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> Wait, are you seriously suggesting that all of the polls that were done (http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/n... http://projects.fivet

> Wait, are you seriously suggesting that all of the polls that were done (http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/n... http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/n...) were manufactured by leftist media? Seriously? In the run-up to the Brexit referendum, some hedge funds did private polls, rather than relying on the publicly disseminated ones (which of course predicted a Remain victory). Those same hedge funds bet on Brexit and made a lot of money. What does this tell you about the quality of the public polls? Fact is, polls can be used as a tool to bludgeon a minority opposition, by sowing disunity amongst the opposition, and by demoralizing them through the strong suggestion that victory is impossible (NYT: 15% chance Trump victory). We have evidence that the Clinton campaign aggressively pressured a multitude of actors into bending the rules. (See Wasserstein-Schulz and Donna Brazile scandals.) We have strong evidence of quasi-universal, vehement opposition to Trump in the mainstream media, and therefore of the willingness of those actors to succumb to such pressures. In addition, if you understand how stratified sampling works, you can convince yourself that it is not so difficult to skew the results in one direction while still maintaining plausible deniability. So why do you think the proposition that polls were systematically biased is so unserious? > Fake news is completely making things up. Sure, but the professor who typed up the widely-shared hit-list of "fake" news sites included Breitbart and Drudge Report, which are manifestly not fake news sites.

dagw 10y ago
which of course predicted a Remain victory Not really. The polls indicated that it was basically 50-50. The media chose to interpreted the polls to predict a Remain victory. The difference is subtle but important. suggestion that victory is impossible (NYT: 15% chance Trump victory). This annoys me no end. In what possible world is 15% an "impossibility". Is rolling a 6 on a fair dice or getting heads three times in a row when flipping a fair coin also an impossibility?
- seertaak 10y ago
  > Not really. The polls indicated that it was basically 50-50. The media chose to interpreted the polls to predict a Remain victory. The difference is subtle but important. I disagree. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United... > This annoys me no end. In what possible world is 15% an "impossibility". In the world of opinion pieces in the run-up to the election. In the world of 24/7 television commentary from the likes of MSNBC, CNN, etc. What world have you been living in?
  - dagw 10y ago
    In the world of opinion pieces in the run-up to the election. Sorry that last bit was absolutely not aimed at you, but at the media that, as you said, looked at models showing Trump having a 15-25% chance of winning and saying first "according to the models Trump cannot win" and then "Boy did those models get it completely wrong".
fryguy 10y ago
> So why do you think the proposition that polls were systematically biased is so unserious? Two reasons. One, and the most obvious one is that the polls weren't very far off. They had the average amount of polling error that there has been (according to what 538 said on their podcast). The polls indicated a 3-4 point national lead, and she ended up with a ~1 point national lead. The second is that polling agencies have their reputations and there hasn't been any indication from wikileaks that there was any tampering or attempted tampering.
- seertaak 10y ago
  I think we're pretty close to agreeing. I would agree, for example, to the statement that it is "unlikely" that the polls were systematically biased, for the reasons you've given. If I wanted to, I could of course pick holes in your reasons, but I think to first order you're probably right. However, please recall that the parent comment adopted an almost mocking tone (Seriously? Seriously?), and that's what I wanted to push back against. So: would you agree that the proposition of systematically biased is unlikely, while also agreeing that serious people could harbour doubts about the impartiality of said polls? It would seem to me to be in the interest of everyone (ironically, especially liberals, although it seems they haven't quite gotten the point yet) to seriously investigate these allegations in light of the revelations of Wikileaks, revelations which the mainstream media worked so hard to cover up and discredit.
- Steel_Phoenix 10y ago
  Assuming you were to put your foot on the scale a bit with the polling in order to demoralize the opposition, the only way you would be able to use that trick more than once would be to make sure to make sure that you quit doing it in the final days or weeks before the election. If the polling is far off from the results, you either get unwanted investigations or you lose credibility for future polling. Anyone with sufficient resources to influence something on this scale is likely playing a long game, and it's clear that the game is being played on some level. Look at the way the DNC started out with the bulk of the superdelegates for Hillary in order to give her an early credibility jump over the opposition, just in time to get actual credibility by winning Texas. Especially when someone is donating to a campaign, they want to donate to a winner.

dagw 10y ago

which of course predicted a Remain victory Not really. The polls indicated that it was basically 50-50. The media chose to interpreted the polls to predict a Remain victory. The difference is subtle but important. suggestion that victory is impossible (NYT: 15% chance Trump victory). This annoys me no end. In what possible world is 15% an "impossibility". Is rolling a 6 on a fair dice or getting heads three times in a row when flipping a fair coin also an impossibility?

seertaak 10y ago
> Not really. The polls indicated that it was basically 50-50. The media chose to interpreted the polls to predict a Remain victory. The difference is subtle but important. I disagree. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United... > This annoys me no end. In what possible world is 15% an "impossibility". In the world of opinion pieces in the run-up to the election. In the world of 24/7 television commentary from the likes of MSNBC, CNN, etc. What world have you been living in?
- dagw 10y ago
  In the world of opinion pieces in the run-up to the election. Sorry that last bit was absolutely not aimed at you, but at the media that, as you said, looked at models showing Trump having a 15-25% chance of winning and saying first "according to the models Trump cannot win" and then "Boy did those models get it completely wrong".

fryguy 10y ago

> So why do you think the proposition that polls were systematically biased is so unserious? Two reasons. One, and the most obvious one is that the polls weren't very far off. They had the average amount of polling error that there has been (according to what 538 said on their podcast). The polls indicated a 3-4 point national lead, and she ended up with a ~1 point national lead. The second is that polling agencies have their reputations and there hasn't been any indication from wikileaks that there was any tampering or attempted tampering.

seertaak 10y ago
I think we're pretty close to agreeing. I would agree, for example, to the statement that it is "unlikely" that the polls were systematically biased, for the reasons you've given. If I wanted to, I could of course pick holes in your reasons, but I think to first order you're probably right. However, please recall that the parent comment adopted an almost mocking tone (Seriously? Seriously?), and that's what I wanted to push back against. So: would you agree that the proposition of systematically biased is unlikely, while also agreeing that serious people could harbour doubts about the impartiality of said polls? It would seem to me to be in the interest of everyone (ironically, especially liberals, although it seems they haven't quite gotten the point yet) to seriously investigate these allegations in light of the revelations of Wikileaks, revelations which the mainstream media worked so hard to cover up and discredit.
Steel_Phoenix 10y ago
Assuming you were to put your foot on the scale a bit with the polling in order to demoralize the opposition, the only way you would be able to use that trick more than once would be to make sure to make sure that you quit doing it in the final days or weeks before the election. If the polling is far off from the results, you either get unwanted investigations or you lose credibility for future polling. Anyone with sufficient resources to influence something on this scale is likely playing a long game, and it's clear that the game is being played on some level. Look at the way the DNC started out with the bulk of the superdelegates for Hillary in order to give her an early credibility jump over the opposition, just in time to get actual credibility by winning Texas. Especially when someone is donating to a campaign, they want to donate to a winner.