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| Stats versus gut feeling in the final days of the US election campaign | Stats versus gut feeling in the final days of the US election campaign |
| (about 1 month later) | |
| • One curious sideshow of this campaign has been the war waged by certain pundits – whose job is to predict the election based on gut feelings – against those who prefer to use maths. In the gut instinct world of cable news, the race is neck-and-neck – a state of affairs that, coincidentally enough, fuels a demand for further gut-based punditry. For statisticians such as the New York Times' Nate Silver, meanwhile, the steadiness of Barack Obama's slight lead in crucial states makes a Romney victory, though far from impossible, fairly unlikely. What explains this disagreement? Pundit after right-wing pundit insists it must be Silver et al's dodgy numbers. ("It's hard to blame conservatives for wondering if he might be working the refs," muttered the Daily Caller's Matt Lewis, seemingly unaware that Silver just plugs publicly available polling numbers, day after day, into the same unchanging computer model.) Now, in these last days of the race, other "better than maths" theories are emerging. Do you realise, asks the influential conservative site Breitbart.com, that Republicans have won every election held on November 6 since 1860? (That's true enough, but you can find patterns to prove anything: the mens' grooming website Grooming Lounge has shown that the candidate with the better-kempt eyebrows usually triumphs, which favours Obama.) But there's encouragement for Romney from New Jersey, where a cockroach named Mitt beat a cockroach named Obama in the New Jersey Pest Management Association's traditional election-season Running of the Roaches. The NJPMA boasts an 84% success rate – so what do you make of that, fancy "statistician" types? The cockroach named Nate Silver, one assumes, just sat in the corner, weeping quietly for his country. | • One curious sideshow of this campaign has been the war waged by certain pundits – whose job is to predict the election based on gut feelings – against those who prefer to use maths. In the gut instinct world of cable news, the race is neck-and-neck – a state of affairs that, coincidentally enough, fuels a demand for further gut-based punditry. For statisticians such as the New York Times' Nate Silver, meanwhile, the steadiness of Barack Obama's slight lead in crucial states makes a Romney victory, though far from impossible, fairly unlikely. What explains this disagreement? Pundit after right-wing pundit insists it must be Silver et al's dodgy numbers. ("It's hard to blame conservatives for wondering if he might be working the refs," muttered the Daily Caller's Matt Lewis, seemingly unaware that Silver just plugs publicly available polling numbers, day after day, into the same unchanging computer model.) Now, in these last days of the race, other "better than maths" theories are emerging. Do you realise, asks the influential conservative site Breitbart.com, that Republicans have won every election held on November 6 since 1860? (That's true enough, but you can find patterns to prove anything: the mens' grooming website Grooming Lounge has shown that the candidate with the better-kempt eyebrows usually triumphs, which favours Obama.) But there's encouragement for Romney from New Jersey, where a cockroach named Mitt beat a cockroach named Obama in the New Jersey Pest Management Association's traditional election-season Running of the Roaches. The NJPMA boasts an 84% success rate – so what do you make of that, fancy "statistician" types? The cockroach named Nate Silver, one assumes, just sat in the corner, weeping quietly for his country. |
| • An email arrives from zoo-loving space-colony enthusiast Newt Gingrich – or, to be precise, from an advertiser who has apparently paid real American dollars for access to his mailing list, Gingrich Marketplace. "The truth is, the next election has already been decided. Obama is going to win," it begins. That's quite a concession from the camp of a prominent Republican. What's the argument? "It's nearly impossible to beat an incumbent president." Well, no, but do go on: "What's actually at stake right now is whether or not he will have a third term." Woah, what? That's right: according to an astonishingly long-winded audio presentation linked from the email – which robbed your diarist, a human with a finite lifespan, of a quarter-hour he'll never get back – "an enormous economic force" will turn Obama into an idol, permitting him to rewrite the Constitution. A disclaimer explains that these wacky views aren't necessarily Newt's own, and to be fair, he's probably far too busy finalising blueprints for his nuclear-powered moon zoo to pay attention to what goes out under his name. Don't mock: once Obama installs himself as world dictator, you'll be grateful for Gingrich's outpost in space. Especially if you like zoos. | • An email arrives from zoo-loving space-colony enthusiast Newt Gingrich – or, to be precise, from an advertiser who has apparently paid real American dollars for access to his mailing list, Gingrich Marketplace. "The truth is, the next election has already been decided. Obama is going to win," it begins. That's quite a concession from the camp of a prominent Republican. What's the argument? "It's nearly impossible to beat an incumbent president." Well, no, but do go on: "What's actually at stake right now is whether or not he will have a third term." Woah, what? That's right: according to an astonishingly long-winded audio presentation linked from the email – which robbed your diarist, a human with a finite lifespan, of a quarter-hour he'll never get back – "an enormous economic force" will turn Obama into an idol, permitting him to rewrite the Constitution. A disclaimer explains that these wacky views aren't necessarily Newt's own, and to be fair, he's probably far too busy finalising blueprints for his nuclear-powered moon zoo to pay attention to what goes out under his name. Don't mock: once Obama installs himself as world dictator, you'll be grateful for Gingrich's outpost in space. Especially if you like zoos. |
| • There's bad news for a mainstay of campaign journalism in the findings of an audience research project conducted by National Public Radio. Listeners generally admire NPR's coverage, it finds, but they can't abide those man- or woman-in-the-street interviews with voters. It's traditional to supplement discussion of candidates and policies with "vox pops", but as one respondent put it: "I really don't care what some random dude in Florida thinks." "Nothing is more frustrating for me," adds another, "than hearing/reading/seeing know-nothing voters expose their utter ignorance." NPR's ombudsman says he partly concurs. But not everyone does. "I quite like quotes from random people that add nothing substantive," said Betty Adams, a 32-year-old from Adelphi, Ohio, who works at a factory making teleportation devices. "Also, it offers an easy way for journalists to conclude their articles." | • There's bad news for a mainstay of campaign journalism in the findings of an audience research project conducted by National Public Radio. Listeners generally admire NPR's coverage, it finds, but they can't abide those man- or woman-in-the-street interviews with voters. It's traditional to supplement discussion of candidates and policies with "vox pops", but as one respondent put it: "I really don't care what some random dude in Florida thinks." "Nothing is more frustrating for me," adds another, "than hearing/reading/seeing know-nothing voters expose their utter ignorance." NPR's ombudsman says he partly concurs. But not everyone does. "I quite like quotes from random people that add nothing substantive," said Betty Adams, a 32-year-old from Adelphi, Ohio, who works at a factory making teleportation devices. "Also, it offers an easy way for journalists to conclude their articles." |
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