“People, understandably, are having trouble believing in the polls,” Nate Silver acknowledged to New York Times columnist Ezra Klein.
The post Nate Silver Suggests ‘Momentous’ Midterms Might Mark ‘the End of the Trump Era’ first appeared on Mediaite.
Man there is nothing we love more than counting our chickens before they hatch, huh?
Strong polls encourage people to vote. Weak polls discourage participation and donations.
https://time.com/article/2026/10/23/what-fake-wedgewood-polls-scandal-reveals-about-election-polling/
Just this year - Michigan primary - one campaign says their donations plummeted when fake polls claimed they were far behind.
My local ads have reverted to the shaming tactic - “your vote is private, but anyone can look up whether you voted or not”. From my dad who’s been working the early voting location for my county, it sure sounds like they’ve had one hell of a turnout.
And yet I keep seeing people on Lemmy say that polls being good discourages people from voting
The science doesn’t back that up.
Ask for numbers
Every positive poll, half the comments are people saying it’s a psyop. Every negative poll, half the comments are people saying it’s a psyop. I genuinely have no fucking clue what results people would consider above board at this point.
Presumably, neck in neck