Guest Post by Mike Shedlock
Salil Mehta, founder of Statistical Ideas comments on Hillary’s recount odds in his post Losers Who Won’t Lose.
Mehta says “Based on statistical randomness of re-assessing voter intent, the chance of Hillary emerging as the victor is far less than 10%.”
I believe Mehta overstates Hillary’s odds (and I bet he agrees with my analysis).
First let’s see what Mehta has to say (emphasis his) …
The only viable path for a Hillary Clinton victory at this stage is to astoundingly uncover a wide-spread (across three states) fraud. And that’s equally unlikely, since the basis for the voting aberrations occurred in less populated counties and anyway the three states employ three different voting mechanisms, so the fraud would have had to somehow jointly occur through different transmission vehicles (paper voting, and electronic voting) and we would require a speedy judicial resolution for states such as Pennsylvania that sidestepped back-up recordings from their direct voting equipment.
We should note the following statistical facts about the electoral vote in the three recount states:
- 10 votes, Wisconsin (Trump leads by 0.9 percentage points)
- 20 votes, Pennsylvania (Trump leads by 1.1 percentage points)
- 16 votes, Michigan (Trump leads by 0.2 percentage points)
Given that Mr. Trump won by 74 electoral votes, Ms. Clinton would need to flip all three states noted above, in order to liquidate this deficit (i.e., >74/2 = >37 votes). The leads described above however, among 4.4 million voters from these three states, is highly statistically significant on a state-level (and certainly when all three states are combined). It would be remarkably unlikely (>5σ event) that we would arbitrarily second-guess every one of these millions of voters’ intents and, convert any (certainly let alone all) of these three states.
Hillary must be cognizant of this improbability, and so instead is foolishly piggy-backing off of the second most reasonable recount rationale: not that errors in intent occurred, but rather straight-fraud on such a scale that would flip most of these states. While tempting for Democrat supporters, this fraud scenario is of course dubious and a humiliating ploy at this stage. Because for it to work, we would need to suppose that such fraud occurred in three different ways at once:
- Michigan is a paper-ballot state (no equipment hacking possible) so electronic fraud is virtually unlikely to come about
- Wisconsin does have paper back-ups recorded though the counties that are most heterogeneous, are lesser-populated and not so wildly-off probabilistically
- Pennsylvania has similar issues to Wisconsin, except they haven’t recorded all of their votes in an auditable back-up so rife judicial hurdles must be overcome
The bottom line is everything must go right here, in all three state recounts (between proving fraud and getting mathematical support from wide-spread “voter intent errors”), in order to better align towards a Donald Trump downfall. And even if this all occurred, accounting for all of these statistical adjustments, the probability of a Hillary Clinton triumph is still quite low.
Mish Analysis
Mehta stated, and I certainly agree “Based on statistical randomness of re-assessing voter intent, the chance of Hillary emerging as the victor is far less than 10%.”
Mehta could have gone further.
For the sake of argument, let’s assume a recount chance of success is 10%. That is on the wildly high side buts let’s be generous.
Based on Mehta’s accurate assessment of election procedures, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania are independent results (they had dissimilar procedures).
If we assign a 10% chance of success to each states, the odds of a trifecta overturn are essentially 0.10 * 0.10 * 0.10. That chance is 0.001, which one tenth of 1%.
But the odds are not 10% across the board. Based on the number of votes needed, the odds of overturning Michigan are far better than overturning Wisconsin. In turn, the odds of overturning Wisconsin are less than overturning Pennsylvania.
Let’s be generous. Assume the odds of overturning Michigan are 10% and the odds of overturning Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are 2% each.
In this case the overall odds of success are 0.10 * 0.02 * 0.02. That chance is 0.00004 or 0.004%.
Are the odds that good?
The overturn case depends on fraud. But there’s an additional catch. The fraud has to be in favor of Trump.
Is it more likely dead people voted in Madison and Milwaukee than say a place most have never heard of like Occonto? Assuming the former, if this actually came down to looking at voter registrations, the odds of fraud would appear to be greater in the areas that voted for Hilllary.
Nonetheless, let’s assume a big “fat tail” is in play. Let’s assume the fraud is all in favor of Trump, and let’s also multiply Hillary’s chances 100 times.
Doing so yields a chance of success of 0.40%.
So we are not just talking about less than 10%, but less than 1%, and that is giving the overturn odds every conceivable twist of fate.
Data Mining
Barry Ritholtz quoted Salil Mehta in his article Beware of Data Mining.
