2016 U.S. Presidential Race Megathread Mark 2.

Black Swan

Manic Moran wrote: »

It's called the Bradley Effect

It's called social desirability bias, but whom is understated and whom is overstated? Both have been polled as being very undesirable, Clinton and Trump, so you can flip a coin at this stage if social desirability bias is in some way affecting either Clinton or Trump. No one knows, as there is no empirical evidence to suggest, explain or predict at this moment in time if such bias exists.

Of course Trump supporters will reach for hope and proclaim that social desirability bias has been understating Trump in polls, because they have been mostly under Clinton since the DNC late July 2016. It could be just as likely that, although Clinton has been generally 2 or 3 points ahead of Trump, her national polls could have been understated due to social desirability bias, and when 8 November 2016 arrives she will win by an absolute landslide.

aloyisious

If Don loses, it'll be a massive "social experiment" failure by the Republican Party where it decided not to run one of it's own experienced sons and put up a tyro, probably a first for the US.

Zubeneschamali

aloyisious wrote: »

If Don loses, it'll be a massive "social experiment" failure by the Republican Party

Fortunately, we can count on them to learn from this. After all, what did they learn from Mitt Romney's loss?

Don't nominate a super-rich old white guy!

gosplan

BorneTobyWilde wrote: »

IN polls there are so many people who will not admit to voting for Trump, they secretly will vote for him. I know many decent people who will not show any public support but will vote for him and want him to win. I'm sure McCain will also vote for him.
Polls are false because of this aspect of it .

So the polls are wrong because people you know (are you in Ireland) are closet Trump fans but would tell you but not an anonomyous person over the phone?

Akrasia

Individual polls are subject to error, but the prepondernace of evidence from a large number of independently conducted polls shows that Trump is rapidly losing support.

Polls don't predict election results, they just measure how people feel on the day they are polled. if Clinton is leading by 8% at the moment, 4% of voters need to switch to Trump to wipe out that lead. Or, Turnout amongst Clinton voters might be reduced because they think the race is already over, and they never really liked Clinton that much anyway, so they might save themselves the psychological pain of voting for a candidate they don't agree with.

The chances of Trump winning is very low, but its still not zero.

Nody

aloyisious wrote: »

If Don loses, it'll be a massive "social experiment" failure by the Republican Party where it decided not to run one of it's own experienced sons and put up a tyro, probably a first for the US.

There were no experiment about it; it simply highlighted the flaw in the system (used by both sides) in electing their presidential candidate. In both cases they need to pander to the hardcore fringe groups to get chosen only to scramble back to the middle to actually get elected by the voter base that matters (while throwing out enough bones to the fringe to still get them to show up in acceptable numbers).

TheDoctor

BorneTobyWilde wrote: »

Rally in Florida is massive. I can understand how Trump doesn't believe the polls.

I remember how no right wingers believed the polls in 2012 either.

Watching Fox meltdown when Obama reached 270 was some of the best television in years.

Trent Houseboat

Karl Rove rejecting reality was a good laugh alright.

RobertKK

I see in one of the Podesta released emails that Hillary's communication director along with a left leaning think tank had a go at Catholics, interesting thing is this is john Podesta emails as he was included to receive the emails, but he did not respond - Podesta is a Catholic btw so probably was not happy with the correspondence and so didn't reply.

The emails in questions:

John Halpin of the Center for American progress:
"Ken Auletta's latest piece on Murdoch in the New Yorker starts off with the aside that both Murdoch and Robert Thompson, managing editor of the WSJ, are raising their kids Catholic. Friggin' Murdoch baptized his kids in Jordan where John the Baptist baptized Jesus,"
"Many of the most powerful elements of the conservative movement are all Catholic (many converts) from the SC and think tanks to the media and social groups. It's an amazing bastardization of the faith. They must be attracted to the systematic thought and severely backwards gender relations and must be totally unaware of Christian democracy,"

Jennifer Palmieri who is Hillary's communication director replied:
"I imagine they think it is the most socially acceptable politically conservative religion. Their rich friends wouldn't understand if they became evangelicals."

---

So far the Democrats have done nothing to distance themselves from this, despite polls showing that Catholics will vote more for Hillary than Trump.


Polls show the Catholic vote as following:
Hillary 55%
Trump 34%

Trump has not brought it up, but if he is clever he will at some point.

Catholics make up 1/5th of the American population.

