Billy Bragg: There Is Power In A Union
U2: Maggie’s Farm
(Live version of Roy Zimmerman’s “Unions are to blame.”)
Paul Robeson: Joe Hill
Rush: Working Man
Pete Seeger Which Side Are You On
Natalie Merchant: Which side are you on
Dropkick Murphys: Workers Song
Strawbs: Part of the union
And now, a message from the President:
Luke 19:29-34
As he approached Bethphage and Bethany at the hill called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples, saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ say, ‘The Lord needs it.’”Those who were sent ahead went and found it just as he had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?”
They replied, “The Lord needs it.”
Exodus 20:15
Thou shalt not steal.
Discuss.
Larry Wilmore does the Late Show.
Stephen: Are Russian hackers targeting American voters.
Thom: Exposing the Koch’s environment corruption.
Stephen with Congressman John Lewis (who goes surfing).
The 2016 White Nationalist Party Campaign Drumpf Campaign:
Stephen: It’s finally time to cut off that Weiner.
Adam Ruins Everything: Why you don’t need 8 glasses of water a day.
Seth Meyers: A closer look at Clinton’s and Drumpf’s debate prep:
David Pakman: Overall, life is much better for most people under President Obama.
Farron Cousins: Sarah Palin’s head injury made her even more crazy.
The Flames in Maine Fall Mainly on LePage:
Seth Meyers: A closer look at extreme weather events and climate change.
Stephen: Scandals surrounding the Clinton Foundation.
Jimmy Dore: Political news of the week.
Weiner’s Wares:
Sam Seder: Shepard Smith goes rogue on FAUX—by casually NOT lying about voter suppression.
Farron Cousins: Surprise! Republican states are the real welfare queens.
Mental Floss: 25 parenting life hacks.
Sports Patriots:
Kimmel: The week in unnecessary censorship.
Stephen: Sarah Palin crashes and burns.
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
Seattle Transit Blog have published their endorsement of ST3. On the one hand, this is probably the most predictable endorsement of the campaign season. On the other hand, it’s such a refreshing change of pace from The Seattle Times’ uninformed screeds or Reuven Carlyle, all of a sudden and way too late, deciding he wants different financing.
Of course, I agree with them. It’s a great thing to be able to travel so easily to the U District and to South Seattle. Expanding the rail system is exactly the right thing to do.
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We now have about 20 new polls since the previous analysis last week. There Sec. Hillary Clinton was leading Donald Trump in mean electoral votes 347 to 199. If the election had been held last week we would expect Clinton to win with near certainty.
The new polls come largely from swing states, and include: 2 AZ, 1 FL, 1 MI, 1 MO, 2 NC, 1 NH, 1 NY, 2 OH, 4 PA, 1 VA, 4 WI, and 1 WV.
A Monte Carlo analysis with 100,000 simulated elections, gives Clinton all 100,000 wins. Clinton received (on average) 350 to Trump’s 188 electoral votes. In an election held now, Clinton would be expected to win with greater than 99% probability.
Basically, the newest polls don’t change the picture much. The only state to flip is Georgia, that went from Trump with a 72.5% probability of taking to state to Clinton with a 50.1% chance. In other words, Georgia looks like a toss-up. The change isn’t because of new polling. Rather, one old poll “dated out”. Frankly, Clinton’s standing is being driven by one poll from JMC Analytics that has her up +7%. I suspect this poll is an outlier.
In Missouri, a new PPP poll has Trump up +6%, which improve his chances of taking the state from 79.4% last week to 93.9% this week.
In North Carolina we lost one old poll and gained two new polls. The net result is no change: Clinton still has an 84% chance of taking the state now.
Here is the distribution of electoral votes [FAQ] from the simulations:
[Read more…]
I don’t. I mean. What?
Obviously, we’re not going to just ship Seattle’s homeless to, like, some island. I’m not sure there are any around that would really fit the bill. The San Juans? Blake Island? Can Seattle just acquire an island? Would we build an artificial island in the Sound just for that like in China or Dubai? All the time and effort to build housing, sewage, roads, transit, etc. to the island could be better used if you want to help Seattle’s homeless. Or just Seattle in general.
