Comments on: Old story: The insiders go after the stat guys. New twist: in politics

By: djpostl

djpostl — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 08:43:16 +0000

And those other guys were dead wrong…

By: djpostl

djpostl — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 08:41:42 +0000

For all the shit he caught…dude was 50 for 50 state-by-state (he went 49 for 50 in 2008)

http://t.co/bOuQZ2PR—
The Mad Mailman (@TheMadMailmann) November 07, 2012

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By: klokskap

klokskap — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 15:38:27 +0000

Baseball Crank is spot on of his analysis of using polling top line data v. internals, comparing the polling analysis to PECOTA and other events where people misread the underlying data – especially as told in Michael Lewis’s great books “The Big Short” and “Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World”.

http://baseballcrank.com/archives2/2012/10/post.php

By: philsieg

philsieg — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 07:20:01 +0000

Marty,

So it is the reading comprehension thing, after all. It’s pretty clear from what I’ve written here that I’m not a Democrat.

By: cur68

cur68 — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 05:54:21 +0000

Hey! I resemble that remark…

By: dprat

dprat — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 05:37:00 +0000

Fiorentino is every bit as clear-headed, rational, evidence-based and unbiased about Rasmussen Reports and “a blogger on NYTimes.com” as he is about Ryan Howard. It’s that kind of consistency that both I and Hall-of-Famer Joe Morgan admire so much.

By: Marty

Marty — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 04:35:52 +0000

I suppose mistaking criticism for “lashing out” is a defect of the insecure, irrespective of party affiliation. Can we have disagreements without broad brush straw manning, eh Democrat?

By: Marty

Marty — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 04:29:53 +0000

Philsieg, try something more original than patting yourself on the back for being open minded. Just because because you’re a committed Democrat doesn’t mean you have to act like a self righteous dumbshit. I have seen nothing here to hint at you considering anything other than sniffing your own ass and approving.

By: djpostl

djpostl — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 03:01:02 +0000

The idiot Tea Party trolls hit Twitter. And attacked the wrong guy named Silver. Priceless. https://twitter.com/MikeSilver/status/264192443904307201

By: klokskap

klokskap — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 02:23:48 +0000

Nate Silver is a really smart guy. That doesn’t make him right. There are other poll analysts out there who come to much different conclusions than Silver:

http://battlegroundwatch.com/

http://www.weeklystandard.com/author/jay-cost#recent-article

By: philsieg

philsieg — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 01:14:59 +0000

Marty,

Is your understanding of the written word so poor that you fail to grasp all the meanings of what I wrote? Of course one can exhibit a preference in one area and that preference can lead to a bias in all areas. You are a perfect example.

Conversely, one can state a preference in one area (i.e.for president) and still maintain objectivity in other areas. It’s called an open mind, but from your response I doubt you know much about that.

To phrase it another way, to exhibit a preference for something is to be biased in favor of that something – but only that something. To say that a single preference leads to bias in all areas assumes facts not in evidence. The fact that you see my statement is dishonest reflects poorly on you and your education – not me.

By: thebadguyswon

thebadguyswon — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 00:44:25 +0000

The problem with a thread like this, in my humble opinion, is then you open it up for people to divert from baseball and blow smoke up everyone’s ass about their political beliefs. I mean what’s next – baseball and the Catholic priest scandals? I go to Real Clear Politics more than I visit here. That’s where I want politics. Here I want baseball mixed with the usual humor and snark. That’s the only point I’m trying to make.

By: thinman61

thinman61 — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 00:00:23 +0000

I’m pretty sure this is the first (and last) time anyone has even indirectly categorized Mitt Romney as a dirt dog.

By: churchoftheperpetuallyoutraged

churchoftheperpetuallyoutraged — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 23:42:37 +0000

And sorry we disagree about Benghazi, but there is certainly a coverup

A coverup by the presidency or a coverup by the media? Because we aren’t talking about the former, we’re talking about the latter. Point taken on MSNBC and Trayvon Martin.

And how am I a hack?

By: Marty

Marty — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 23:00:30 +0000

…ad by levity I mean you’re a fucking hack.

By: Marty

Marty — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 22:59:52 +0000

Church, I’ll expound on this when I have more time, but MSNBC has willfully edited Romney speeches and the Treyvon Martin 911 calls to conform to their agendas. As for the NYT, I don’t read that paper for news stories so I can’t mention specifics beyond their columnists am editorials.

And sorry we disagree about Benghazi, but there is certainly a coverup. Even Bob Woodward is investigating. How you’d lump that in with your other slightly valid quips makes me think you have some serious levity issues.

By: churchoftheperpetuallyoutraged

churchoftheperpetuallyoutraged — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 22:38:55 +0000

Perhaps the NYT isn’t as biased as Fox or MSNBC, but they haven’t endorsed a Republican for president during my lifetime.

Who cares when the last time the NYT endorsed a Rep candidate, answer the damn question. When’s the last time that the NYT, or another major [liberal] media source blantantly lied about a story or intentionally misled viewers?

For reference, here’s a few things that Fox News has done:

Fox News wonders why people haven’t moved on from the Phone Hacking scandal in Britain*. The gentleman they bring on says “News of the World is a hacking scandal….why haven’t we moved on? Citicorp got hacked, insurance companies got hacked into….we have to figure out a way to deal with this hacking problem!”

