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Romney actually believed that "unskewed polls" superstition

Einzige

Einzige

Elitist as Hell.
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The funny thing is that Romney billed himself as a data guy and a technocrat and not a ideologue. The entire 'don't trust the polls' thing was entirely faith-based, and built on the notion that their campaign could actually stop the trend of the white vote decreasing every election. One would imagine they would at least game out the possibility that their assumptions were wrong.

Adviser: Romney "shellshocked" by loss - CBS News

As a result, they believed the public/media polls were skewed - they thought those polls oversampled Democrats and didn't reflect Republican enthusiasm. They based their own internal polls on turnout levels more favorable to Romney. That was a grave miscalculation, as they would see on election night.

Those assumptions drove their campaign strategy: their internal polling showed them leading in key states, so they decided to make a play for a broad victory: go to places like Pennsylvania while also playing it safe in the last two weeks.
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Romney, for all of his posturing, is not and never has been the sort of nonideological technocrat he pretends to be. This is Example A.
 
Einzige said:
The funny thing is that Romney billed himself as a data guy and a technocrat and not a ideologue. The entire 'don't trust the polls' thing was entirely faith-based, and built on the notion that their campaign could actually stop the trend of the white vote decreasing every election. One would imagine they would at least game out the possibility that their assumptions were wrong.

Adviser: Romney "shellshocked" by loss - CBS News

Romney, for all of his posturing, is not and never has been the sort of nonideological technocrat he pretends to be. This is Example A.
Click to expand...

If that's true it certainly diminishes my opinion of Romney's intelect -- which was actually pretty high.
 
AdamT said:
If that's true it certainly diminishes my opinion of Romney's intelect -- which was actually pretty high.
Click to expand...

I don't blame him for it. If you don't understand how polling works, a lot of Dean Chambers and Unskewedpolls.com stuff seems to make sense. And there really isn't any reason that Romney himself should've known much about polling. Now his campaign advisers and internal pollsters on the other hand, should've known why the criticisms of the polls were completely ridiculous.
 
Einzige said:
The funny thing is that Romney billed himself as a data guy and a technocrat and not a ideologue. The entire 'don't trust the polls' thing was entirely faith-based, and built on the notion that their campaign could actually stop the trend of the white vote decreasing every election. One would imagine they would at least game out the possibility that their assumptions were wrong.

Adviser: Romney "shellshocked" by loss - CBS News



Romney, for all of his posturing, is not and never has been the sort of nonideological technocrat he pretends to be. This is Example A.
Click to expand...

Right

Romney actually believed enough Americans still believed in Free Market Economics, The American Dream, Individual Achievement and not just Obamaphones from Big Government Liberals

How foolish of him
 
Anagram said:
I don't blame him for it. If you don't understand how polling works, a lot of Dean Chambers and Unskewedpolls.com stuff seems to make sense. And there really isn't any reason that Romney himself should've known much about polling. Now his campaign advisers and internal pollsters on the other hand, should've known why the criticisms of the polls were completely ridiculous.
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Part of Romney's gimmick is that he's an objective, rationalist businessman who's driven by the numbers. But there's no magic to polling; anyone who can figure out their average business expenditures can figure out the polling.
 
AdamT said:
If that's true it certainly diminishes my opinion of Romney's intelect -- which was actually pretty high.
Click to expand...

Obama gave them a phone. He's gonna do more.

You sign up. If you low income, you on Food Stamps, Disability.

Obama will just pay for it with his stash
 
Anagram said:
I don't blame him for it. If you don't understand how polling works, a lot of Dean Chambers and Unskewedpolls.com stuff seems to make sense. And there really isn't any reason that Romney himself should've known much about polling. Now his campaign advisers and internal pollsters on the other hand, should've known why the criticisms of the polls were completely ridiculous.
Click to expand...

I don't buy that. Romney graduated with honors from Harvard Law and Harvard B-School and he made his bones as a numbers guy. He's been in politics for 12 years and if he still doesn't understand how polls work there's some kind of disconnect there.
 
AdamT said:
If that's true it certainly diminishes my opinion of Romney's intelect -- which was actually pretty high.
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Same here. I really expected that he would be at least a modestly competent CoC, albeit looking to execute a path very different than what I want to see the country take. Although self-delusion is a stubbornly human condition trait, I’m really saddened if it is true that he was this vulnerable. :( EDIT: Although I guess I should be more upbeat that we dodged him getting elected.

He is getting up in years, sometimes that can be a contributing factor. The aging, distinguished-career professor that loses is a real thing, for example. Or maybe he just wanted this so damn much?
 
Bronson said:
Right

Romney actually believed enough Americans still believed in Free Market Economics, The American Dream, Individual Achievement and not just Obamaphones from Big Government Liberals

How foolish of him
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Sour grapes.

My point is that a liberal arts student with a minor in business could have looked at the polls and knew they were right when poll after poll after poll showed that Democratic turnout was as high as the Republicans (higher when you factor in that most independent voters this year were Teabagger pretend-independents) and that their enthusiasm at least equaled the GOP.

I knew Romney was going to lose three months ago.
 
Einzige said:
The funny thing is that Romney billed himself as a data guy and a technocrat and not a ideologue. The entire 'don't trust the polls' thing was entirely faith-based, and built on the notion that their campaign could actually stop the trend of the white vote decreasing every election. One would imagine they would at least game out the possibility that their assumptions were wrong.

Adviser: Romney "shellshocked" by loss - CBS News



Romney, for all of his posturing, is not and never has been the sort of nonideological technocrat he pretends to be. This is Example A.
Click to expand...

It's human nature to deeply attach oneself to things that one is deeply invested in personally, and to hold out hope that they're true. I don't blame him much for it. There probably hasn't been any presidential candidate in the last 40 years who actually thought they were going to lose until 5 minutes before it happened.
 
stop the trend of the white vote decreasing every election.
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What the ****, dude? Give this **** a break.
 