Trent Houseboat

You might be barking up the wrong tree there Robert. I think Trump has white Catholics sewn up. His problem is that most Catholics in the US are Hispanic. And he doesn't stand a chance of if winning them over, no matter how many stages taco eating photos he takes.

Billy86

BorneTobyWilde wrote: »

IN polls there are so many people who will not admit to voting for Trump, they secretly will vote for him. I know many decent people who will not show any public support but will vote for him and want him to win. I'm sure McCain will also vote for him.
Polls are false because of this aspect of it .

Doesn't hold up and you know it from how often it has been pointed out, those same polls showed Trump winning the primaries easily.


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationwide_opinion_polling_for_the_Republican_Party_2016_presidential_primaries

RobertKK

Trent Houseboat wrote: »

You might be barking up the wrong tree there Robert. I think Trump has white Catholics sewn up. His problem is that most Catholics in the US are Hispanic. And he doesn't stand a chance of if winning them over, no matter how many stages taco eating photos he takes.

Trump could leave it to the last debate, bring it up when Clinton thinks she and her team have gotten away with that, and ask her why has nothing being done about Jennifer Palmieri given her comments about Catholics as well as Evangelicals.
Trump just has to say that Hillary's communication director backed up a comment that Catholics have systematic thinking and backward gender relations, and why has Hillary not distanced herself from her communications director, given this has been out for one and a half weeks.
I can tell you, it would open the eyes of some of her voters.

On a separate note...

There is the scripted interview that Hillary did with MSNBC, where Hillary reads from a script.
https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/786158412119707648

Then there is Donna Brazile who is the current interim DNC chairperson and CNN contributor gave the Clinton team a question that would be difficult for Hillary at a CNN townhall debate last March with Sanders.
Brazile said in an email to the Clinton team that she sometimes get the questions in advance.

BorneTobyWilde

gosplan wrote: »

So the polls are wrong because people you know (are you in Ireland) are closet Trump fans but would tell you but not an anonomyous person over the phone?

This was post above. It's what I'm referring to.
How a person when asked in person or on phone will give a politically correct answer but will vote the other way.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/11/opinion/campaign-stops/how-many-people-support-trump-but-dont-want-to-admit-it.html?_r=1

It's no surprise to see Trump winning online polls. The debate poll had him winning by huge margin online but not in those face to face polling polls..

B0jangles

FYI for most of those online polls you can vote as many times as you like if you clear out your cookies each time. You can also run scripts that automate and speed up the process of repeat voting.

They are total junk.

oik

Trent Houseboat wrote: »

You might be barking up the wrong tree there Robert. I think Trump has white Catholics sewn up. His problem is that most Catholics in the US are Hispanic. And he doesn't stand a chance of if winning them over, no matter how many stages taco eating photos he takes.

Patently false.

The majority of Catholics are white, mostly of Irish and Italian descent with Hispanics making up around 30%

And Trump doesn't necessarily have them sewn up.

I don't know the exact numbers but I do know that Irish immigrants were typically Democrats.

PopePalpatine

I've said this before and I'll say it again, if online polls were a reflection of reality we'd be reaching the end of 8 years of Ron Paul in the White House.

Feline Grabber

BorneTobyWilde wrote: »

This was post above. It's what I'm referring to.
How a person when asked in person or on phone will give a politically correct answer but will vote the other way.


It's no surprise to see Trump winning online polls. The debate poll had him winning by huge margin online but not in those face to face polling polls..

You do know that people were making scripts to keep voting in online polls for trump? There is proof of online pro trump communities brigading polls and voting multiple times. They weren't exactly quiet about it. Don't understand how people are dumb enough to brigade a poll and then claim victory but here we are. Why are people suddenly afraid to say they support Trump in an anonymous poll? They'll attend his rallies, put up yard signs vote in online polls but they become shy on the phone.

oik

Billy86 wrote: »

Doesn't hold up and you know it from how often it has been pointed out, those same polls showed Trump winning the primaries easily.


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationwide_opinion_polling_for_the_Republican_Party_2016_presidential_primaries

Apples and oranges.

There's nothing to be gleaned about the accuracy of primary polling that can be applied to the presidential race without controlling for a host of factors.

So many factors are different. Different sets of people voting. The people tend to be more politically engaged. More confident in their beliefs.

And most importantly, Trump was already strongly in the lead for most of the primary season and had won numerous primaries so there would be a strong social desirability bias in his favour rather than against. It was perfectly socially acceptable for Republicans to say they support Trump, not so much for independents and Democrats.

