PPP under fire from Cohn, Silver, etc.

[Lief 🗽]

Really starting to dislike Nate Silver.

He literally wouldn't have a job without accurate pollsters like PPP.

[Lief 🗽]

Yeah, maybe this stuff is important for pollsters and statisticians, but all I and I suspect most people care about is results, and PPP has been consistently accurate and consistently willing to poll races that no one else is (coming up with good results in the process).

And again, Nate Silver criticizing them is a bit rich, since without them his precious model would be based much more on garbage like Mason-Dixon and Gallup.

[Lief 🗽]

A few things. First of all, acting like any pollster is "scientific" these days with the pathetically low response rates, the rise of no-landline people, etc. is stupid. I think that the old assumptions about what makes a good polling methodology need to be seriously looked at, especially because PPP, despite not doing it the "correct" way, is getting accurate results, often in races where no one else is brave enough to poll, often before anyone else has released any polls. This is not dumb luck and it's not making up numbers. They're clearly very accurate, and at the end of the day, for their clients, for political enthusiasts, for journalists, etc. that's all that matters.

Second, PPP is a private company and they make their living from getting hired by politicians and other organizations to poll races, usually local or congressional races, and usually these polls aren't published. The polls that PPP does make public are essentially their advertisements for the accuracy of the service they provide. They have no obligation to release to us the details of every poll they do. If they do a poll of a race that no one else is doing and get a result that they think is garbage and they think would hurt their reputation (and thus their business) then it makes sense that they would choose not to release it.

[Lief 🗽]

Great article defending PPP against Nate Silver's nonsense:

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http://www.psmag.com/politics/use-abuse-polling-american-politics-66266/