Also, it’s fucking cruel. If homeless people want to live on an island, they can right now. But to separate them from community and family because, reasons, doesn’t seem like it will help anyone.
I know this is one person who I hadn’t heard of before, and their idea is being soundly rejected. But on the other hand, they do hold leadership in the county Democrats.
Today, G.O.P. Presidential Nominee Donald J. Trump will hold a rally in Everett, WA. So, think of our gathering of the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally as the anti-rally “safe space.” No play-dough, bubbles or puppies, but there will be plenty to drink. All are welcomed—no extreme vetting involved.
We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. You’ll find us in the small room at the back of the tavern. We start at 8:00pm.
Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings this week. Tonight, the Tri-Cities chapter also meets. On Thursday, the Tacoma chapter meets. And next Monday, the Yakima and South Bellevue chapters meet.
There are 185 chapters of Living Liberally, including twenty in Washington state, three in Oregon and one in Idaho. Find, or go out and start, a chapter near you.
It’s sort of amazing how little King County is paying to make its own EpiPens. The article makes it clear that in their current form, they couldn’t be for wide use. But it seems like the free market would mean that some company or other org could step up and put something into wider use. Or maybe King County could figure out how to make them easier to use and sell them. It seems like a good use of my tax dollars if the private sector can’t step up.
Mark 6:35
By this time it was late in the day, so his disciples came to him. “This is a remote place,” they said, “and it’s already very late.
Discuss.
Russ Feingold hits Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) on student loans.
Conan and Sen. Franken: Humor in politics.
Obama to Congress: Louisiana may need more funding.
Thom: Tribal rights & the Dakota access pipeline.
What the polls do to us.
Clinton Makes History:
Farron Cousins: Alt Right—Just another name for mainstream Republican.
The Other Washington episode 6.5: Paid sick leave.
Thom: The secret list of those who have voted twice.
Colbert: Real Tim Kaine reacts to fake Tim Kaine.
Run The Jewels: “Nobody Speak”.
White House: West Wing Week.
The 2016 White Nationalist- Drumpf-Fest:
Bassem Youssef: The ISIS Hunter.
David Pakman: The FAUX sex scandal explodes.
Young Turks: Gov. Paul LePage leaves homophobic meltdown voicemail.
America’s worst idea.
Pres. Obama celebrates 100 years of National Parks.
Thom: Voter suppression and the mathematical proof.
Young Turks: Andrea Tantaros, “Faux News a sex-fueled, Playboy mansion-like cult
Tim Kaine jams with Jon Batiste and Stay Human.
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
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The previous analysis showed Sec. Hillary Clinton with nearly 100% probability of beating Donald Trump in an election held last week. Her average Electoral College total was 337 to Trump’s 201.
Since last week’s analysis, there have been 22 new polls released in 16 states. We have three new polls in North Carolina, two in Florida, a pair in Michigan, and two in Virginia. Note that I did not include a recent poll from South Carolina because it was commissioned by the state Democratic Party. I explain my inclusion and exclusion criteria for polls in the FAQ.
After 100,000 simulated elections, Clinton wins all 100,000 times. This time, Clinton received (on average) 347 to Trump’s 191 electoral votes. In an election held now, Clinton would have a very close to a 100% probability of beating Trump.
Clinton is now in an extremely strong position. Even if she wins only the “safe Clinton” and “strong Clinton” states (i.e. darkest shades of blue) and loses all of the states that “lean Clinton” or are “weak Clinton” (i.e. medium or light shade of blue), she wins the election with 294 electoral votes. That is, Clinton still wins the election without Iowa, Nevada, North Carolina, Oregon and Ohio. I should add that nobody seriously expects Clinton to lose Oregon; the most recent poll we have in the state is from mid-June, and has Clinton leading Trump by a few points.
A few things have changed since last week that bumps up Clinton’s electoral vote total.
In Iowa and old Docking poll aged out and a new poll was released giving us three current polls. The newest has Clinton up by +2%, one has Trump up by 1.2% and the third is a dead tie. The net result is that Clinton won 57.2% of the simulated elections suggesting she is slightly favored, but statistically, Iowa is a tie.
