5 ms·

The US government cares not.

by inscionent 7y ago

blunte 7y ago
this is not the US government. this is the mad orange flexing.
- make3 7y ago
  they voted for him, saddly, and quantitative analyses show he might get elected again
  - whymauri 7y ago
    Where is this analysis?
    - rjf72 7y ago
      As an indirect response to this, if you'd like to see impartial predictions for the next election - turn to Vegas [1]. People betting have a financial incentive, not a political one - so it tends to be a great way to avoid potential bias. If you're not familiar with betting terminology something like "+110" (current odds on Trump) means if you bet $100, you will win $110 in profit. By contrast something like -450 (Clinton's odds on the morning of the election in 2016) means you need to bet $450 to win $100 in profit. So the smaller a number, the more likely it is to happen. Factored into this is going to be a bit of juice. Trump's currently on +110 so Vegas is saying the next election is basically a coin flip. For an example of this revealing things that regular polls might not, it's also showing that Biden is a pretty sizable dog to Warren (+550 vs +375). You can now use these numbers to see how close your predictions come to what the market is suggesting. So for instance let's imagine you think Trump has a 50% chance of winning. What would be your expected value if you bet $100 on this? It's: 0.5 * -$100 + 0.5 * $110 = $5. So you have expected value there of a 5% gain, so you're slightly more optimistic than Vegas - though once you factor in the juice/vig/'tax' it's about even. Now let's imagine that you think Biden or Warren stand a 60% chance of winning (30% a piece) with 40% for Trump, and so you put $100 on each of them. We can again work out the math. 0.4 * -$200 + 0.3 * $550 + 0.3 * $375 = $197.5. That means that if your expectation is accurate, you would have an expected value of doubling any wager. So you are going pretty far away from what the market thinks, and if you believe this to be objectively accurate - it'd be a terrific wagering opportunity. [1] - http://www.lasvegassportsbetting.com/2020-US-Presidential-Election-Las-Vegas-Odds_P14398.html http://www.lasvegassportsbetting.com/2020-US-Presidential-El...
  - blunte 7y ago
    If by "they" you mean the electoral college, then yes. But if you mean "they" as in The People, then no - they voted for Hillary Clinton. I'm not a fan of either, for the record; but even with the voting irregularities which indicate fraud in favor of Trump, > 50% of the popular vote was for Clinton.
    - rootlocus 7y ago
      Trump's campaign was finely tuned to win the electoral college, because that was the winning condition. If there was no electoral college, his campaign would've been different, and he might've won either way.
    - make3 7y ago
      I'm against Trump, but you can't move the goalposts after an election. There is no reason to think he would not have had a different strategy had the system been on popular vote instead of using the electoral college
- Matticus_Rex 7y ago
  Well, that's how the US Government works in practice, so...
  - blunte 7y ago
    Not traditionally. Executive Orders are essentially out-of-band governmental actions. Normally (the normality that preceded the current administration and even the previous one), Congress would produce bills which sometimes would become laws. Those would be the significant policy changes. Now there are comparatively few Congressional effects and more Executive Orders.
    - Matticus_Rex 7y ago
      It's the way it works today, and the way it has worked in the last two presidencies as well. Yes, I'd love a big crackdown on EOs (a drum I've been beating since the Bush presidency).
    - nickysielicki 7y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_federal_executive_orders#Consolidated_list_by_President https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_federal_... It's not really true that it's "not traditionally" the way that government works. The first half of the 20th century is the watermark. Not that I remotely disagree with you in principle, just want to make the point that this isn't some recent development that we can swing back towards normalcy --- it's been this way and there's no going back.
    - rjf72 7y ago
      This insanity started much earlier than that. For one extreme example see executive order 6102 [1]. In 1933 FDR passed an executive order that made it a criminal act for Americans to possess any private gold coins, bullion, or certificated ownership. They were required to turn over all their gold to the government in exchange for about $400 per ounce in inflation adjusted prices. Refusing to do so was punishable by up to a $194,000 fine and ten years in prison. And this was topped off by the "gold reserve act" [2] passed the following year which let the government artificially set the price of gold. FDR chose a 75% increase. Makes modern executive orders look downright tame by comparison, and this is from a president that would go down extremely positively in history. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Reserve_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Reserve_Act

