Nate Silver
The fundamentals now favor Obama
Given Mr. Obama’s current approval ratings and consensus forecasts on the economy, he rates as about a 60 percent favorite to win the popular vote against Mitt Romney, with somewhat higher chances against any of the other Republicans running for the nomination. By contrast, in the November version of the model, Mr. Obama was an underdog to Mr. Romney, with a 40 percent chance of winning; the president’s approval ratings were about 6 points lower then and economic forecasts were somewhat more pessimistic.
Blowback
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Keep telling yourself that, Nate.
The economy isn’t nearly as sunny as everyone’s making it out to be.
teke184 on February 16, 2012 at 4:52 PM
What evah, there is the media and Democrats attacking Republicans with Republicans attacking Republicans, oh by the the Great Obama is tanking in the tracking polls again. Get back to me in September for actual numbers.
rob verdi on February 16, 2012 at 4:53 PM
It isn’t nearly as sunny as Obama lover’s are making it out to be.
cozmo on February 16, 2012 at 4:53 PM
Dr. Wishcaster wishes once more.
strictnein on February 16, 2012 at 4:53 PM
And what if the economy is not good in November(BTW, it won’t be) and his opponent isn’t Willard?
Doughboy on February 16, 2012 at 4:54 PM
ALL IS WELL!!!!!! AMERICA IS BACK, BABY!!!
DavidW on February 16, 2012 at 4:54 PM
With the MSM, it`s not about facts. They`ll spin a fantasy and it has to be counter-acted EVERY time.
ThePrez on February 16, 2012 at 4:54 PM
Yeah, but we’re gonna beat Romney, so who cares?
thirtyandseven on February 16, 2012 at 4:55 PM
If it’s Santorum, the MSM will have a field day ignoring the economy and focusing on the Santorum’s views of the morality of gambling, abortions, non-reproductive sex, man-on-dog…
DavidW on February 16, 2012 at 4:56 PM
Nate Silver is certainly biased, but he also does good work. There is peripheral evidence suggesting he may be correct like the collapsing Republican primary turnout, a key indicator in 2008 that Obama was headed for victory.
Ignore Silver at your peril.
Doomberg on February 16, 2012 at 4:57 PM
Nate’s as straight shooter as you’re going to find. I buy his analysis of probabilities.
Random on February 16, 2012 at 4:58 PM
Silver tarnishes over time.
BHO Jonestown on February 16, 2012 at 4:59 PM
That based on a snapshot of how things look now and projecting them forward – like a weather forecast.
And it’s based on the fiction that the economy is roaring back – Watch the left cherry pick the data to push that narrative from now until the cows come home.
Are better off than you were $4 trillion ago?
Chip on February 16, 2012 at 5:06 PM
When Romney gets to the general election, he would be bloodied. Aint no way the Mormon is winning.
liberal4life on February 16, 2012 at 5:07 PM
I bet you guys believed him when he had Obama at 40%…
Can.I.be.in.the.middle on February 16, 2012 at 5:09 PM
Speaking of which –from the mouth of a Downgrade Administration horse:
Chip on February 16, 2012 at 5:09 PM
So, would you say that you’re in favor of the continued Downgrading of the country?
Chip on February 16, 2012 at 5:11 PM
And the drive-bys think this will work? Remember when Stephie at that debate harped on contraception for 15 minutes and the crowd got really PO’d and started booing and hissing him? Imagine millions of Americans doing that during the general election if the media tries to focus entirely on issues that are not only irrelevant to voters, but have nothing to do with Santorum’s platform either.
Doughboy on February 16, 2012 at 5:12 PM
Or not. Silver attempted to refute a point on global warming by using data from a cheap, off the shelf weather sensor installed on top of a tarred roof in the middle of the U of MN campus. I alerted him to this (because he misrepresented the data source he was using or was just completely ignorant about it), and said that he should really be using the $250k-$300k sensor array installed at the MSP airport (which didn’t show the trends he was trying to show), but he did nothing to correct his analysis and said it wasn’t an issue.
So he’s a super serious straight shooter, except when he’s not because the data doesn’t show what he wants it to. I understand though. He was bickering with the boys at PowerLine and would have lost some of his super-stat genius cred by admitting he was wrong, so he didn’t. But I’m sure that’s the only time he’s ignored more accurate, but contradictory data because it didn’t fit his viewpoints.
strictnein on February 16, 2012 at 5:13 PM
Economy is on the right track. Unemployment keeps dropping and employers keep hiring.
I’m sorry for letting facts get into the way of your narrative
liberal4life on February 16, 2012 at 5:14 PM
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA !!!!!!!!
and…
HA!
Rixon on February 16, 2012 at 5:15 PM
I want Obama to be so stunned on election night that he is incapable of giving a concession speech.
salem on February 16, 2012 at 5:15 PM
The mentals have always favored Obama.
BlueCollarAstronaut on February 16, 2012 at 5:15 PM
Too bad for him the election isn’t right now.
JellyToast on February 16, 2012 at 5:19 PM
But fewer companies are hiring, which suggests the rate is more people having stopped looking for work rather than an economic turnaround.
Unemployment is usually the last figure to turn around in an economy, following GDP by 2-4 quarters. It doesn’t make any sense for it to precede a turnaround in the economy.
