100 scenarios they run.
All network polling saying Biden will win (including Fox)
So, based on careful thought (as I did in 2016)
I'll say that it is all bullshit and Trump will win. -
So whats happening with the laptop stuff? Surely that cast iron evidence was the final nail for biden? Or has it gone by the wayside this close to the election?
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@Paekakboyz said in US Politics:
So whats happening with the laptop stuff? Surely that cast iron evidence was the final nail for biden? Or has it gone by the wayside this close to the election?
FBI still has an active money laundering case. It’s been going for almost a year. It’s clearly a valid story, it’ll probably get reported in better in a few days regardless of the election result. The Greenwald article was a reasonable summary if you are interested.
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@Winger https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/02/trump-biden-supporters-campaign-bus
Not at Trump rallies but democrat campaigners enroute. Quite a number of other sources reporting on it.
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Righto my election prediction.
So this is how it sits according to latest polling. 319 Biden to 219 Trump, though a large number are 'technically' toss-ups.
Not pretty viewing and although betting odds are narrowing it doesn't look good for Trump.
The polls are surely more accurate than last time, a lot of reputations got tarnished after 2016 so I can't see the same mistakes being made and I don't buy the idea that polling is intentionally being skewed to dissuade Trump voters (If anything I'd have thought that would energise a base). On top of that Corona has removed Trumps "It's the economy stupid" argument and unlike 2016 msm and social media has gone pretty much all-in on censorship of anything anti-Biden. I find it funny showing supposedly 'politically informed' folk Biden gaff clips that they had absolutely no idea about, let alone the mind-boggling content of crackhead son's laptop.
Having said all that, I still have hope. Trump supporter enthusiasm is off the charts, huge rallies, convoys, regattas. Look up on youtube to find amateur artists writing songs and raps for Trump where there is no real equivalent for Biden. My feeling is those polled who support Trump will vote while those who support just may not, the only enthusiasm is really to be against the Orange Man.
In 2016 we were told he was 'literally Hitler'...and well after 4 years and still no concentrations camps, an increasing support amongst minorities, recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the development of the #blexit & #walkaway movements, a string of peace deals (Bahrain/Israel, Israel/UAE, Serbia/Kosovo, Israel/Sudan), no additional major military conflicts (how long since a president who managed that?)...well where can the anti-Trump argument go? Sure you can hit him with Corona handling, though surely some responsibility lies with state representatives..and of course public gaffs and tweets..but it doesn't really measure up to "Trust us, he is Hitler, electing him will be a crime against humanity!".
Of course the side effect of the extremist anti-Trump narrative pushed by mainstream outlets had the side effect of painting anyone who was either supportive of or even neutral to Trump as being racists/nazis/facists/-insertword-phobic and as such it is your civic duty to berate, dox, assault and do everything in your power to have their means of employment and supporting their family removed. I have a MAGA hat but even in a city on the other side of the world I can nearly guarantee if I was to wear it in public I would be attacked. Has there been any other US president where showing support will likely get you attacked in public in a foreign western country? Hell I had a family member of my partner frothing at the mouth about how Trump and his family need to be murdered for the sake of humanity at a family skype dinner the other day, this from a medical specialist with his own practice. The brainwashing at work to create such a visceral reaction from a respected medical professional is incredible as it is terrifying. I can only imagine this being significantly worse in democrat strongholds & toss-up states and its from this I see the shy Trump support. If anyone asks you say you are voting Democrat because failure to do so could very likely result in significant pain to you or your family.
Finally as cities around the US are busy boarding up their windows for expected violence during election night, you can bet it isn't Trump supporters they are worried about. The twin marxist movements of Antifa and BLM have really made their mark this year, fighting for racial justice and against the evils of capitalism through assault, vandalism, arson and murder. It took Biden until August to condemn the violence with Democrats appearing to openly encourage it until polling started to show that it might not be the vote winner they thought it was. Most recently this occurred in Pennsylvania which is shaping up to be a very key battleground state, this looked to be safely in Biden's hands until a couple weeks ago..
So in conclusion my prediction is that the polling has improved and a lot of 2016's polling issues have been accounted for..however I think the specific enthusiasm, shy Trump support and folk who appreciate law and order are new issues which will not be accounted for in 2020 polling. At a guess I think this could be worth about a 4% shift on the polls and as such I see Trump taking it narrowly at 285 to 253
Of course I'm hoping like hell for a more convincing win than even last time, including the popular vote, as I see that as being the only way this rising radicalism in the states can be addressed.
If I'm wrong and the Dem's take it out as expected then I think we can all agree its certainly been a fascinating 4 years on the Trump train.
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Even though I picked PA to underestimate Trump in the other thread the RCP polling average there @Rembrandt is trash. Absolutely it's nudging back Trumps' way but the magnitude of the shift is overstated by flooding of polls by the usual suspects to achieve that very result.
That RCP average is five polls, two of which are Trafalgar and Rasmussen. So they are using polls who state they account for the shy Trump factor to begin with.
