President Biden: The NEW one and only politics thread

Polling is getting harder and harder to the point where it's verging on not being real statistical analysis and the honest pollers, like Nate Cohn of the Times, have acknowledged that. Since 1984, every presidential election has fallen in between a 55A-45 split in the electorate, which is very close to within the margin of pure statistical error. Yet we demand they tell us the winner in 51-49 or closer (Bush-Gore!) races. It's impossible. It may well go back to the times when crowd sizes and yard signs and such were used as indicators. That's no long ago, back to the 1940s. Back in the 19th century, some states held their state elections in September or October in presidential years and they were used as polls are now for entrail reading. That's where the phrase "as Maine goes, there goes the nation" comes from.

 

When you can't pay Black's for Trump anymore...

 

Despite their inherent flaws, polls remain a way to gauge the thinking of a representative group of people. It's extremely easy to silo yourself and develop a personal echo chamber. Polls can help break through that and show just how popular someone or something is compared to your own beliefs.

Again, they're not perfect. They never have been. But in context, they provide a rare data point in an area of life that thrives on anecdotal experiences.

 

The POLLS! have become the sum being of the media's reporting on this race. How lefthanded women born on Tuesday during a full moon are trending. How about men who drink light beer? Those who believe the "dynamic kickoff" is contributing to the downfall of Western Civilization?

It's worse than baseball analytics.

 

This year, we have heard a great deal about how Betting Markets are really the best predictors of political outcomes. I'm very curious to see how that works out.

 

"Hello, welcome to Fucko's Fine Food Diner, our special tonight
is our Chef Donnie's All-You-Can-Eat Horseshit Salad. ... Enjoy!"

 

I had a sociology class that dealt with polls, among other things. We were told that any poll with a margin of error larger than 3,5 wasn’t to be used as a meaningful snapshot of anything. And yet today we get polls with 5+ margins of error and folks freak out about them. Not statistically significant.

 

True dat.

 

That is a masterpiece. It's much funnier when you read it.

Create a college course: Trumpspeak 101

 

Like…is this real?

 

My best guess is that he's recognizing people, most notably his nephew, talking about dementia in the Trump family line, especially Trump's father. "a time in life when the weave won't finish properly". But Trump goes on to poo-poo that by saying his uncle was brilliant, so he must be that also, just like Nicklaus would produce great golfers. Unfortunately, the weave didn't finish properly here.

 

Cool take.
Like what you wrote except ... "The media's reporting of this race."
As previously posted, my limited faith in polling ended in 2016.
Kinda wonder how many people lie when asked. Or how many people refuse to answer.