In Missouri we lose two old polls, including one with Trump up by +9.9%. The three current polls have Trump up: +1%, +2% and +3%. As a result, Trump dropped from a 91% to a 84% chance of winning the state.
For the previous analysis we only had an old poll for New Mexico that had Clinton up by about 3%. But a new PPP poll in the state has Clinton up 40% to 31% (+9%). Consequently Clinton moves from a 76% probability of winning the state last week to a 99% this week.
North Carolina moves to a lighter shade of blue this week. Last week we had three current polls with Clinton up by +9% and +2% and Trump up by +4%. Three new polls are added this week that has Clinton up +2%, Trump up +10%, and a tie. The net result is that Clinton went from a 91% probability of winning the state last week to an 84% chance of taking it this week.
Here is the distribution of electoral votes [FAQ] from the simulations:
[Read more…]
Back to the usual nonsense next week.
Something something Carl’s vacation.
Washington’s primary election results have been certified, and we are on the way to November. Please join us tonight for political talk and electoral chat at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally. All are welcomed—no extreme vetting involved.
We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. You’ll find us in the small room at the back of the tavern. We start at 8:00pm.
Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings this week. Tonight, the Tri-Cities chapter meets. On Wednesday, the Burien and the North Spokane chapters meet. The Kent and Woodinville chapters meet on Thursday.
There are 185 chapters of Living Liberally, including twenty in Washington state, three in Oregon and one in Idaho. Find, or go out and start, a chapter near you.
There is a new Pennsylvania poll released today that has Trump leading Clinton 41.9% to 36.5% from a random sample of 1000 registered voters. The poll is released by a Canadian consulting firm that specializes in something like project management in the petroleum industry.
The poll is almost certainly fake, and without further information, it will not be included in my database of polls. It isn’t just the surprising results (Clinton has been leading Trump handily in PA for some time now) that leads me to exclude it. Rather it is what the “pollster” writes that flags this as a fake. The alternative is that the press release has been written by a rank amateur who has completely botched the description of the poll and, perhaps, the results.
At this point, I invite you to join me in some wonky fisking of the poll press release. Let’s start with the methods:
The survey is designed to use a scientific method to provide results which are as much as possible representative of the actual voter population with minimal distortion of results.
It uses “a scientific method”? Really! Don’t all polls? Real pollsters don’t say shit like this. Rather, they might mention using standard polling methods or some such thing. Most simply describe their methods without fanfare.
Adults 18 years of age and older registered voters residing in the state of Pennsylvania were contacted on landline numbers and interviewed in English using robo-call interviewers.
Nevermind that PA isn’t a state (it is a commonwealth). But “using robo-call interviewers” is rather informal for a description of methods. Inclusion of the word “interviewers” suggests sloppiness or ignorance of what a robo-poll is. “Using robo-call interviews”, perhaps. “Interviewers,” no.
Landline telephone numbers were randomly selected based upon a list of registered voters from throughout the state of Pennsylvania from reputable suppliers of random phone numbers to opinion research companies.
First, this is a very badly written sentence–a theme throughout the press release. But…”suppliers” in the plural? They needed more than one supplier of phone numbers for Registered voters? Who were they, and how did they get voter’s phone numbers to match up with the voter registration?
Samples generated are as close to truly random as possible.
No they weren’t. This sounds entirely like a non-statistician trying to sound technical. Nobody with real training in polling methods or statistics would make such an idiotic statement. First, nobody (particularly a real pollster) truly believes that samples in political polls are all that close to random, and (2) one could always find better (costlier) methods to draw samples that are closer to random.
The phone numbers were selected to ensure that each region was represented in proportion to its population.
Again, this seems suspect and amateurish in wording and from the lack of specifics. No regional breakdown was given in the results.
The questions asked during the Robo-call survey was kept extremely simple to minimize any distortion to the response due to: Framing of the questions, communication issues, distractions and the consequent impact on the interpretation and response.
Poorly written, bad grammar, and partially nonsensical. At this point, let me say that this could all be a function of a bad press release writer.
