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PaperclipPerfector  13hr ago (text post)   1765 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 5, 2026

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Basically what I'm saying. If the big national races are close, semi-coinflip outcomes should ultimately come down for the GOP in the end. You have to believe in a serious blue wave to expect a flip of the Senate, especially a flip that actually gives them 'control' vs. just a nominal majority.

Polymarket believes blue wave, Nate silver believes blue wave, polls predict blue wave, RCP believes blue wave, rumors are that GOP insiders believe blue wave, I am pro Trump also - but I think that his absolute remarkable dumb political luck has finally ran out. A nominal majority is control when it comes to appointments and passing laws.

I’m not sure how seriously I take polymarket, polls and Nate Silver. Not that they’re certainly wrong, but there’s always the issue of motivated reasoning. Elections are something that almost everyone cares about the outcome of, and this is going to come out in what people predict. A lot of people really really want a blue wave, just like a lot of people wanted Trump to lose. This shows up in polling data and predictions because they’re all made by humans.

I believe that Nate Silver wants to be right and does his best.

Now the question is not whether you take said sources seriously, but whether you do it consistently or not. Empirical evidence is that people that are under the impression they are winning are not busy unskewing the polls. When the Iowa gold standard poll came out two years ago, republicans didn't try to prove that it is wrong, they just laughed at it. With good reasons.

I have taken Nate seriously for more than a decade so far (and he has always given Trump higher chances than the rest of his cohort, so there is that), so if I have to make exception now - there has to be good reasons for it. This year may be different - but the only different thing so far is that I really dislike his prognosis.

Now if your gut tells you that Republicans are in better shape than presented, and said gut was also mostly right about the 2016-2024 elections - I will say - great - a track record is a track record.

I have not heard the 'GOP insiders' rumor, personally.

I also don't see Dems acting like they expect such a win.

The problem with citing PolyMarket, Nate Silver, RCP, and polls is they're all functionally drawing from the exact same data, nobody has 'insider' info here.

IF that dataset it tainted, biased, or otherwise missing something, which has happened before then they can't give you a more accurate picture just by aggregating them together.

And we already have some pretty sizeable polling misses in the primaries!

I think its fair to say the error bars are probably larger than you think. Like, after the Ur-example of a polling miss in Trump's 2016 original win, you should keep your salt grains on hand for reading political polls.

And importantly, Trump needs 50 non-cucked Republicans to make any appointments. Judges can rule like kings in many cases. We need Trump to be able to appoint them which he can't do without those 50 votes.

I am hopeful for a blue fizzle based on demonstrated poll bias. But maybe I have my head in the sand.

Do you have links towards serious analysis why polls are terribly wrong that is not fueled by binge on copium and hopium?

I think the vibe opinion is that only boomers pick up the phone. Off the top of my head I can’t even think of a way to do an unbiased survey on US politics today.

I think my phone even auto filters pollsters straight to spam and don’t even show me the call.

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