Nate Silver

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@chrislhayes Obviously theories centered around GOP officials/functionaries were on much warmer ground than ones centered around the courts. If someone had one of those theories, congrats to them. If they had a court-driven theory, they probably need to re-evaluate their assumptions. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@chrislhayes OK, but "sure this could happen ... if the race is REALLY close" was always my position but got me yelled at by a bunch of people who thought that wasn't alarmist enough. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Trump has also gotten his ass handed to him in court decisions so far. So if your version of the story was "courts will steal the election for Trump", I think that requires a deeper re-examination of one's priors than other theories. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

This is still the Underwear Gnomes problem. Under what pretext would ACB "thrown out ballots", enough to swing a not-super-duper-close election? To the extent we're talking about mail votes that arrived after Election Day, the impact of that is quite small FWIW. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Which was always an implausible plan that was extremely unlikely to succeed. To the extent that's the scenario people were banking on, it does look like an overreaction. There was never any explanation of the doctrine or pretext that courts would use to stop the count. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Maybe that's OK. "We don't know *how* the election might be stolen, but Trump has expressed a lot of dangerous ideas and parts of the system haven't been tested, so we need to keep our guard up". That's totally reasonable. But there's a fine line between vigilance and panic. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Namely, there was a lack of precision to many of them; they didn't explain the mechanisms by which the election would be stolen. Often they were a bit Underwear Gnomes-ish: 1. Trump wants to steal the election 2. ???* 3. ELECTION STOLEN * Or "THE COURTS!!" — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

It didn't come close to succeeding. But I don't think people should inherently be criticized for having pointed out that a high-impact but low-probability event—Trump stealing the election—deserved attention. ... With that said, there were issues with *some* of these claims. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @Redistrict: BREAKING: Biden/Harris just became the first presidential ticket in history to surpass 80 million votes... Biden 80,033,99… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

There's also a degree of path-dependance. If Facebook has lost high-info readers because its news feed is too low-quality, the remaining customers might not like it if you changed things. But ideally you'd want to win the high-info readers back, which could take time to measure. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Publishers understand this, which is why they employ editors. If the NYT wanted to maximize traffic *next week*, they could publish lots of highly sensationalist or even conspiratorial stories about Trump, etc. But this would likely be very damaging to them in the long term. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

One thing that's striking here is the extent to which Facebook is maximizing for short-term, measurable gains as opposed to long-term brand equity. A better news feed could result in more trust from readers, more partnerships with news organizations, higher internal morale, etc. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @MattGlassman312: Its not that hard: the election and aftermath has not been as bad as some expected, in part because many things aren’t… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Lukewarm take: It's fairly hard to infer how people would have behaved if the election were closer. (Close enough that Trump's efforts to overturn the result would stand a chance.) I mean we know how Trump would have behaved, but everyone else—courts, state officials, etc. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @mkraju: #Breaking: GSA’s Emily Murphy signs off and says the transition can begin, per @KristenhCNN https://t.co/S6YKKQBrQR — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

If some vaccines are highly effective and some are moderately effective, are there immunological issues with initially giving some people the moderately effective vaccine, and then also the highly effective one once we've made enough? Like, could they interefere with one another? — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @TimAlberta: Republican canvasser AARON VAN LANGEVELDE announces he will vote to certify Michigan's election results. It's over, folks… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Also adding to the pressure: COVID-related budget shortfalls and the fact that New Jersey just legalized weed via ballot initiative. https://t.co/Ht9dliQyUF — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

With a couple of flips from the GOP, you'd think New York State might finally have the votes to legalize marijuana, which fell just short last year. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

I'll leave it up to someone with more domain knowledge in biostatistics, but seems like it should be doable to reverse-engineer these numbers on the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine and determine the degree of statistical significance here. https://t.co/zr0RzFy66L https://t.co/lqVAk2SzwM — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @MattGlassman312: Imagine being axed for craziness from a legal team that includes Rudy Giuliani! This is like when Guns and Roses boo… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

If Republicans are claiming to have had a House seat in *Baltimore* stolen from them, it also demonstrates the inelasticity of the GOP's election-rigging conspiracy theories toward reality. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

If Republicans are claiming to have had a House seat in *Baltimore* stolen from then, it also demonstrates the inelasticity of the GOP's election-rigging conspiracy theories toward reality. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

People are sometimes too quick to describe public figures as "insane" but I wonder if that's literally true in the case of Sidney Powell. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

Still have no idea what's gonna happen in the Georgia runoffs but seeing more conservatives starting to express this concern. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

I point this out because you still have some media critics who are fond of pointing out stray tweets, headlines, etc. that aren't phrased well and implying that "well, the media is just both-sidesing again". But that is simply not an accurate reflection of the coverage overall. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

If you read the typical article in the Times, the Post, at CNN, etc., it is unsparing in pointing out that Trump's attempts to overturn the election result are i) baseless ii) dangerous iii) unlikely to succeed. It is not both-sides-y at all. https://t.co/haQSOERett https://t.co/EIdndGMsaq — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

It's like an exercise in self-gaslighting. — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

RT @bluestein: Breaking: Kelly Loeffler is self-isolating after positive, then inconclusive, coronavirus tests #gapol #gasen https://t.co/p… — PolitiTweet.org

Nate Silver @NateSilver538

@BenjySarlin There's also an argument that outdoor things should have been more open in the summer so people could prepare themselves for having potentially much less social activity in the winter. Certainly less beach-shaming, etc. — PolitiTweet.org