It's a rather weak argument to keep leaning on tbh.

oik

MSNBC panelists admitting that their own company's poll was "cooked"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XEx_zZhjLg

TheDoctor

Trent Houseboat wrote: »

Karl Rove rejecting reality was a good laugh alright.

Vintage right wing behaviour.

gosplan

oik wrote: »

Apples and oranges.

There's nothing to be gleaned about the accuracy of primary polling that can be applied to the presidential race without controlling for a host of factors.

So many factors are different. Different sets of people voting. The people tend to be more politically engaged. More confident in their beliefs.

And most importantly, Trump was already strongly in the lead for most of the primary season and had won numerous primaries so there would be a strong social desirability bias in his favour rather than against. It was perfectly socially acceptable for Republicans to say they support Trump, not so much for independents and Democrats.

It's a rather weak argument to keep leaning on tbh.

I don't get it.

Some polls OK but polls now not OK?

Closet Trump fans but no closet Hillary fans.

Seems a little thin to be honest.

oik

gosplan wrote: »

I don't get it.

Some polls OK but polls now not OK?

Closet Trump fans but no closet Hillary fans.

Seems a little thin to be honest.

You're right. You don't get it.

Hillary is not cast as a racist, sexist sexual assaulter. She's just a bit corrupt and untrustworthy like a lot of politicians. There's no good reason to be a closet Hillary supporter unless you live in the deep south where your vote won't matter.

gosplan

oik wrote: »

MSNBC panelists admitting that their own company's poll was "cooked"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XEx_zZhjLg

Polls become news stories though.

Taking one at a bad time for trump gives you the breaking story that he's slipping.

Bad timing for trump, but y'know, he could just stop fcuking up.

gosplan

oik wrote: »

You're right. You don't get it.

Hillary is not cast as a racist, sexist sexual assaulter. She's just a bit corrupt and untrustworthy like a lot of politicians. There's no good reason to be a closet Hillary supporter unless you live in the deep south where your vote won't matter.

Ok so when the polls were closer everyone in the know was saying Trump was actually 4 points up?

Do you think he's ahead?

oik

gosplan wrote: »

Polls become news stories though.

Taking one at a bad time for trump gives you the breaking story that he's slipping.

Bad timing for trump, but y'know, he could just stop fcuking up.

Exactly polls are useful as propaganda tools. Trump used them throughout the primary season. That's exactly why 4chan and r/The_Donald brigade those online polls to create the impression that Trump won. And it's exactly why NBC/WSJ took their first poll in weeks the day the scandal broke and ended right before the debate.

They conducted the poll over 2 days and released it then conducted another one the day after and released it separately whereas the last NBC/WSJ was conducted over 3 days.

NBC was also apparently responsible for the tape being released.

They're running offensive for the Clinton campaign.

oik

gosplan wrote: »

Do you think he's ahead?

No. He's clearly behind, probably by about 6 or 7 points.

Reagan was behind by 12 at this stage, I believe.

gosplan

oik wrote: »

Exactly polls are useful as propaganda tools. Trump used them throughout the primary season. That's exactly why 4chan and r/The_Donald brigade those online polls to create the impression that Trump won. And it's exactly why NBC/WSJ took their first poll in weeks the day the scandal broke and ended right before the debate.

They conducted the poll over 2 days and released it then conducted another one the day after and released it separately whereas the last NBC/WSJ was conducted over 3 days.

NBC was also apparently responsible for the tape being released.

They're running offensive for the Clinton campaign.

I think you need to appreciate the idea that a significant number of people maybe think Trump must not be president.

Quin_Dub

oik wrote: »

No. He's clearly behind, probably by about 6 or 7 points.

Reagan was behind by 12 at this stage, I believe.

He was behind by 4 points..

gosplan

Quin_Dub wrote: »

He was behind by 4 points..

Trumps problem is so far, he can't do what he needs to.

He has to appeal to people beyond attack, attack, attack.

People are now looking at him for something to change their minds and wiki leaks, or threatening to lock people up won't cut it.

He needs to get to core republican policy, link HRC to failures and explain what he's going to do in the future.

Attacking people has run it's course

oik

Quin_Dub wrote: »

He was behind by 4 points..

That was the difference between the final poll and the final result.

