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A few words about FiveThirtyEight

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Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#101

Post by kelnos »

koolba wrote: post #7
henning wrote: post #4

[flagged]

You mean polls like this that put Clinton 15% ahead? https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/blogs/wisconsin-voter/20... I think there’s a stronger argument that those polls were intended to suppress Trump voters into thinking they were not the majority (when in fact they were).

That poll was in August of 2016. A lot changed between then and election day. Obviously we can't know if Clinton really would have had a 15 point lead on the day that poll was taken, because no official vote was taken. You may think it's implausible that it could have been true, but you're just some rando on the internet, what do you know? (Same with me!)

> intended to suppress Trump voters into thinking they were not the majority (when in fact they were

Depends on what you mean by "majority". If you're just talking about Wisconsin and that specific poll, sure Trump voters ended up being in the majority, but we can't say with any certainty what that situation was in early August. Polls like that one are the best guesses we have for that particular snapshot in time.

If you're talking about an overall majority of those who ended up being actual voters, then that's also not the case, as Trump did not win a majority of votes; Clinton did. Sadly, though, popular vote majority is not how our presidential election system works.

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#104

Post by genewitch »

roenxi wrote: post #80
genewitch wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the probability of 89% of blue counties (in 2020) switching to red counties is a 50-50 chance? can you show your work?

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2024-election-forecast/ You'll note that the distribution mode for a Trump win was 312 electoral votes; which is what he got. They do a good forecast - it suggests there was a 50-50 chance Trump wins, and if he wins the most likely outcome is ... exactly what happened. If it was a Harris win the best bet is she would have gotten 319 electoral votes with high correlation in the swi…

you still didn't watch the video i linked^, and you did not answer my actual question: 89% of counties turning red compared to the 2020 election is a 50-50 chance? Can you show your work?

^ The person in the video explains why thinking it is 50-50 chance is detrimental to the liberal cause.

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#105

Post by genewitch »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #86
genewitch wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, do you recall seeing a "county map" of the blue votes in the 2020 election?

If you include Alaska, which is a huge state (I hear bigger than Texas), land starts voting very blue due to Alaskan native influence. They don’t have counties though, just boroughs (Alaska still goes red even if it’s land goes blue due to population distribution).

Louisiana doesn't have counties, either. I live in Louisiana, and when i said "counties" i included the parishes in my state, and any other geographically distinct entity of the same legal merit.

there are 3300 counties in the US. People live in all of those counties.

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#106

Post by genewitch »

leourbina wrote: post #87
genewitch wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lol TIL "The View" is "some rando on youtube" And to answer your question, the video is a guest on the view who i don't know, saying the exact numbers i quoted. I was quoting the person on the view, which aired yesterday or something. what's interesting, is instead of discussing what i said prior to the link, you chose to instead try and make me feel bad for linking a video. Keep it classy, HN.

Anyone can say anything on YouTube. I think you’re confusing confirmation bias with “citing your sources”.

you didn't watch it either, huh? Nice.

also what bias? I didn't make the stats up. Statements of fact cannot be insolent. If you disagree with the facts, then let's talk about that, and look for more data. However, what has happened in this thread is thinking i have an agenda, other than i think people need to hear what they were talking about - in that clip

The mentality that "it was real close to 50-50 and trump didn't get a majority of the vote and therefore we can keep on doing what we're doing" is what the video clip was talking to. It didn't work, and the tactics need to change if anyone wants to see change.

I don't care that people want to argue with me personally. But it's not doing themselves any favors, as it pertains to getting people elected they want to see in office.