The US government cares not.

blunte 7y ago

this is not the US government. this is the mad orange flexing.

make3 7y ago
they voted for him, saddly, and quantitative analyses show he might get elected again
- whymauri 7y ago
  Where is this analysis?
  - rjf72 7y ago
    As an indirect response to this, if you'd like to see impartial predictions for the next election - turn to Vegas [1]. People betting have a financial incentive, not a political one - so it tends to be a great way to avoid potential bias. If you're not familiar with betting terminology something like "+110" (current odds on Trump) means if you bet $100, you will win $110 in profit. By contrast something like -450 (Clinton's odds on the morning of the election in 2016) means you need to bet $450 to win $100 in profit. So the smaller a number, the more likely it is to happen. Factored into this is going to be a bit of juice. Trump's currently on +110 so Vegas is saying the next election is basically a coin flip. For an example of this revealing things that regular polls might not, it's also showing that Biden is a pretty sizable dog to Warren (+550 vs +375). You can now use these numbers to see how close your predictions come to what the market is suggesting. So for instance let's imagine you think Trump has a 50% chance of winning. What would be your expected value if you bet $100 on this? It's: 0.5 * -$100 + 0.5 * $110 = $5. So you have expected value there of a 5% gain, so you're slightly more optimistic than Vegas - though once you factor in the juice/vig/'tax' it's about even. Now let's imagine that you think Biden or Warren stand a 60% chance of winning (30% a piece) with 40% for Trump, and so you put $100 on each of them. We can again work out the math. 0.4 * -$200 + 0.3 * $550 + 0.3 * $375 = $197.5. That means that if your expectation is accurate, you would have an expected value of doubling any wager. So you are going pretty far away from what the market thinks, and if you believe this to be objectively accurate - it'd be a terrific wagering opportunity. [1] - http://www.lasvegassportsbetting.com/2020-US-Presidential-Election-Las-Vegas-Odds_P14398.html http://www.lasvegassportsbetting.com/2020-US-Presidential-El...
- blunte 7y ago
  If by "they" you mean the electoral college, then yes. But if you mean "they" as in The People, then no - they voted for Hillary Clinton. I'm not a fan of either, for the record; but even with the voting irregularities which indicate fraud in favor of Trump, > 50% of the popular vote was for Clinton.
  - rootlocus 7y ago
    Trump's campaign was finely tuned to win the electoral college, because that was the winning condition. If there was no electoral college, his campaign would've been different, and he might've won either way.
  - make3 7y ago
    I'm against Trump, but you can't move the goalposts after an election. There is no reason to think he would not have had a different strategy had the system been on popular vote instead of using the electoral college
Matticus_Rex 7y ago
Well, that's how the US Government works in practice, so...
- blunte 7y ago
  Not traditionally. Executive Orders are essentially out-of-band governmental actions. Normally (the normality that preceded the current administration and even the previous one), Congress would produce bills which sometimes would become laws. Those would be the significant policy changes. Now there are comparatively few Congressional effects and more Executive Orders.
  - Matticus_Rex 7y ago
    It's the way it works today, and the way it has worked in the last two presidencies as well. Yes, I'd love a big crackdown on EOs (a drum I've been beating since the Bush presidency).
  - nickysielicki 7y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_federal_executive_orders#Consolidated_list_by_President https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_federal_... It's not really true that it's "not traditionally" the way that government works. The first half of the 20th century is the watermark. Not that I remotely disagree with you in principle, just want to make the point that this isn't some recent development that we can swing back towards normalcy --- it's been this way and there's no going back.
  - rjf72 7y ago
    This insanity started much earlier than that. For one extreme example see executive order 6102 [1]. In 1933 FDR passed an executive order that made it a criminal act for Americans to possess any private gold coins, bullion, or certificated ownership. They were required to turn over all their gold to the government in exchange for about $400 per ounce in inflation adjusted prices. Refusing to do so was punishable by up to a $194,000 fine and ten years in prison. And this was topped off by the "gold reserve act" [2] passed the following year which let the government artificially set the price of gold. FDR chose a 75% increase. Makes modern executive orders look downright tame by comparison, and this is from a president that would go down extremely positively in history. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Reserve_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Reserve_Act