He was polling at 39% at this time and won with 51%, so I was incorrect to say he was 12 behind but he gained 12 between this time 36 years ago and polling day.

Christy42

oik wrote: »

Apples and oranges.

There's nothing to be gleaned about the accuracy of primary polling that can be applied to the presidential race without controlling for a host of factors.

So many factors are different. Different sets of people voting. The people tend to be more politically engaged. More confident in their beliefs.

And most importantly, Trump was already strongly in the lead for most of the primary season and had won numerous primaries so there would be a strong social desirability bias in his favour rather than against. It was perfectly socially acceptable for Republicans to say they support Trump, not so much for independents and Democrats.

It's a rather weak argument to keep leaning on tbh.

It is by quite some distance more evidence than has been supplied for the shy Trump voter.

I can think of reasons for there to be shy Hillary voters (she is also unpopular) or for Trump to under perform his polling (his weak ground game that is dependent on a hostile republican party and he tended to under perform his polling in the primaries slightly until near the end). However as I don't have evidence for.them.I don't keep bleating on about them being fact.

RobertKK

Putin is unhappy that the US elections are being used to attack Russia and himself.
He told CNBC that neither campaign can exploit Russia to win the US elections.

oik

Christy42 wrote: »

It is by quite some distance more evidence than has been supplied for the shy Trump voter.

I can think of reasons for there to be shy Hillary voters (she is also unpopular) or for Trump to under perform his polling (his weak ground game that is dependent on a hostile republican party and he tended to under perform his polling in the primaries slightly until near the end). However as I don't have evidence for.them.I don't keep bleating on about them being fact.

The whole point of the shy voter phenomenon is you have to wait until after the election for the evidence. There's never any evidence pre-election but it has happened time and time again in various countries.

No one is bleating on about it as fact but the absence of the phenomenon is not a fact either.

We're still before the fact here, so no one should be talking about fact either way. It's all prediction.

gosplan

oik wrote: »

The whole point of the shy voter phenomenon is you have to wait until after the election for the evidence. There's never any evidence pre-election but it has happened time and time again in various countries.

No one is bleating on about it as fact but the absence of the phenomenon is not a fact either.

We're still before the fact here, so no one should be talking about fact either way. It's all prediction.

Surely this would have existed with s black man running for president?

20Cent

oik wrote: »

The whole point of the shy voter phenomenon is you have to wait until after the election for the evidence. There's never any evidence pre-election but it has happened time and time again in various countries.

No one is bleating on about it as fact but the absence of the phenomenon is not a fact either.

We're still before the fact here, so no one should be talking about fact either way. It's all prediction.

Wouldn't polling companies take this into account? They must have ways of doing this. Same was said about the same sex marriage referendum here. The "silent majority" didn't show up on the day.

B0jangles

RobertKK wrote: »

Putin is unhappy that the US elections are being used to attack Russia and himself.
He told CNBC that neither campaign can exploit Russia to win the US elections.

And former KGB man Putin would never ever tell a fib :pac:

Billy86

RobertKK wrote: »

Putin is unhappy that the US elections are being used to attack Russia and himself.
He told CNBC that neither campaign can exploit Russia to win the US elections.

Thank kind of thing tends to happen when you hack the US government in order to tilt their elections in your favour. It failed.

gosplan

Billy86 wrote: »

Thank kind of thing tends to happen when you hack the US government in order to tilt their elections in your favour. It failed.

There's still no smoking gun.

It's not going to happen without one.

Sure you can say 'Bill did this' and 'Hillary's advisers said this' but it is insignificant in comparison to a man who is publically losing the support of his own party due to bragging about sexually assaulting women.

alastair

Quin_Dub wrote: »

He was behind by 4 points..

And he (Reagan) had a good boost from the debates - universally accepted to have put to bed concerns regarding his age, capacity to compromise, and quick-wittedness.

None of which you could claim for Trump.

oik

20Cent wrote: »

Wouldn't polling companies take this into account? They must have ways of doing this. Same was said about the same sex marriage referendum here. The "silent majority" didn't show up on the day.

If someone tells the pollster they're undecided or voting for Gary Johnson you pretty much have to believe them. They control for demographics to make sure the sample is representative but past that there's no way to get around people lying to pollsters.

The SSM result was a win for Yes but Yes still underperformed the polls by 7-10%

alastair

oik wrote: »

That was the difference between the final poll and the final result.