AdamT said:
I don't buy that. Romney graduated with honors from Harvard Law and Harvard B-School and he made his bones as a numbers guy. He's been in politics for 12 years and if he still doesn't understand how polls work there's some kind of disconnect there.
Click to expand...

It's a distinction most people don't see. Even someone who deals with polling regularly can easily misunderstand that party ID is something that pollsters shouldn't measure. Even Scott Rasmussen, who makes his living as a pollster doesn't see it that way. I doubt Romney ever really had to understand polls himself, and had advisers and campaign managers tell him what they meant.
 
AdamT said:
I don't buy that. Romney graduated with honors from Harvard Law and Harvard B-School and he made his bones as a numbers guy. He's been in politics for 12 years and if he still doesn't understand how polls work there's some kind of disconnect there.
Click to expand...

Just another article claiming to know the inner-workings of someone else's mind.

As for me? I think he knew it was right down to the wire. He gave it all he had. He lost. He's a gentleman as evidenced by his concession speech. Both men fought a battle to the death just like gladiators of long ago. Champions both.
 
Anagram said:
It's a distinction most people don't see. Even someone who deals with polling regularly can easily misunderstand that party ID is something that pollsters shouldn't measure. Even Scott Rasmussen, who makes his living as a pollster doesn't see it that way. I doubt Romney ever really had to understand polls himself, and had advisers and campaign managers tell him what they meant.
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Scott Rasmussen "didn't see it" because he's a paid employee of Newscorp. That simple. If he hadn't been reliant on Fox for funding, I guarantee you his numbers would have lined up remarkably well with the overall average.

The only actual outlier was Gallup, and that's because it's fallen victim to the same technological trends that it had mastered in 1936: the progress in telephony.

EDIT: And, I suppose, Mason-Dixon, which is typically far better than it was this year, but it has a Republican house bias of about R+4.
 
MaggieD said:
Just another article claiming to know the inner-workings of someone else's mind.

As for me? I think he knew it was right down to the wire. He gave it all he had. He lost. He's a gentleman as evidenced by his concession speech. Both men fought a battle to the death just like gladiators of long ago. Champions both.
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*giggle* - now that I'd like to see. :)
 
Aunt Spiker said:
What the ****, dude? Give this **** a break.
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This is a simple matter of fact: the white vote has decreased by about three and a half percent in every election since 1992.
 
Bronson said:
Right

Romney actually believed enough Americans still believed in Free Market Economics, The American Dream, Individual Achievement and not just Obamaphones from Big Government Liberals

How foolish of him
Click to expand...

First I want to know how to get this mythical Obamaphone n maybe I can get it from the muslin in Kenya that was there for Obama birth? Second pull your head out and breath for a second. Third, I doubt Romney felt so strongly about his chances especially when local papers in Ohio for example had polling that correlated with national polling data. Cincinnati Inquirer and Toledo Hearald for example.
 
Anagram said:
I don't blame him for it. If you don't understand how polling works, a lot of Dean Chambers and Unskewedpolls.com stuff seems to make sense. And there really isn't any reason that Romney himself should've known much about polling.
Click to expand...
If you are that weak on groking data coming in that is brutal for someone the is supposed to be an economy wizard that’ll steer the country to the promised land. Unless the technical prowess of his time at Bain, and his work with the Salt Lake City Olympics was all just really attributable to him skimming the credit of underlings/others (AKA the Herman Cain Experience), which there really hasn’t been any indication of that I have seen, then he really should have been able to see through the blatant fallacy of unskewedpolls.com.
 
MaggieD said:
Just another article claiming to know the inner-workings of someone else's mind.

As for me? I think he knew it was right down to the wire. He gave it all he had. He lost. He's a gentleman as evidenced by his concession speech. Both men fought a battle to the death just like gladiators of long ago. Champions both.
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How is Obama a Champion? Romney killed some guy's wife remember? Gonna put ya'll back in chains. Vote for revenge.

You're mushy Maggie

You're the Kathleen Parker/Peggy Noonan of these boards. It's pathetic.
 
Kandahar said:
There probably hasn't been any presidential candidate in the last 40 years who actually thought they were going to lose until 5 minutes before it happened.
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To his credit, McCain sure seemed to have a grasp of his demise in 2008 earlier than that.
 
Dwight said:
To his credit, McCain sure seemed to have a grasp of his demise in 2008 earlier than that.
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Goldwater and McGovern both knew weeks in advance. Outside of obvious landslides, Dole was also aware of his impending defeat as early as the last debate, and his defeat is comparable to Romney's.
 
I dunno. I think it's easy for them to say afterwards that they knew all along they were headed for defeat, but during a campaign I'm not sure that's true. The presidency is something that they've been working toward for a very long time...sometimes for their entire life. I would imagine that it would be very psychologically difficult for any candidate to accept that he's going to lose until the minute it actually happens.
 
Kandahar said:
I dunno. I think it's easy for them to say afterwards that they knew all along they were headed for defeat, but during a campaign I'm not sure that's true. The presidency is something that they've been working toward for a very long time...sometimes for their entire life. I would imagine that it would be very psychologically difficult for any candidate to accept that he's going to lose until the minute it actually happens.
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Sure. What you're talking about is denial - and it doesn't look good in someone who says, "look here, I'm strictly a numbers guy."
 
Einzige said:
Sure. What you're talking about is denial - and it doesn't look good in someone who says, "look here, I'm strictly a numbers guy."
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Not really - a candidate who isn't positive, forward thinking and 100% into himself within the campaign won't get far - and definitely won't be getting my vote.

Belief in your ability to win and succeed as president after is essential.
 
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