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#107

Post by genewitch »

kelnos wrote: post #97
skissane wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> by whom? Well, both by the majority of the drafters of the US Constitution, and the majority of the drafters of the Australian Constitution. And the authors of the German Constitution – the German upper house, the Bundesrat, represents the German states (Länder), and although (unlike the Australian and US Senates) it does give more populous states a greater number of seats, the number of seats is still out of propo…

> the German upper house, the Bundesrat, represents the German states (Länder), and although (unlike the Australian and US Senates) it does give more populous states a greater number of seats, the number of seats is still out of proportion to population: in Bremen there are 223,830 people per a seat, compared to 2,977,586 people per a seat in North Rhine-Westphalia. To be fair, though, in the US, the House also has u…

I've heard this my entire life, too. However, having lived more places than just California, I see California as having undue influence on the entire country. Prop 65 warnings pop up on things outside of California. I've even seen stuff labeled as CARB outside of California. These are trivial examples, but both of those things are California legalities. If Louisiana had undue influence on the US, more packaging would have French language as well as English; just as a trivial example.

Something that affects someone living in Los Angeles County may not affect someone in any of the other "2xxx" counties that have less population. For instance, i have a well for water. I don't worry about water shortages in California when i run my well. My water usage doesn't affect Los Angeles at all. And not even in the "butterfly" way because the jetstream goes the other way. This, again, is a trivial example.

Policing in L.A. is different than policing in LA. roadworks are different. Disaster preparedness is different. Fire risks are different. Taxation is different. Health needs are different.

What this boils down to: Californians, and specifically the valley and L.A. County residents, have a loud enough voice to push this agenda, but only when someone they don't like wins. California was happy to put a republican actor in office when the republican actor was "from California."

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#108

Post by genewitch »

nobody9999 wrote: post #94
genewitch wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lol TIL "The View" is "some rando on youtube" And to answer your question, the video is a guest on the view who i don't know, saying the exact numbers i quoted. I was quoting the person on the view, which aired yesterday or something. what's interesting, is instead of discussing what i said prior to the link, you chose to instead try and make me feel bad for linking a video. Keep it classy, HN.

>what's interesting, is instead of discussing what i said prior to the link, you chose to instead try and make me feel bad for linking a video. Others had already rebutted your assertion at least as well as I could, so I didn't feel the need to repeat what had already been offered. However, given your initial rationale: >>note: not clicking that because you disagree with me is really doing yourself a disservice. was…

Okay. have it your way.

The thought that the vote was "real close to 50-50" and "trump didn't get a majority of the vote" and "therefore we just need to do what we're doing and it'll work out OK in 2028 and the midterms" is what the video clip i linked was talking to.

Specifically, nearly every reply to my comment, other than yours, argued that "the number of counties that switched" is irrelevant, as if that happened by accident, as if your neighbors apparently changing from blue to red for the 2024 election isn't a bellwether of something else. Trump still got a plurality of votes. Asking "why" is something that needs to be done.

Nearly every comment assumed something about me, because i quoted a statistic. I knew, because i have been on internet forums for over a quarter century, that no matter how i phrased my comment, i was going to get downvoted and argued with.

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#109

Post by [deleted] »

nozzlegear wrote: post #41
qqtt wrote: post #24

As someone who was super interested in the 538-style of election coverage in 2008, I've kind of fallen "out of love" so to speak with election models and forecasting in general. I'm not really convinced about what it adds to the conversation around elections. We can all look at various polls and get an assessment of who is generally ahead. Weighted polling aggregators and forecasting models just collect all these pol…

I largely agree with your points. Election modelers and forecasters really don't add much to the conversation after 2016, despite their attempts and even purported success at correcting their models and mistakes. The only election forecasting model that I take seriously these days is my own vibes based forecasting. I have enjoyed the meta-drama around forecasting and modeling that pops up every election season though…

[deleted]

Re: A few words about FiveThirtyEight

#110

Post by verzali »

kemayo wrote: post #77
genewitch wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, do you recall seeing a "county map" of the blue votes in the 2020 election?

Why would we have? It's pointless. As the GP said, land doesn't vote. The more interesting map is the one where you weight the display by population, since it gives a much more accurate representation of how the USA is divided: https://engaging-data.com/pages/scripts/d3Electoral/countyel... The tool on that website is actually pretty informative to play with if you want to quickly see how adjusting the map style can…

Bit of a tangent, but I've always wondered why the United States has a very clear dividing line between the populated east and relatively empty west. It's really visible in the first map you shared. Is there a historical reason behind that line? Or some geographical boundary?
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