Saturday Learning Series - The Psychological Significance of the Biblical stories

Jordan Peterson talks about the importance of the Bible stories in this 17 part series.

Warning:  this is an intense intellectual lecture that requires your time and attention.  It's worth it though.

Mark Dice, still good and why Biden is in Iowa

 Mark Dice doesn't need my repost of his latest video, but he's got it anyway.

I do still expect an October surprise from Democrats but I think it's too little, too late to make a difference.  Election Day is Tuesday and I think the Democrats believe it's done.  

Why is Joe Biden in Iowa today?  He's not going to win Iowa. I think he's trying to help the Democrats' chances in the senate and trying to help upset Republican incumbent Joni Ernst.  If he felt like he was going to win the election, he would be in a more swingy, swing state.  Not Iowa.

Friday Musical Interlude - Fake Plastic Trees but it's an orchestra

 Epic Orchestra performs the Radiohead song Fake Plastic Trees, epically.

My predictions have been wrong all along (slightly)

Two days ago I pointed out that if the polls in 2020 had 85% of the same October bias as did the polls in October 2016, Trump was leading Biden at 247 to 243 electoral college votes with 48 electoral college undecided. Today, with the same bias level,  and giving Virginia, New Mexico and all of Maine to Biden, Trump is leading Biden 264 to 260 with only New Hampshire and Minnesota remaining undecided.  

If Trump  gets Maine District 2 and wins New Hampshire, he actually gets to 269 - the dreaded tie scenario if Biden were to win Minnesota.  However I took a closer look at North Carolina which I was seeing as perilously close.  If Trump were to win that he would actually have enough electoral college votes to win the election even without New Hampshire and Main District 2.

It got me thinking - I'm applying both my own view of the 2016 bias as well as the 538 pollster bias. I could be double counting the bias.  But thanks to a video (I cannot relocate the exact one) from Red Eagle Politics (a great YouTube channel worth checking out), I decided to take a closer look at the 538 pollster bias ratings. As was pointed out on the video I saw, the pollster ratings provided by 538 are kind of suspect. The New York Times/Siena polls are rated as a +0.7% bias towards - Republicans??? 

Looking Just at North Carolina polls in October 2016, they had Clinton +2 (late September) and Clinton +8 (late October).  In their poll of the last three days before the election they rated it a 44-44 tie, with a margin of error +/-3.5% (their CYA poll).  In North Carolina in 2016 Trump won 49.8 to 46.2.  That represents a victory of 3.6%, actually just outside their margin of error. And in fact, they underrepresented the Trump support by 5.8% and Clinton by 2.2%.  Clearly (1) they got it wrong by even their own Margin of Error on 1 of the 2 data points as well as the overall result, and (2) how the hell are they rated Republican +0.7%? What is that rating based on? Perhaps congressional polling results? It doesn't matter, their bias factor clearly cannot be  attributable to upcoming election at a presidential level. That's just one example, and I found others.

The takeaway - The 538 pollster bias is sketchy at best, and I am backing it out of my calculations.

Stay tuned for a revised update of my polling-adjusted view of the electoral college situation later today. That's not to say all of the 538 data is bunk.  The do provide a pollster grade rating that is, for the most part, reasonable - especially when it comes to lesser known pollsters.  I will still be filtering out those pollsters that they have rated below a C+.  That may be a generous inclusion of me when it comes to certain pollsters, but I do still have other means of filtering out garbage polls (old polls, Margin of error issues, sample sizes to small for example) and those will remain intact. 

I expect my look later today will be more accurate than what I have been showing and I expect it to break slightly more in Trump's favor.

The economy had a pretty good third quarter

 Via Breitbart:

The U.S. economy grew at the fastest pace ever recorded in the third quarter, expanding at an annualized pace of 33.1 percent, the U.S. Commerce Department said Thursday. 

The economic rebound means the U.S. recovered significant ground following the record-breaking collapse of output due to lockdowns intended to stem the spread of the coronavirus. Despite the third-quarter gains, the economy is still 3.5 percent smaller than it was as the year began. 

Economists had expected the economy to grow 30.9 percent, according to Econoday. Some economists, however, had been expecting a bigger expansion following the release this week of positive data in recent news on durable good data and international trade. The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow had third-quarter growth at 37 percent. 

The third-quarter GDP gain was fueled by a record 40.7 percent increase in consumer spending. Business investment surged 20.3 percent during the quarter, reflecting a 70.1 percent jump in investment in equipment. The housing market is booming: residential investment grew at a rate of 59.3 percent.

That's the largest growth quarter in history.  Following the worst quarter in history, the best.  CNN will spin this as 'people are still hurting but this proves that the president gets economics. Under Biden and a shutdown this would be another quarter of contraction with a negative GDP in Q3.

Predicting the presidential race comes down to belief

The 2020 election comes down belief. I'm not taking just who believes in their candidate.  I'm talking about predicting who is going to win depends on what and who you believe.  The pols seem wonky and over-dramatically pro-Biden. But that's what I believe. I believe that man cannot generate enthusiasm.  Then again, you might believe there's a rabid anti-Trump enthusiasm that overshadows Biden himself.

Maybe there's a revenge factor for Democrats who really, really wanted Hillary Clinton to  win.  Conversely Trump supporters have a reason for revenge of their own - 4 years of phony impeachment to oust a duly elected president.

Now election  prediction - that's a different sort of beliefs, going back to what you believe about the polls.  In 2016 they were wrong. Badly wrong.  Oh, granted in the final days they got close. But that was right at the end.  I pointed this out yesterday.  The real question is: "Is the same thing happening again in 2020"? It's hard to believe that the Democrats chose a candidate that is even more lackluster than Hillary Clinton was, but they actually did it. So yes, I believe that the polling is again in 2020 either erroneous or deliberately misleading.  How much so?

That's the real question. I'm seeing some truly dramatic election impacts if the reasonable and recent polls (margin of error less than 4.3%, done in the last 13 days and by reasonably reputable pollster) are scaled to the same level of bias (or less) compared to how off they were in 2016.

For example, if the polls are only 80% as biased towards Biden as the were to Hillary. Biden has almost won.  In this scenario he probably gets all of the states that cannot be called based on polling, except maybe Iowa and ends up 305 electoral college votes - a solid win.  However, in order to ensure that he wins the level of bias would have to drop all the way to 45% where Biden would also capture Florida.

But if the bias is 85% of the Clinton bias, Trump is actually leading right now.  And interestingly, Pennsylvania is the first state to flip from Biden to Trump's column.

At 90% of the Clinton bias in polls applied to 2020, North Carolina flips from Biden to Trump as well, but he still has not won.

At a bias level in late October 2020 matching that of October 2016, Michigan flips and Trump wins.

If there is zero bias in the polls Biden has 308 electoral votes and likely garners most of the 48 undecided states. His potential ceiling is 356 electoral college votes.  That shows this is definitely a matter of belief.  After all the bias could be even worse this time around. Biden is less energizing than Hillary Clinton was, right?  If the bias is 125% of what Hillary got in October 2016, Trump get 288 electoral votes comfortably and at possibly 28 of the undecided 48 undecided states (where the polling is just not sufficient to make a plausible call), for a total of 316 electoral college votes.

What do you believe? The polls are right, or close, or wrong?  That's what leads to an inability to make a reasonable prediction right now and we are less than a week away.

For the record, I see no evidence that the pollsters recognized and adjusted their methodologies from 2016. As a result, I believe Trump is going to win (minus any cheating). I just don't know how soundly he is going to win. My hope is that it's enough to overcome any potential "insurance policies" on the part of the left.