He was polling at 39% at this time and won with 51%, so I was incorrect to say he was 12 behind but he gained 12 between this time 36 years ago and polling day.

Primarily on the back of his debate performance. The phenomenon of Reagan Democrats came from his ability to convince beyond his base, and they primarily appeared post-debate, the week before election day.

oik

Latest Reuters 4-way poll puts Clinton ahead by 7 points with 11% undecided.

Given all we know about the candidates, how could 11% still be undecided? Hmmm...

alastair

oik wrote: »

If someone tells the pollster they're undecided or voting for Gary Johnson you pretty much have to believe them. They control for demographics to make sure the sample is representative but past that there's no way to get around people lying to pollsters.

The SSM result was a win for Yes but Yes still underperformed the polls by 7-10%

That depends which (late) poll you look at -

An Ipsos MRBI poll in the Irish Times found:
Yes 58% (down 6)
No side 25% (up two).
Don’t know 17% (up 5)

A Red C poll in the Sunday Business Post found:
Yes 69% (down 3),
No 25% (up 5)
Don’t know 6% (down 2)

A Millward Brown poll in the Sunday Independent found:
Yes 53% (down 13)
No 24% (up 3)
Don’t know 23% (up 10)

A Behaviour and Attitudes poll in the Sunday Times found:
Yes 63% (down 10)
No 26% (up 4)
Don’t know (up 5)

So, two polls underestimated the yes vote, one got it pretty much correct, and one overestimated by 7%.

alastair

oik wrote: »

Latest Reuters 4-way poll puts Clinton ahead by 7 points with 11% undecided.

Given all we know about the candidates, how could 11% still be undecided? Hmmm...

It's a pretty typical undecided percentage for any election year.

TheDoctor

oik wrote: »

Latest Reuters 4-way poll puts Clinton ahead by 7 points with 11% undecided.

Given all we know about the candidates, how could 11% still be undecided? Hmmm...

Clearly don't plan on voting.

Christy42

oik wrote: »

The whole point of the shy voter phenomenon is you have to wait until after the election for the evidence. There's never any evidence pre-election but it has happened time and time again in various countries.

No one is bleating on about it as fact but the absence of the phenomenon is not a fact either.

We're still before the fact here, so no one should be talking about fact either way. It's all prediction.

Right so can we stop talking about it then?

Sure it could happen but the odds of it happening seem low. There are a few ways you can predict it that don't apply here but you are right about the fact that we need to wait till after for the final proof.

As for your 11% undecided, we have had undecided voters in other elections and have a good idea how they tend to break. All 11% going to Trump is incredibly unlikely. Both candidates have a month or so to convince them and move the polls (which is possible for Trump but the odds are most certainly against him).
You can also stick in some of the 3rd party voters as undecideds as they tend to switch close to election day (though they are doing better this time around so not certainly not all of them).

oik

alastair wrote: »

That depends which (late) poll you look at -

An Ipsos MRBI poll in the Irish Times found:
Yes 58% (down 6)
No side 25% (up two).
Don’t know 17% (up 5)

A Red C poll in the Sunday Business Post found:
Yes 69% (down 3),
No 25% (up 5)
Don’t know 6% (down 2)

A Millward Brown poll in the Sunday Independent found:
Yes 53% (down 13)
No 24% (up 3)
Don’t know 23% (up 10)

A Behaviour and Attitudes poll in the Sunday Times found:
Yes 63% (down 10)
No 26% (up 4)
Don’t know (up 5)

So, two polls underestimated the yes vote, one got it pretty much correct, and one overestimated by 7%.

All polls seriously underestimated the No vote.

The No vote was the one which suffered from undesirability bias which is plain to see from the data you have kindly presented.

No poll vs No result:
25-38 (+13)
25-38 (+13)
24-38 (+14)
26-38 (+12)

If there's a similar phenomenon with Trump (I doubt it) it would be a trouncing.

RobertKK

Fox news say the electoral college currently stands at:
Clinton 307
Trump 187
Toss up 44

alastair

oik wrote: »

All polls seriously underestimated the No vote.

But not the yes vote - which was the claim you made.

The undecideds in this election are presented with more than a binary choice, and keep in mind that the polls may well have been accurate, and it was voter turnout (rather than shy voters) that shifted the undecided percentages into the no camp.

oik

TheDoctor wrote: »

Clearly don't plan on voting.

The pollsters ask them how likely it is that they'll vote. They don't poll people who don't plan on voting.