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naraburns  nihil supernum  6mo ago (text post)   28014 thread views

U.S. Election (Day?) 2024 Megathread

With apologies to our many friends and posters outside the United States... it's time for another one of these! Culture war thread rules apply, and you are permitted to openly advocate for or against an issue or candidate on the ballot (if you clearly identify which ballot, and can do so without knocking down any strawmen along the way). "Small-scale" questions and answers are also permitted if you refrain from shitposting or being otherwise insulting to others here. Please keep the spirit of the law--this is a discussion forum!--carefully in mind.

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Did Nate Silver just get obliterated by some twitter random (Keith Rabois) for 100K? Back a month ago there was this exchange where Nate asked this dude for a binding promise to transfer 100K if Trump didn't win by 8 points in Florida. Nate seemed pretty confident and I assumed he knew what he was doing. The other guy seemed like an angry lower-caps twitter dude.

https://x.com/NateSilver538/status/1842211340720504895

Florida is 91% in and it's looking pretty bad for Nate: https://www.axios.com/visuals/presidential-election-results-2024-updates-harris-trump?selectedRaces=all

Trump 5,864,014 56.1% Harris 4,491,712 43.0

Am I fundamentally misunderstanding what's going on here? It seems very bad for Mr Forecaster if he bets so confidently and gets nuked.

Edit: According to Rabois Nate Silver later withdrew his offer of a bet: https://x.com/rabois/status/1853971462744359299

Sorry to not answer your question, but what's up with Florida?

Florida was THE swing state until quite recently. Obama won in 2012. And now Trump is going to win by 12 points !?

Is it just that conservatives are fleeing the corruption and taxes of Illinois and New York for the sunnier shores of Florida? Or is it DeSantis coattails?

More sinister explanation: Retirees are living in Florida for tax residency, but then voting (D) in their original home states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin now that Florida is no longer in play.

A) A lot of people moving here/retirees from Blue states that increase the Republican voteshare.

B) Desantis is a terrifyingly competent governor, from day 1. Even Dems notice that he keeps the state in tiptop shape.

C) As part of B), Desantis cleaned up the problem counties when it came to voting, which probably eliminated whatever fraud there was.

I explain here.

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