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Political prognosticator Nate Silver says the numbers show President Obama is a "modest" favorite to win the election. (AP image)

Former poker player nailing political picks

BY Tom Tangney  on October 19, 2012 @ 10:34 am (Updated: 11:56 am - 10/19/12 )

You know how I love polls, and no one does it better than Nate Silver. In the last presidential election, Silver, a statistician by trade, correctly predicted 49 of the 50 states, got every single Senate race right, and came within a single percentage point of the popular vote too.

On the basis of that, the New York Times hired him to write his popular "FiveThirtyEight" column for them. His daily column is called that because that's the number of electoral votes in the Electoral College, but then we all knew that, right? Right.

I spoke with Silver about his powers of prognostication, and the first thing I wanted to ask him was if he could explain to my esteemed colleague Linda why following polls was important. But he was a big disappointment to me.

"I have no problem if you just want to tune everything out and wait until election day and see what happens," Silver laughed.

Score one for Linda, who just doesn't get my passion for politics.

But seriously, there's a lot of value in what Silver does.

"It would be a little grandiose to say I'm helping the democratic process or whatever," Silver said. "But I do think that we provide a counterbalance to other types of news coverage, news coverage that sensationalizes every development on the campaign trail, that takes polls that are outliers relative to where the consensus of the evidence is and trumps them up because it makes for better headlines. We're trying to sort through all this data and find, extract a useful signal from it."

Not surprisingly for a guy who at one time lived primarily on his winnings from online poker, Silver says his analysis is all about determining the right odds.

"We're thinking about things in terms of probabilities more like a handicapper or an investor or a gambler might, but we're not saying 'oh we know what's going to happen for sure.' Of course we don't know. You shouldn't listen to anyone who says for sure they know what's going to happen on November 6. But we can say given the information we have and given how well it's performed historically lets give you some betting odds. What odds do you need right now to bet on Romney or Obama.

So where does the race stand right now? Silver has the electoral vote count as 287.2 for Obama to 250.8 for Romney and a 50.1 to 48.9 popular vote, again for the President.

As of today, he calls Obama a "modest" favorite.

Tom Tangney, KIRO Radio Host
Tom Tangney is co-host of KIRO Radio's Seattle's Morning News and resident enthusiast of...everything. He loves books, movies, TV, art, pop culture, politic, sports, and Husky football.
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Comments (5)


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  • when reality hits you wrote...
    Republicans wont like the sound of that.
    October 20, 2012 5:21 am
    Michael Medved already wrote a book declaring Romney the winner, based on a few tragic bits of data he likes to call facts. I wonder on what shelf his book will rest this winter?
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  • tlmbrt wrote...
    Very simple
    October 20, 2012 8:41 pm
    Obama is a SOCIALIST. Don't deny it. He has said as much many times. Don't vote Obama if you want to stop the USA from fading away. Most people are too STUPID or CLUELESS to understand what is at stake. You have the leftist education system to thank for that....
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  • ron prevost wrote...
    WOW - 2008 49 of 50 states AND within 1% of the popular vote.
    October 21, 2012 9:19 am
    As if 80% of the American people couldn't have done the same thing in 2008. ... Well, maybe except for the popular vote - that might have been a one out of three or four bet.

    2008 was easy as McCain seemed old and dull and Obama bright and full of hope - and running against the Bush record. My dog could have called that one.

    Funny, though, his current prediction. How do you get X.2 elector votes? These are just the current odds. .. And apparently subject to change daily. ... And as things change daily, I'm sure he may get closer to the actual outcome. .. And just what was the date of his final 2008 prediction?

    As all gamblers do, he's hedging his bets daily. Might be right, but gambling. Even with his current 'odds' it's just about even money.

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  • Forrest wrote...
    And you want this guy to lead the world's most powerful military.
    October 21, 2012 7:30 pm
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6udew9axmdM
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  • SeattleNative wrote...
    This guy's odds keep changing...
    October 22, 2012 4:08 pm
    ...and for the past month they've moved steadily in Romney's favor.

    Of course Silver blogs for NYT. You know in whose camp he solidly resides...

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