All that glitters is not Silver

Nate Silver’s fivethirtyeight.com deserves journalism’s worst timing award.  On August 11, 538’s Harry Enten all but crowned Hillary Clinton Democratic nominee claiming that the Bernie Sanders surge was “over“.  A few hours later, the first of two polls came out showing Sanders ahead by 7 in New Hampshire.

Friday, Silver posts this drivel in which self-anointed seers proclaim that Hillary remains the prohibitive favorite regardless of whether Biden enters the race.  Saturday the Des Moines Register reported that Sanders had nearly eliminated Clinton’s formerly mammoth  advantage in Iowa. She’s below 40% matched against Biden and Sanders and at 43% with Biden out.  Among Iowa democrats under 45 years old, Sanders thumps every other candidate.

In late July, Bernie was within 5 of Hillary in Oregon.  I’m unaware of any more recent polling but given the trajectory of the two candidates in other states and in national polls (each national pollster’s most recent poll shows a tighter race than its previous poll did), it’s a fair bet that he’s tied with her in the Beaver State.  Also Bernie does about as well as Hillary in polls measuring their support against the cons.  So yeah 538, you’re right on top of this one, stick a fork in Bernie (and Biden and O’Malley and Chafee), he’s all done.