How about, YOU WERE THE ONES DOING THE HACKING! while everyone else was a victim of it.

Or how about accusing the gov’t of fudging the jobs report from last month to make Obama look better? Or the lies about Benghazi? Or the stupidity of Obama’s birth certificate?

*http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtC4gT-_Nj0&feature=related

By: Marty

Marty — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 22:18:30 +0000

I’d say exhibiting preference is the very definition of bias, but hey I’m not trying to convolute like you are.

You have a point about editorial bleeding over to the news pages, but your first statement is so fucking dishonest I don’t care to waste time considering anything else you write.

By: Jeremy Fox

Jeremy Fox — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 22:15:16 +0000

No Marty, the weight you put on Silver’s analysis is *not* just a function of who you have in the race. I share Silver’s politics–and I bought his forecasts in 2010 too, even though doing so was depressing. And I was far from alone in this. Democrats didn’t noisily criticize Silver in 2010 the way Republicans are in 2012.

There really is a difference between the two sides here. Lashing out at quantitative, evidence-based analyses because you don’t like the conclusions really is more of a Republican sport, at least when the analyses concern election outcomes.

By: philsieg

philsieg — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 22:13:11 +0000

I know this is a difficult concept to grasp, but exhibiting a preference does not mean you are biased in any other area save that preference. You want to infer that because a newspaper takes a certain editorial page position, that everything printed in that paper is affected/tainted by that position. Not only does that imply that anyone who takes a position with which you disagree is incapable of independent thought on any other issue, it ignores the fact that any endeavor like the Times is made up of many human beings, all of whom have their own thoughts based on their life experiences, upbringing and education.(Do you recall Judith Miller, for example? Have you read Thomas Friedman’s op-ed pieces on the Iraq war? Do you actually read the paper at all, ever?) Disagreeing with you is not in itself prima facie evidence of bias. Perhaps your comment was made while gazing in the mirror?

(For the record, I voted differently than the NYT endorsement in 1980, 1996, 2000, and 2012, though in no instance did I vote for a Republican.)

By: dowhatifeellike

dowhatifeellike — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:59:53 +0000

That is the way they play the game… I just wish people would stop buying what they’re selling. The practice will end only when elections become more about substance than style.

By: Jeremy Fox

Jeremy Fox — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:56:31 +0000

Well, except the people criticizing him for incorrect weighting aren’t doing so on the basis of evidence. They just don’t like the conclusions that Silver’s weighting leads to. Silver has data-based reasons, which he’s described, for weighting the state polls as he does. Just as there are data-based reasons for, say, the weight that baserunning is assigned in fWAR. Not there isn’t scope for reasonable disagreement about weightings. Indeed, there are other quantitative forecasting sites, like Votamatic, that weight state-level polls even *more* heavily than Silver does. But I have yet to see anyone make a *data-based case* that Silver’s weightings of state-level polls (not to mention other sites’ even higher weightings) are unreasonable, or that there is scope for *reasonable* weightings that would give Romney a better-than-even chance of victory.

By: Marty

Marty — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:55:30 +0000

So to be clear, you are admitting they are biased, but you agree with the bias so it’s not much of an issue, and because so they should not be considered biased.

By: crackersnap

crackersnap — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:50:54 +0000

The problem, as I see it, is that those active in the political process cannot afford to have a momentum of the narrative begin to build against them. It doesn’t matter which side of the fence you are on when Silver’s numbers come out against you. You are forced to reject those conclusions lest they create any synergistic tide of self-fulfillment.

In fact, the greater the proclamations are against you, by anybody, the stronger your side needs to bark out against that information in order to create backlash, hopefully to create a counter tide of narrative in your favor prior to the actual deadline of voting day.

By: Craig Calcaterra

Craig Calcaterra — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:50:47 +0000

I’ve written 18 posts today. Aaron has written 13 or 14 more. Exactly one of those posts was about something other than baseball, and this one focused on the work of a person who has been extremely influential in baseball and covers a subject (inside-outside reporting) which is of great relevance to baseball reporting. And which is something I have written about since the day this blog began.

But sure, I got nothing to write about.

By: thebadguyswon

thebadguyswon — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:44:07 +0000

Admit it Craig, you have nothing to write about.

By: philsieg

philsieg — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:44:00 +0000

Well, in my lifetime the NY Times endorsed Dewey and Eisenhower twice. They stopped endorsing Republicans when the fiscally moderate and socially liberal Republicans were driven gradually from the party in the post-Goldwater purge and during the Reagan ascendency. Since then the Republicans and their surrogates have drawn the political conversation further and further to the extreme right and demanded increasingly more rigid fealty from anyone desiring to wear the label. Where exactly is anyone not part of the extreme right wing supposed to go?

By: thebadguyswon

thebadguyswon — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:42:56 +0000

Yeah right. Or maybe people want baseball on their baseball sites. Don’t assume badguys doesn’t follow politics.

By: Marty

Marty — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:34:22 +0000

Perhaps the NYT isn’t as biased as Fox or MSNBC, but they haven’t endorsed a Republican for president during my lifetime.

AND, I believe Nate Silver fostered his political career at the Daily Kos. I think the notion that he could be biased is extremely fucking valid.

By: churchoftheperpetuallyoutraged

churchoftheperpetuallyoutraged — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:27:14 +0000

I voted for Kodos