...for some reason. The Irish betting Web site says:
With sincere regret we must inform you that due to circumstances recently discovered we must immediately cease trading activity.
What the heck? Now we'll all have to go back to guessing, like Republicans. From a piece in the Atlantic (my emphasis):
Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan both believed the public polls were wrong, and
that they'd win on Election Day. Their wives did, too. "I don't think
there was one person who saw this coming," a senior adviser told CBS News' Jan Crawford.
An advisor said of Romney, "He was shellshocked." When Romney claimed
on Election Day that he hadn't written a concession speech, it sounded
like trash talk. Apparently it wasn't. How could they not have seen it
coming?
"There's nothing worse than when you think you're going to win, and you
don't," said another adviser. "It was like a sucker punch."
Or check out this from Slate:
Mitt Romney says he is a numbers guy, but in the end he got the
numbers wrong. His campaign was adamant that public polls in the swing
states were mistaken. They claimed the pollsters were over-estimating
the number of Democrats who would turn out on Election Day. Romney’s
campaign was certain that minorities would not show up for Obama in 2012
the way they did in 2008. “It just defied logic,” said a top aide of
the idea that Obama could match, let alone exceed, his performance with
minorities from the last election. When anyone raised the idea that
public polls were showing a close race, the campaign’s pollster said the
poll modeling was flawed and everyone moved on. Internally, the
campaign’s own polling—tweaked to represent their view of the
electorate, with fewer Democrats—showed a steady uptick for Romney since
the first debate. Even on the morning of the election, Romney’s senior
advisers weren’t close to hedging. They said he was going to win
“decisively.” It seemed like spin, but the Boston Globe reports
that a fireworks display was already ordered for the victory. Romney
and Ryan thought they were going to win, say aides. “We were optimistic.
More than just cautiously optimistic,” says one campaign staffer. When Romney lost, “it was like a death in the family.”
How did the Romney team get it so wrong? According to those involved,
it was a mix of believing anecdotes about party enthusiasm and an
underestimation of their opponents’ talents.
And then there's poor ol' Peggy Noonan:
We begin with the three words everyone writing about the election must
say: Nobody knows anything. Everyone’s guessing. I spent Sunday
morning in Washington with journalists and political hands, one of whom
said she feels it’s Obama, the rest of whom said they don’t know. I
think it’s Romney. I think he’s stealing in “like a thief with good
tools,” in Walker Percy’s old words. While everyone is looking at the
polls and the storm, Romney’s slipping into the presidency. He’s
quietly rising, and he’s been rising for a while.
That's it; that's Noonan's statistical sampling.
Who knows what to make of the weighting of the polls and the
assumptions as to who will vote? Who knows the depth and breadth of
each party’s turnout efforts?
Well, Nate Silver for one. (And there were plenty others. You just had to consult them.) This woman gets paid to write this stuff?
Is it possible this whole thing is playing out before our eyes and we’re
not really noticing because we’re too busy looking at data on paper
instead of what’s in front of us?
After reading this, I wanted to shout at Ms. Noonan: DON'T YOU READ NATE SILVER? DON'T YOU AT LEAST LOOK AT INTRADE?
But to be fair, Republicans aren't the only ones who don't trust polling. On the morning of the Academy Awards, Chris Matthews predicted Silver Linings Playbook would win Best Picture. To which I wanted to yell at the TV: But Argo has been the clear leader on Intrade for months! What's wrong with you?
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