2018 Midterms

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[96583UP]

srsly leave Him outta this

[Simple Torture]

TRIGGER WARNING:How FiveThirtyEight’s 2018 Midterm Forecasts Did

But while our top-line numbers were quite accurate, what about in individual races? Those were very good also. Between the House (435 races), Senate (35) and gubernatorial races (36), we issued forecasts in a total of 506 elections. Of those:

The Lite forecast called the winner correctly in 482 of 506 races (95 percent).
The Classic forecast called the winner correctly in 487 of 506 races (96 percent).
And the Deluxe forecast called the winner correctly in 490 of 506 races (97 percent).

But you can still get out your pitchforks:

...it isn’t entirely good news that there were fewer upsets than expected. That’s because it means our forecasts weren’t super well-calibrated. The chart below shows that in some detail; it breaks races down into the various category labels we use such as “likely Republican” and “lean Democrat.” (I’ve subdivided our “toss-up” category into races where the Democrat and Republican were slightly favored.) In most of these categories, the favorites won more often than expected — sometimes significantly more often.

For instance, in races that were identified as “leaning” in the Classic forecast (that is, “lean Democrat” or “lean Republican”), the favorite won 83 percent of the time (25 of 30 races) when they were supposed to win only two-thirds of the time (20 of 30). And in “likely” races, favorites had a 94 percent success rate when they were supposed to win 86 percent of the time. Based on measures like a binomial test, it’s fairly unlikely that these differences arose because of chance alone and that favorites just “got lucky”; rather, they systematically won more often than expected.

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[The Argonaut]

haha, I love the subtle troll to the trags of the world. The bad news is that the model did better than it should have. It goes both ways

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[McParadigm]

Wisconsin’s really gonna do it

[96583UP]

authoritarianism is IN

[Norah]

scott walker is fucking evil

[bune]

I hope - and I'm not going to kid myself here so I'm leaving it as hope - I hope that the voters of these states and vote the fuckers out two/four years from now. But we all have such short memories that I'm not going to hold my breath.

[McParadigm]

I hope - and I'm not going to kid myself here so I'm leaving it as hope - I hope that the voters of these states and vote the fuckers out two/four years from now. But we all have such short memories that I'm not going to hold my breath.

South Dakota’s GOP used 'emergency' rules to repeal a wildly popular anti-corruption law mandated by voters, and then did just fine in the midterms.

[bune]

See, I was right in not holding my breath.

[McParadigm]

See, I was right in not holding my breath.

And here we are again.

Activists earned the requisite number of signatures to put the family leave and wage hikes on the ballot, and each was polling above 60%, so the GOP legislature passed the bill themselves to keep it off the ballot.....with every intention of undoing it after the election.

I’m having a harder time with each passing day maintaining any assumption that Republicans care about democratic process or payoff.

[bune]

In this day and age of Trump and not being politically polite, why doesn't someone with a big enough voice call them out on this? You see articles but it's from braintrust folks mostly and not really impassioned so much as clinical.

[bune]

[Bi_3]

Holy crap people actually voted for this person. And 72k+ people liked this.

[4/5]

Holy crap people actually voted for this person. And 72k+ people liked this.

I was surprised nobody posted that when it first happened. And it isn't so much that people voted for her in a primary in a blue district when the incumbent wasn't paying attention, it's that she's a rising star and potentially the the future of the party.

[bune]

*pinches nose*

So, can either of you expound on what you're going on about? I get you don't like her but you're just freaking out at this point.

[McParadigm]

*pinches nose*

So, can either of you expound on what you're going on about? I get you don't like her but you're just freaking out at this point.

She doesn’t know the difference between transactions and spending and grossly misunderstands budget numbers, and this makes her pretty much in line with 70% of politicians on both sides but she’s a young female liberal so it’s horrifying.

She’s super quick to assume things and is financially illiterate, but she’s also not the Democrat rallying cry she’s presented as and won’t have any real budgeting influence for many years. It’s hard to take this gasping in horror seriously considering the state of fiscal conversations and ambitions in conservatism today.

[McParadigm]

It’s sort of like how the anti-SJW thread is full of people who don’t see the irony in having created a safe space where they can alternate between being alarmed by and derisively mocking perceived problems that amount to literally nothing.