When oh when are we going to stop thumbsucking to make ourselves feel better by repeating the myth that the polls were wrong 4 years ago?
The polls were right 4 years ago.
This thumbsucking is dangerous and it diverts focus from the job of actually winning the election. If you do not recognize what is wrong you cannot possibly fix it and clearly if you do not acknowledge that anything is wrong you cannot fix it.
Indeed it is. Also, the left wants you to think it's in the bag. Well, it isn't!
When oh when are we going to stop thumbsucking to make ourselves feel better by repeating the myth that the polls were wrong 4 years ago?
The polls were right 4 years ago.
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The referenced Politico article was from 4 years ago *after* the election. I don’t recall a single poll going into the 2016 election showing Pres. Trump winning.
Here's why I think this way.
RCP averages the polls by averaging the Trump poll portion, and then averages the Clinton/Biden portion, and calls this the average poll.
However, this average drops the margin of error within each poll in the average. That's where their failure lies.
As you know, I've been modeling polls going back to the 2010 House races. I use the MOE to convert the poll spread into a probability of the leader actually winning (Nate Silver does the same thing). RCP's article only uses the high/low spread to declare the poll's success or failure (they called it a success).
Consider some real data:
I have 10 polls for Florida throughout September 2016. Simple averaging of the polls gives me Clinton 44.5 Trump 44.2.
Now, take a deeper look at these three polls:
All three of these polls has the leader ahead by 1%. However, when the MOE is factored in, these polls become very different. Looking at the probability of winning:
The last Florida poll in September was from Mason-Dixon on 9/27-9/29. It showed Clinton 46 Trump 42 with an MOE of 3.5% This converts to a probability of Clinton 90.8 Trump 9.2. The Fox13/Opinion Survey poll above was from 9/27-9/28, and showed a lower, but still leading, probability of winning.
Just taking the last 5 polls from the second half of September, the average (and probability of winning) is:
The September poll spread was +2.2 for Clinton. President Trump won Florida 49 - 47.8, or +1.2 for Trump.
RCP can say that the result was within a polling "mean absolute error" of +2.7%, but a +2.2 lead in Florida in September was a 71% probability of winning.
It's a harder argument to make that a poll that predicts a 71% probability of a candidate winning who ultimately loses was a correct poll, when all the others polled the same way. One outlier poll, maybe, but not all of them.
-PJ
No the polls were NOT right 4 yrs ago unless you consider the ones of the last 4 days before election day. This is a game long played by the lib media in order to cement their ability to point to their FINAL poll as a way to brag about their polling accuracy while ignoring the multitude of push polls they put up throughout the election
In the almost 2 years run up to then the polls were total crap and anyone paying attention knows that. They had Clinton consistently up by anywhere from 6-12 points nationwide and up by a lesser amount in the swing States but up nonetheless.
If you cannot see at this point that the huge majority of polls are biased demographically as well as being unable to account for the “silent Trump voter” phenomenon, than you shouldn’t comment on them.
No the polls were NOT right 4 yrs ago unless you consider the ones of the last 4 days before election day. This is a game long played by the lib media in order to cement their ability to point to their FINAL poll as a way to brag about their polling accuracy while ignoring the multitude of push polls they put up throughout the election
In the almost 2 years run up to then the polls were total crap and anyone paying attention knows that. They had Clinton consistently up by anywhere from 6-12 points nationwide and up by a lesser amount in the swing States but up nonetheless.
If you cannot see at this point that the huge majority of polls are biased demographically as well as being unable to account for the “silent Trump voter” phenomenon, than you shouldn’t comment on them.
All the polls and articles leading up to Nov 2016 were the same as now along with Freepers and their room and gloom opinions. Deja vu.
You are full of crap. No poll had Trump winning
Michigan, no poll had Trump winning Wisconsin, no poll had Trump winning Pennsylvania.
About the only swing state the polls had Trump winning was Ohio.... and that was by one or two points.
Thank you for pointing out the obvious - again.
Of course the polls were right in 2016. I was posting D +40 in the House here beginning in September 2018, and got called all kinds of names.
The inability to face reality almost always leads to disaster.
The polls that said Trump couldn’t win were wrong.
they were NOT correct stop posting bullshit.
They all had HRC winning by double digits throughout the summer. ALL battleground polls had her winning, including Wisonsin and PA, so much so that she didn’t even CAMPAIGN there for months.
I can post links to POLLS and THREADS made about those POLLS from summer of 2016.
Now you go suck YOUR thumb.
The gas lighting never ends even with the trolls here on FR.