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@Rembrandt Mate in all seriousness I think you should consider getting some help. You are that far down the rabbit hole that it is a real worry. You're clearly a nice guy who doesn't talk over differing opinions, but I think you need to step back a take a look at where you've got to.
I think I'm correct in thinking you're from NZ but live in Australia. Why the obsession with the US? With politics and events that really have little bearing on your life?
Do you have family there? Do you have any hats in support of a NZ political leader? Or Australian? Why the obsession?
You think you can't trust the media, and in some ways that is fair enough, but then you are prepared to trust stuff which deserves it even less. You're prepared to take what are effectively propaganda anecdotes, and use these to draw massive conclusions because they're in support of the clickbait articles that your previous choices have sucked you into, which purport to give some sort of secret knowledge outside of the mainstream media - where everything against your established view is 'narrative'. It is classic conspiracy theorist behaviour.
I get that the extremist ways of thinking on the far left are mad, as are the right. But how much of that actually impacts your life, in real life? I would assume, like the rest of us, the answer to that is fuck all. It's very easy to watch a bit of youtube and draw a false conclusion 'OMG this is happening in America'. Even if it is raw footage, America is a big place and you can't draw conclusions like that. It's like how after Once Were Warriors came out a heap of Seppos thought that was how NZ was, from a bite-sized piece of fiction: Presentation is everything, and from afar you are getting a tiny piece of the picture, which in today's world is deliberately tailored via data collection to confirm the rabbit hole you've gone down, to keep you clicking, and to keep the advertising in front of you. Reference also that Fox piece on our 'scary response' to Covid, our 'Quarantine Camps' - all but calling our government fascist, despite just being elected in a landslide, and literally nobody in NZ having that actual experience. There will be people in the US right now who are down that rabbit hole, and who believe that, and who will be going 'OMG this is happening in NZ'. -
I think Biden is the favourite, and my prediction to win, but the US system makes it harder to predict. There's also a lot more legal chicanery available than here - for example, it's legal on the face of it for a state to legislate who their electors will vote for and ignore the result of the vote. I'm not expecting to see that actually happen, but it's not a total impossibility either.
Another factor at play is the undecided responses - most polls these days exclude that because they assume that they won't vote at all based on previous experience, but if a lot of those undecideds do vote and are heavily pro Trump, that would swing the election in Trump's favour.
That's the primary reason why predictions are a percentage chance of a particular result - to attempt to account for undecideds voting at all, and mostly voting for one candidate (rather than being distributed along the same lines as the polls). A secondary reason is the possibility that some of the responses change their minds and votes between when the poll is taken and election day.
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Listening to the final 538 podcast before the election on the way to work this morning, they pretty much refuted the shy Trumper theory.
They proposed that the 2016 result was more different than most pollsters as the large undecided voter pool (12.5%) swung to Trump following Comey's email investigation announcement.
This year the undecided voters are estimated to be only 4.3%, and less likely to all swing to one candidate
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@reprobate I liked your post on a general level.
Without getting involved in a critique of @Rembrandt , I can say that I find it useful to step back every now and then and remind myself that I am simply a sideline commentator.
It is very easy (and I put my hand up as a culprit here) to get dragged into justifying your pov with an argument that starts to blinker you.
This is the very thing that many of us complain about, with the increasing divisions of thought and entrenched positions.
It is important to reset and try and look at the other view every now and then. -
@reprobate Seriously? Christ mate it's a US politics discussion thread on a NZ rugby forum...you known kinda where people discuss US politics...oh but thanks for your concern buddy, really sure you mean that, almost brings a tear to my eye that a bloke somewhere in the world is going that extra mile to try and reach out and help a fellow human being in such a time of need. Such a selfless act which I'm sure the sycophants will lap up with glee
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@Stockcar86 Trump generates such a powerful response either way, and Biden is such an uninspiring candidate, I still think the question is will the people be happy with another 4 years or do they simply want him out. I expect the voter turnout to be much higher this time, which may be bad news for Trump but who really knows
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@Crucial said in US Politics:
@reprobate I liked your post on a general level.
Without getting involved in a critique of @Rembrandt , I can say that I find it useful to step back every now and then and remind myself that I am simply a sideline commentator.
It is very easy (and I put my hand up as a culprit here) to get dragged into justifying your pov with an argument that starts to blinker you.
This is the very thing that many of us complain about, with the increasing divisions of thought and entrenched positions.
It is important to reset and try and look at the other view every now and then.A lot of the time the thread is a Trump echo chamber, with all this evidence that Biden has done this and his son has done that and that Trump can do no wrong. There is not a lot of consideration of the flaws of both men, which I guess is something that US politics seems to bring out as much as any. As the national guard and business owners prepare for riots or unrest regardless of the result, I suppose that is representative of what is going on in the US itself. Only a decisive victory will stand a chance to keep a lid on the madness. If it's close they might want to buckle up because the next few weeks could get very rocky
US Politics