In an e-mail exchange, he [Mehta] observed:
“There is an increased craving to slice and dice the recent election data, particularly given that the major pollsters have been shamed as they all immensely errored in projecting this year’s election’s victor. All gave President-elect Trump <15% a faux probability of winning. The risk of now retorting with data-mining this single election result is that they often miss an analysis of the predictive errors in this unique match-up (e.g., record high undecideds on Election eve), don’t take into account budding geospatial patterns to validate evidence, and in most case none of this should deceptively be promoted as an election forecasting model.”
I said exactly the same thing for months on end, totally ignored by Nate Silver, mainstream media, Barry Ritholtz, and damn near everyone else, except Mehta.
Silver made three colossal mistakes to which he has still not admitted.
Silver’s Mistakes
- Silver ignored social attitudes and anger
- Silver over-relied on history
- Silver took short term polls and projected them way too far into the future
Nate silver never responded to a single email no matter how polite I was. In contrast, Mehta responded to every one of my emails.
Mish Mistakes
I made my own mistakes. Following the first debate, I was totally disgusted with Trump’s performance and was pretty sure he would lose.
After FBI director James Comey reopened the case against Hillary, I reassessed.
Curiously, my early attitude forecasts were spot on.
Flashback May 23, 2016: Grim Election Map for Trump? Fox Analyst vs. RCP vs. Mish
Juan Williams, political analyst for Fox News Channel says Electoral Map Looks Grim for Trump.
I believe the map looks grim for Hillary.
Clearly one of us is wrong, so let’s compare maps and analysis.
RCP Map Analysis 2016-05-23
What a bunch of hooey. Let’s start with an RCP Tossup Map.
It’s absurd to start with a map of “Romney states”.
Williams’ comment “If Trump holds all the Romney states and carries Virginia, Pennsylvania and Florida” is even more ridiculous.
Mish Map Analysis 2016-05-23
I believe Trump will win the rust belt states of Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio. If so, Hillary will need a clean sweep of about every remaining state to win.
In the above map, if Trump wins Michigan as I project, all he needs to do is win North Carolina.
Suppose Trump does not win Michigan. Instead, give him North Carolina. In that case, either Virginia or Pennsylvania would put Trump over the top.
If Trump wins Pennsylvania and Ohio (not unlikely actually) I believe it’s pretty clear he will win.
In fact, if Trump carries those states, it’s likely he picks up other swing states moving towards an electoral landslide.
I purposely did not presume a miracle for Trump. I gave him leeway tradeoffs consistent with some things likely to break his way.
A Trump landslide is not impossible.
Landslide Map
A landslide by either party is not my prediction, but it’s quite possible Trump could pull one off, and perhaps even lose the popular vote by a little bit.
My May assessment was nearly perfect. I cannot brag too much because I changed my assessment following the first debate.
I thank Mehta for listening to and responding to my analysis every step of the way.
Did Michael Moore Call the Election?
Much credit is given to Michael Moore for calling the election.
I don’t believe Moore did so. Nor do I believe most of those who claim to have called it.
Moore is a media manipulator. His motive for calling the election for Trump is very clear: It was a purposeful attempt to get out the vote, for Hillary.
I am equally suspicious of those who were sure Trump would win all along.
Comey may very well have swung the election to Trump, bailing out those who stuck with Trump thick and thin.
Credit Where Credit is Due
The one person I am willing to give credit to is professor Allan Lichtman who says “polls stink”. Lichtman Predicted Last 9 U.S. Elections, Including Trump’s Win.
Lichtman has no election biases that I can detect. However, CNN reports Professor predicted Trump win, says he will be impeached.
That headline could be misleading. Here is the statement “There’s a very good chance that Donald Trump could face impeachment,” Allan Lichtman told Erin Burnett on OutFront.
A very good chance could mean 25%. It could mean anything from 10% to 90%. There is a difference between “very good” and likely.
I rate the odds of impeachment as “not very good”. To place a number, let’s say 2%.
Salil, care to comment?
The results of the vote count were most probably honest and too large to be influenced by a recount (recounts usually involved very close results and rarely change even them).
The vote count, not necessarily the votes themselves which probably can’t be audited to find out one way or the other but probably included a large number of illegal votes (Obama even went public encouraging illegal voting).
Too many people were watching the count too closely for it to be otherwise, which brings up the question of why the call for a recount weeks down the line instead of earlier when it would be expected?
My question now is: Will the results of the recount be honest as well?
