How Can We Ever Trust Pollsters Again?

[COL Mustard]

According to Nate Silver, Trump had a 10% chance of winning. Yet here we are, on Wednesday morning, and it’s still neck and neck.

What am I missing?

[DumpTrump20202020]

1. i hate polls because

a lot of people become relaxed and stay home.

and in 2020, no excuse. You could have voted from your couch and people still didnt. Very sad. Too many people I know didn't vote. Shame on them.

[redstatebluegirl]

26. This is why I hate them.

People here put so much stock in these damn polls, clearly they were not correct.

[Ace Rothstein]

2. We can't.

Polling is dead until they get it right for 3 or so straight cycles.

[doc03]

3. The Economist had a 3% chance of Trump winning. Those guys get paid for that?

I still think there are a lot of Trump voters that are ashamed to admit they would vote for him.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. There will be a whole lot of analysis going on.

I haven't a clue why the polls were off, but I thought that they'd cleaned up their methodology after 2016. Either they didn't, or they still haven't figured out how to do it.

[SomedayKindaLove]

5. Really have to wait until all the vote is counted

Before we know how much the polls are off.

[crimycarny]

6. Cheating

I don’t think the pollsters were that far off. I think there is voting manipulation by bad actors. Intelligence officials already warned that Russia had successfully hacked into voting machines across the country.

I’d like to see how close paper ballots only were to the polls.

[MyMission]

12. Absolutely. Voting machines can be hacked

And we know this. We want to believe that cheating doesn't happen much, or we can overcome it by our voter turnout. Meanwhile, they've turned hacking into a science over the last 20 years.

That's why polling has become less accurate.

[Raine]

7. 2016 was proof they can never be trusted. 👎 nt

[Hav]

8. True, it's very close

but with millions of votes still to be counted and Dems rather choosing to vote early, it might get closer to the poll results.

[Bonn1997]

9. Or, how can we ever trust electronic voting again?

Regardless, Nate also reminded us that 10% is not 0%. It means that if we had these same circumstances 100 times, Trump would win 10 times.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

10. Probability. NT

[COL Mustard]

19. Yeah, Lightning Can Strike Twice!

[hamsterjill]

11. Most DU'ers don't.

We tried to warn people based on what happened in 2000 and in 2016. We were told we were being “negative”.

Polls mean nothing. Only the end result.

[Mike Niendorff]

13. Two points:

(1) Anything based on "land lines" is utterly, utterly obsolete. Disregard it entirely.

(2) Any analysis that presumes no interference in the vote count by state actors (Russia) is also woefully naive.


MDN

[littlemissmartypants]

14. I've never trusted them. Too many people lie. They think they're being cute screwing

with the results.

[kairos12]

15. I will go with my Magic 8 Ball.

[leftyladyfrommo]

16. Obviously we would do better with a crytal ball and a

deck of tarot cards.

[COL Mustard]

22. Don't Forget The Chicken Entrails

Yuk.

[leftyladyfrommo]

24. At least a tarot reader has intuition. Can't say that about

Tossing stones and reading chicken guts.

[COL Mustard]

29. True!!!

[frazzled]

17. I won't

And just let them try to explain their way out of this one. Unless their explanation is that there was major fraud or foreign interference, there is no explanation other than that polling is just a woo undertaking of mumbo jumbo that makes a shit ton of money for the pollsters.

You might as well buy a lottery ticket.

[uponit7771]

18. ***FACTOR IN VOTER SUPPRESSION*** ... Voter Suppression WORKS !!

[LisaL]

20. There is not much pollsters can do if "shy Trump voters" are lying to them.

NT

[gollygee]

21. They have to learn how to poll in the current era

Their methodologies don't take into account how to reach people now or how people get information now.

[LisaL]

25. Or how to tell if people are lying to them.

NT

[gollygee]

27. I think Trump voters are very proud to be voting for Trump

I don't think it's people lying.

[R0ckyRac00n]

23. How Can We Ever Trust Pollsters Again?

10% isn't zero, right? I mean I'm no math major, but... If you don't think you can roll a "1" you never played D&D as a kid! (or as an adult of course!)

[leftyladyfrommo]

28. We can't. We couldn't before.there is a huge

section of the population that pollsters can't get to. .and apparently it's the red part.

[JHB]

30. Anyone still want to criticize that "work like we're 10 points behind" advice?

It seems to have held up pretty well.