This close to an election, who do I want to hear from? Nate Silver, of course. I sat down with the FiveThirtyEight founder and math wizard to talk about how he builds his forecasting models, what they’re saying about 2018, how big the Democrats’ structural disadvantage in the House and […] Read more »
Beware of Preelection Polling Spin
At this late phase of the electoral season, there is a blur of polling data from different directions and of variable quality. You can pretty much cherry-pick data to support almost any prophecy you want. CONT. Ed Kilgore, New York Magazine Read more »
How the polls could have caught ‘surprise’ victories like Trump’s
Many pollsters have been asked to explain why they didn’t better predict the 2016 election. 3dfoto/shutterstock.com Fred Wright, North Carolina State University The election of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency surprised almost everyone, including apparently Trump himself. On the morning after the 2016 election, my teenage son made snarky […] Read more »
Nate Silver will make one firm prediction about the midterms. Most journalists won’t want to hear it.
After the roller-coaster ride of 2016’s election night, have journalists and political junkies learned not to let conventional wisdom substitute for hard knowledge? Nate Silver — the closest thing there is to a celebrity in the arcane field of statistical journalism — is not wildly optimistic about that. CONT. Margaret […] Read more »
Ask the Expert: Polling the 2018 Elections
As the 2018 elections approach, polling finds itself in the spotlight once again and the glare is harsh. Facing the growing problems that confront all of survey research as well as public skepticism about polling that followed the 2016 presidential election, polling practitioners have examined their methods and many have […] Read more »
Did Minnesota’s Eighth District Really Swing by Almost 20 Points?
Minnesota’s Eighth District is one of a handful of Democratic-held House seats where Republicans have a realistic shot to win in the midterms in three weeks. The incumbent, Rick Nolan, is retiring, and he won by only one percentage point in 2016 in a district President Trump carried by 15. […] Read more »