Sunday, November 2, 2014

A Prognosticator Spins

Nate Cohn writes in The New York Times that while the GOP is likely to win Senate control on Tuesday, it is actually a bad year for the GOP. The first part is prediction, the second part is hopeful lefty spin.

Cohn anticipates the GOP will only do well because few young people and minorities bother to vote in midterm elections. About Democrats, he admits:
Polls suggest that the party is not faring as well among young or Hispanic voters as in years past.
Then he shrugs that off and continues to assume Hillary (or whoever) will be able to reassemble the Obama 2012 coalition. If most Millennials can't find career jobs in the next two years, don't bet on them voting to continue a Democratic White House with an economic losing streak.

Cohn hopes demographics are destiny. He is a decent statistician, he should stick to that and leave the spin to party hacks. A week from now we'll have a better idea how various groups in the Obama coalition voted.

For another take-down of the Nate Cohn column, see a critique by Leon Wolf at RedState. Wolf makes an entirely correct point - Cohn conveniently avoids mentioning polling that shows young people, women and Hispanics all moving away from the Democrats.