This guy’s missing a couple of key points: first, team Hillary doesn’t have to prove fraud. They just need to get recounts done. Second, he’s discounting the possibility of rogue electors. If they could flip PA and MI, Trump would be down to 270. Then they’d only need two rogue electors to vote for Hillary. Michigan was a razor-thin Trump victory. It’s far from impossible for the Dems to contest enough ballots – especially absentee – to swing it to Clinton. In PA they’d have to use brazenly bogus methodology to set aside tens of thousands of ballots, but I wouldn’t put it past them. Get it in front of a liberal judge. Then it goes to the left-dominated Third Circuit Court of Appeals. The 4-4 Supreme Court couldn’t overturn. “Wet work” anyone? They started gaming this out over a year ago. Don’t think they don’t know which judges in PA they want to hear challenges to a bogus recount. I give Hillary a 20% shot. I’m in MN. I’ve seen it happen.
There are more “what ifs” in this article than kneegrows in the EBT office.
Hillary’s chance of being chosen as POTUS at this stage of the game is ZERO. .
This is all being done by Demoncraps to set up roadblocks every step of the way for the Reign Of Donald. Of course, we all knew that was coming.
Mike Shedlock completely misses the point of this.
Soros (through the Clintons) is going for a COLOR REVOLUTION.
They need a basis for the revolution – it will be the supposed “voter fraud”.
DID ANYONE NOTICE THAT BOTH BILL AND HILLARY CLINTON WORE THE SAME COLOR PURPLE ON THE NIGHT SHE GAVE HER CONCESSION SPEECH?
The color purple is BLUE plus RED (i.e. it represents the unhappy blue voters and unhappy red voters).
This is preparation for a COLOR REVOLUTION. Book it, Dano.
Anon- The COLOR REVOLUTION has already been named THE PURPLE REVOLUTION as I have posted. It is in progress and will ramp up soon just as you projected, at least you can see the forces at work.
The cartoonification of this past (s)election is like nothing I have ever seen so I will agree that some sort of nullification of the Trump presidency is forthcoming.
Which is why the Senate should vote on the Session’s nomination the am of the 21st and he should immediately put a team of experienced,tight lipped prosecutors on Hillary in particular and all election tampering in general.
Bubba’s premature jubilation:
Keep masturbating Mish.
Don’t forget the Kleenex.
Wisconsin Denies Request For Recount By Hand As Stein Threatens To Sue
by Tyler Durden
Nov 28, 2016 3:00 PM
Finally, a voice of reason emerges in Wisconsin to combat Jill Stein’s useless recount crusade. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Wisconsin Elections Commission Chairman, Mark Thomsen, who happens to be Democrat, announced earlier that the committee would follow through with Stein’s recount request but denied a request that the recount be conducted by hand. Thomsen cited a 2011 recount that changed the overall vote margin by 300 votes as evidence that the current recount would overturn Trump’s 22,177 vote lead in the state.
Citing the results of a 2011 statewide recount that changed only 300 votes, Elections Commission chairman Mark Thomsen, a Democrat, said this presidential recount is very unlikely to change Republican Donald Trump’s win in the state.
“It may not be 22,177,” said Thomsen, referring to Trump’s win over Democrat Hillary Clinton in the vote count. “But I don’t doubt that the president-elect is going to win that.”
Thomsen dismissed Stein’s claims of problems with the vote as unfounded and misleading. But he directed his toughest criticism to Trump’s unsupported allegations that millions of people voted illegally nationwide, calling them “an insult to the people that run our elections.”
Under the plan adopted Monday, the recount would begin Thursday and could cost $1 million. Of course, we assume that Stein didn’t factor in the incremental costs associated with suing states that call her out for her ridiculous recount efforts. As such, she may need to raise some more money just as the flow of funds seem to have slowed to a trickle…we suspect Hillary supporters have finally caught on to the scam.
Here is the official timeline for the recount per the Wisconsin Election Commission:
Monday, cost estimates and vote tabulation method will be provided by county clerks to the commission by noon. Commission officials will provide estimated statewide costs to the campaigns of both Stein and De La Fuente by the end of the day.
Tuesday, the Stein, De La Fuente or both must pay for the recount. Once full payment is received, the commission will issue a recount order to all presidential candidates.
Wednesday, commission staff will hold a teleconference in the morning for all county clerks and canvass members to outline the process and rules of a recount. Since a 24-hour public meeting notice is required for the recount, each county must post its notice by Wednesday.
Thursday, recount begins in every Wisconsin county.
Dec. 12, all county canvass boards must be completed by 8 p.m.
Dec. 13, Elections Commission staff will prepare the official recount canvass certification by 3 p.m.
Meanwhile, this may all be a “best case scenario” for Stein who would get to pocket the $6.3mm raised so far if recount efforts are denied and she decides to walk away.
I live in SW Pennsylvania. I’m lovin’ it! Goodbye Crooked Hillary!!!