American Agora

I was a faithful follower of Nate Silver's website FiveThirtyEight.com throughout the election, and this post-election article from the New York Times illustrates how amazingly accurate Silver was in his predictions. Here's some of the rundown, from the Times article itself:

• He projected Senator Obama would win 833 Super Tuesday delegates, which was within about a dozen of the actual vote estimates.
• Between his live TV appearances on election night, Mr. Silver updated his model and determined around 8 p.m., after New Hampshire went to Senator Obama, that Senator McCain had no way of winning.
• By the end of the night, Mr. Silver had predicted the popular vote within one percentage point, predicted 49 of 50 states’ results correctly, and predicted all of the resolved Senate races correctly.
• He had forecast that Senator Obama would beat Senator John McCain back in March.

In March!!! The mainstream media and blogosphere wasn't convinced that Obama was likely to win until days before, not months.

Silver's is an amazing story, and thought it would be worthwhile to throw up for all to see (if you haven't already).

PHOTO CREDIT: Beth Rooney for The New York Times

- A.S. Noel