The questions asked were as follows: “Who will you vote for in November Presidential Elections?- Press 1 for Donald Trump. Press 2 for Hillary Clinton. Press 3 for Neither.”
That would be only one question, not “questions”. If this is truly the only question asked, then the poll results are fake, given that age and income questions must have been asked as well.
the sample was balanced based on the 2014 Pennsylvania Census
Only problem…there was no “2014 Pennsylvania Census”. There are population estimates for 2014 in PA, but these are based on the 2010 census. A knowledgeable writer might say, “based on 2014 population estimates for PA” or some such thing, but would never say “based on the 2014 PA census.”
This survey excluded the various counteracting variable factors to provide a more representative ground reality without complicating it with the said factors. These variable factors, inter alia consist of: In-State / Out-of-State migration, transients, people without landlines or cell phones, racial demographic representation at the polling booth. Another counter-acting set of variables is turnout: among young people, people who have never voted before, increased/decreased turnouts compared to previous elections. These factors are in a state of continual flux at this dynamic stage of the election process. It is not feasible to accurately include the impact of these factors without introducing unintended distortion in the outcome.
This is largely gobbledygook.
Note that both principals listed for this organization have Indian surnames, and this press release does have some elements of Indian English. I’ve spent a lot of time in S. Asia and working with Indian scientists and statisticians over the years, so I can say with some certainty that the errors, sloppiness, ambiguity and amateurishness of this press release are not a function of it being written in Indian English.
Results are statistically significant within ±7.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
The “19 times out of 20” is an okay way of saying “at the 5% level”, but there is a problem with the margin of error (MOE) of 7.1%. The sample size is 1000, which makes 7.1% absurd for the MOE.
Pollsters find the 95% MOE as ±1.96*sqrt[p*(1-p)/N], where N is the sample size, p is the proportion for one candidate and (1 – p) for the other. Usually, pollsters find the maximum MOE by assuming there really is a tie (i.e. 0.5 for each candidate), so our equation becomes ±1.96*sqrt(0.25/N). Substituting in 1000 for N the MOE should be about ±3%, not ±7.1%.
Earlier in the press release was the statement:
According to CEPEX analysis, the error percentage is high due to the results obtained from just one day of polling. Subsequent polling would be required to reduce the error percentage.
This statement either betrays this as fraud or, perhaps, the press release writer is totally ignorant of statistical methods, sampling error and the like. The fact that it was only one day of polling is completely irrelevant. The MOE is simply based on the sample size (and the assumptions of a binomial process). It doesn’t matter whether 1000 people were asked in one hour or one week. On the other hand, this all might be an awkward way of saying that they could only squeeze in 1000 phone calls in a single day.
That’s it for methods, which can be criticized on other grounds as well (no cell phone subsample, no randomization of candidate order, registered instead of likely voters, etc.).
The results have some “funny” things in them as well.
They have 10 age categories. It is certainly possible that their polling robot would ask for direct age entry. So…okay, but what happened to 18-29 year-olds? It looks like the youngest age category starts at 30.
So much for their “random sample” of voters in Pennsylvania.
For income, they have an astonishing 15 categories. Political pollsters never ask for household income directly, only in rough categories. People are highly reluctant to give their income over the phone in a political survey. But pollsters do get reasonable compliance when asking about income in a small number of broad categories.
The fact is, no real election poll would ever ask about income in 15 categories. There are several reasons, particularly for robo-polls:
The number of income categories alone suggests very strongly to me that this is a fake poll.
I took a quick look at the Waybackmachine for the URL, and it only has an archive from 2am today. I suppose it could be a brand new URL they moved to today, but given all the other issues”, it sure looks like a fake poll.
A couple of months ago, I was thinking about the incentives and disincentives for a campaign to set up a series of fake polls. If you believe that inertia can make a difference, then there are some good incentives for doing this.
This poll may be our first such specimen–if so, it is very badly done. In the future, they may be much more difficult to uncover.
Eager to share our brilliant political commentary and blunt media criticism, but too genteel to link to horsesass.org? Well, good news, ladies: we also answer to HASeattle.com, because, you know, whatever. You're welcome!