New York magazine has an interview with Nate Silver, the poll-watching wunderkind who went from blogger to go-to expert on political predictions. He had some very interesting things to say, including about the presidential election. Here’s how he’s handicapping the election at this point:
So, basically, barring an October surprise, Romney’s chances are more like nil?
Not nil, but slim. So the debates for example have proven to move the number by about 3 points in the past. So, for example, in 2000, Al Gore had about a 3-point lead against George W. Bush at this point in the election and was perceived to have lost the debates — I guess he sighed too often or something — and that was enough to reduce his lead and turn the election into what was almost literally a tie.
The problem now is that there are a lot of ways that Romney could kick a field goal, but Obama seems to be ahead by a touchdown right now. So, I guess he could kick two field goals, to stretch the metaphor out. Or maybe if Romney did pretty well in the debates, and you had a couple of bad but not extraordinarily bad jobs reports, he could put two or three things together, and then they get a strong turnout. So that’s why you can’t quite say that he can’t come back organically, if you had a cluster of different medium-sized things happen, to get some momentum. But I’m not sure that, say, the debates alone are enough to move the numbers for him. I think he needs that and something else, or he needs some kind of acute crisis to develop.
And I love this exchange about Dick Morris:
What do you make of Dick Morris? You mention him in your book, and he’s just the absolute least accurate pundit ever, and yet he still gets a platform.
I’ve been thinking about starting a hedge fund, just to invest in whatever Morris says won’t happen. You have to actually be quite skilled to be that bad.
It’s amazing. He said the other day that Romney would win by 4 or 5 points.
I know, that would be my secret plan if I were the Romney campaign, to get Morris to make a prediction of an Obama landslide. I’d definitely lay some money on Romney at that point. I think it’s just, when you make that many poor predictions — and we’re not just teasing him for one, he really does have a terrible track record — are you deluding yourself? Or is it all a show to rally your base? With him I don’t really know, but, I see prediction as a way to judge whether you’re, frankly, in touch with reality or not. We all have our views, and we look at this information in a certain way, and you test that by means of an event that you don’t know the outcome to yet and seeing if your subjective point of view matches what unfolds. So I think a slightly impolite way to put it is that at best Dick Morris is detached from reality, and at worst I guess, he knows it and is just lying to people.
Morris gets a platform because he’s telling fact-averse Fox News viewers exactly what they want to hear. He reinforces their wishful thinking.
Incidentally, Silver also talks about his days making lots of money playing online poker. Silver went to East Lansing High School, where his debate coach was my friend Will Repko, now the debate coach at Michigan State (where he’s won 3 national championships in the last 9 years). I’ve known Will since he was in high school, when I coached against him. Will is also a very good poker player. We’ve played together a few times and I’ve generally tried to stay out of his way and tangle with other players instead.
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slc1
October 6, 2012 at 11:02 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Or maybe if Romney did pretty well in the debates, and you had a couple of bad but not extraordinarily bad jobs reports, he could put two or three things together, and then they get a strong turnout.
Of course, the latest jobs report was rather positive, which was quite a surprise to the so called experts who predicted an increase in the unemployment rate. Instead, it decreased from 8.2% to 7.8%. It is quite amusing to see the clowns over at the fascist news channel claiming that the books were cooked. This should negate, to some extent, any advantage that Romney gained from his Gish galloped debate performance.
Michael Heath
October 6, 2012 at 11:23 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Ed writes:
I wonder if Mr. Morris’ arguments also help keep the financial constituents contributing when reality’s not favoring the home team. I’m guessing not, that he’s ignored by them, that Morris has been reduced to a pathetic sycophant for Fox’s hosts. I would have also mentioned sniveling but I think that attribute has always been present.
josephmccauley
October 6, 2012 at 1:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
As soon as I see or hear Morris on TV or in print, I’m gone. If he were in your headline I would have skipped. Isn’t he (in)famous for other stuff? I’ll stick with Nate for prognostications.
d.c.wilson
October 6, 2012 at 2:59 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Don’t be so hard on Dick Morris. He has to whore himself to Fox. Not legitimate organization will hire him and prostitutes who will let you suck on their toes aren’t cheap!
shripathikamath
October 6, 2012 at 3:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
How good are you at poker, Ed?
Michael Heath
October 6, 2012 at 3:22 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
josephmccaluley writes:
I’d suggest election prognostications only. Mr. Silver’s taking some heat from highly regarded climate scientists for things he wrote in his book regarding climate science. I’m not sure who has the winning case, but I can’t imagine why Mr. Silver thought he had the skill set and experience to even expound on climate science.
slc1
October 6, 2012 at 5:03 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Re Michael Heath @ #6
Here’s a link to a review by Michael Mann, of the chapter in Mr. Silver’s book where he discusses the issue of climate change. It appears that Mr. Silver, whose training and expertise is in economics, is, indeed, pontificating on a subject that he lacks the scientific background to be taken seriously. Sliver is a textbook example of someone pontificating on a subject outside his area of expertise, joining even such distinguished scientists as Linus Pauling (vitamin C/cancer), William Shockley (inequality in intelligence and race) and Lynn Margulis (9/11 trooferism), amongst others.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-e-mann/nate-silver-climate-change_b_1909482.html
slc1
October 6, 2012 at 5:06 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Re #7
Relative to Lynn Margulis, she was also an HIV/AIDS denier. I had the pleasure of outing her on that subject on PZ Myers blog on Scienceblogs when he turned over a thread to her for a discussion of a book which she had written.
J Myers (no relation)
October 6, 2012 at 7:40 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Unfortunately, that interview posted on 28-Sep. Here’s the latest from Silver. I’ve been very pessimistic about the likely effect of that debate on Obama’s chances; I think there are several (unusual? unique?) factors that will amplify the effect of Romney’s performance (and Obama’s lack thereof) well beyond what has been seen in post-debate polling historically.
J Myers (no relation)
October 6, 2012 at 7:46 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
effect -> affect… I’m hopeless this week.
Dr X
October 6, 2012 at 9:08 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
SLC,
Interesting link. It happens that I bought Silver’s book earlier today and started reading it. I like it so far, but I’m not very deep into it yet. What the reviewer describes in the Huffpo link would appear to be a fundamental error framing his analysis. Nonetheless, the theme of the book is sound when we’re talking about human behavior. He has some interesting things to say about the invention of the printing press, which I ordinarily think of as the first information explosion, in the most positive sense, but he also points out that the printing press was responsible for a simultaneous explosion of bullshit in the information environment. So it was analogous to the internet–I know it’s true because I read it on the internet. I hadn’t ever really thought about this, but since I had only one college history class, I only ended up with the US history thumbnail version.
chakeith
October 6, 2012 at 9:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
ELHS?! Wild, I just realized that Nate Silver is THAT Nate Silver… I graduated a couple years ahead of him and I also know Will from the tennis team. what a small world…
jamessweet
October 7, 2012 at 8:33 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I loved his response about being compared to Malcolm Gladwell. Basically a very nice way of saying, “I’m flattered, because Gladwell is such a popular and effective writer… but actually he’s kinda full of shit, and I’d like to think I’m not.” :D
joewinpisinger1
October 7, 2012 at 1:09 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I think the jobs report may have trumped Romney winning the debate. Unless Romney beats him that badly in the last two debates Obama will win… Romney sealed his fate when he made the rule change at the Convention. The Ron Paul people bolted and are voting for Gary Johnson. At least enough of them to hand the election to Obama.