Besides, it’s a moot point. Unemployment will still be above 8% in November, gas will be $4.50 a gallon nationally, somebody will have nuked Iran and/or Israel, and Afghanistan will have started falling apart as we withdraw troops. And there’s another Debt Ceiling debate landing around October.
None of this bodes well for Obama, regardless of who he’s running against.
Sorry for ruining your narrative.
Nethicus on February 16, 2012 at 5:20 PM
Let’s see – the Downgrade Administration continues to grade it own performance on the economy as good – and you don’t see a conflict of interest there?
Did you reference the link to the article that:
Given that admission from the administration, how do you see us avoiding the fate of Greece and the rest of the European union?
Chip on February 16, 2012 at 5:23 PM
Play with the tool he links to a little bit, and you’ll see that it’s a very tenuous grip on the lead.
If GDP growth is +1.7% and Obama’s approval rating slips just a little to 47%, Romney has a 55% chance of winning, for example.
Let’s play this like predicting a player’s future batting average. If you know nothing else about a player, the starting point would be to average his last two seasons. In this case, that would be (-3.5% + 3%) / 2 = -0.25%.
As far as approval rating goes, yes, it’s been going up slightly recently. 49%, though, is assuming the best of the last 3 weeks or so. The most recent number I find is 43% (http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/popularity.php).
Plug those two numbers in and Romney has an 83% chance of beating him; Gingrich 71%, Santorum 71%, RON PAUL 68%.
In short – the analysis is good, the tool is good, the data is good – but you have to make a LOT of assumptions about the future to see a second term. It all depends on the economy the next nine months.
playblu on February 16, 2012 at 5:25 PM
Hurry up 12/21/2012 or something.
SouthernGent on February 16, 2012 at 5:28 PM
Which are based on biased “polling”.
I stopped right there.
Del Dolemonte on February 16, 2012 at 5:31 PM
lmao
kunegetikos on February 16, 2012 at 5:31 PM
getalife said the very same things in February of 2009. He was wrong too.
Del Dolemonte on February 16, 2012 at 5:33 PM
“Yes, we can” –2008
“No, we coldn’t” –2012
Same set of stupid voters
Schadenfreude on February 16, 2012 at 5:33 PM
\
So add Mormons to the list of people you hate. At least you didn’t call them terrorists!
Chuck Schick on February 16, 2012 at 5:50 PM
Guess he missed this one:
New CBO Report Decimates ‘Obamanomics’: Real Unemployment Hits 15%
albill on February 16, 2012 at 5:56 PM
Sure. Can you super-size that? Yeah, I’ll pay extra.
platypus on February 16, 2012 at 6:08 PM
“Consensus forcasts.”
Those are always SO much more accurate than the ones based on facts.
logis on February 16, 2012 at 6:16 PM
This is just stupid-if you plug in last years ‘official’ growth number of 1.6%, he gets killed, even with a 49% approval rating.
And since we know they fudged the 4th quarter GDP numbers with a .4% rate of inflation, it’s even worse than that (probably around 1.2% for the year).
And I’m supposed to believe that with record gas prices, record unemployment, historic deficits and credit downgrades, this tool is going to be reelected?
Meh. Talk to me in August. If the MSM can convince 15 million unemployed people that they actually have a job, I’ll be worried…
PetecminMd on February 16, 2012 at 6:35 PM
I don’t need Nate Silver to tell me this. Some of you can stick your head in the sand if you want, but unfortunately, Obama’s re-election chances aren’t as bad as some of you wish they were. You can whine about biased polls all you want, but that won’t change the outcome on election day. Sadly, unless something drastic happens, Obama is most likely going to be elected.
Unemployment will not be above 8% in November. It’s at 8.3% now. There’s no doubt whatsoever that it will be under 8 by election day.
$4.50 gas will be a problem, but not as bad as you think. If it gets that high, it will be in part because of an improved economy. Plus people are getting used to high gas prices. They don’t like them, but they aren’t shocked by them anymore either. Besides, everyone knows high gas prices are Bush’s fault.
Nukes? Give me a break. No one is nuking anybody.
As for Afghanistan falling apart, no one cares. Folks want the troops home. They support the withdrawal. If anything, a collapsing Afghanistan will make Republicans look bad for going there in the first place. And no, I don’t agree with that point of view.
Debt ceiling debate? In the middle of election season? Are you kidding? You think our side is going to risk Grandma not getting her social security check THEN? Boehner and company will cave even faster than they did last time. Neither side is going to make an issue of the debt ceiling a month before the election.
Two more things that don’t help: One, our candidates suck. Sorry, but no one is excited about voting for any of them. That’s a problem. Two, and even more of a problem….many(if not most) Americans actually want the socialism Obama promises them. If number two is true, and it’s hard to argue otherwise at this point, it’s over.
Yeah, keep telling yourselves that Obama doesn’t have a decent chance. He does, and it sucks, because he shouldn’t.
xblade on February 16, 2012 at 7:30 PM
Yeah, ever since republicans have been able to effectively c**kblock Obama out of screwing the country things have been improving, albeit very slowly. Things would improve even better if the rancid stench of the democratic party was removed from any semblance of power.
Darth Executor on February 16, 2012 at 9:09 PM