How Nate Silver and 538 Came to Be So Popular

Nate Silver is a data geek. He's very good at interpreting data. However, what he is doing now (and in 2016) is interpreting flawed data, and I'd argue making it more flawed. But why?

Nate started working for ESPN. He was excellent while working there. Want to know the chances of victory when your team is up 28-10 in the 2nd quarter? His analytics still live at ESPN today, and while there are of course improbable comebacks and crazy things that happen in sports, these analytics are pretty spot on - to the point that Vegas changed their systems for in game betting odds.

Right before the 2008 election, ESPN was at the beginning of their move into politics, and asked their new found advanced stats guy to make some political predictions. His system nailed it. He missed one state - Indiana, predicting that McCain would take Indiana but Obama took it in a historic victory.

The New York Times took notice and Nate moved from sports to politics. His 2012 forecast was perfect, and in 48 of the 50 states, he was in the margin of error.

So, Silver and 538 are a new star. 99 out of 50 states in the '08 and '12 elections - his word was golden. ESPN lured him back from the New York Times and doubled his staff. In an ill-advised attempt to grow the model, he tried to predict the Oscars and it was terrible.

Then came the 2016 election and the debut of the Polls-Plus model that he still uses. Not only did Donald Trump change the accuracy of the polls, Silver's additions made 538 even more inaccurate.

Silver gave Trump less than a 2% chance of winning the GOP nomination. He even said in an interview that 2% was too much and he was embarrassed.

When Trump won the nomination, his model predicted Clinton would have anywhere from an 85-99% chance of winning. We know what happened in 2016.

The same thing is going on this year with Nate. He is so confident in his model that he has doubled down on it. When he puts his controls in, it gives Biden Georgia and Texas. Rather than taking a step back and realizing something is wrong, he is confident in his model and puts out a ridiculous map like he did.

Right now, his model is saying a 12% chance of a Trump victory.
His model says the GOP has a 26% chance of keeping the Senate.
His model says the GOP has a 5% chance of keeping the House.

That equates to a 3.1% chance of keeping the White House and the Senate and a 0.2% chance of the GOP having all three. There is no way a real person can believe those odds. His model is flawed. He knows it but he knows that if he changes it and it gives Trump a decent shot he will lose his gravy train.

I am on the outside and don't have access to everything he does, but I feel like he is going to get embarrassed this year. I wish that in the name of science, he would drop his "Plus" and go back to his roots. It would probably be in the 55-45 range for Biden, but that's too much for his liberal masters.