andrew_gelman_stats andrew_gelman_stats-2011 andrew_gelman_stats-2011-654 knowledge-graph by maker-knowledge-mining
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Introduction: Jonathan Chait writes that the most important aspect of a presidential candidate is “political talent”: Republicans have generally understood that an agenda tilted toward the desires of the powerful requires a skilled frontman who can pitch Middle America. Favorite character types include jocks, movie stars, folksy Texans and war heroes. . . . [But the frontrunners for the 2012 Republican nomination] make Michael Dukakis look like John F. Kennedy. They are qualified enough to serve as president, but wildly unqualified to run for president. . . . [Mitch] Daniels’s drawbacks begin — but by no means end — with his lack of height, hair and charisma. . . . [Jeb Bush] suffers from an inherent branding challenge [because of his last name]. . . . [Chris] Christie . . . doesn’t cut a trim figure and who specializes in verbally abusing his constituents. . . . [Haley] Barbour is the comic embodiment of his party’s most negative stereotypes. A Barbour nomination would be the rough equivalent
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1 Jonathan Chait writes that the most important aspect of a presidential candidate is “political talent”: Republicans have generally understood that an agenda tilted toward the desires of the powerful requires a skilled frontman who can pitch Middle America. [sent-1, score-0.516]
2 The presidential candidate is the star of a television show about a tall, attractive person who can be seen donning hard hats, nodding at the advice of military commanders and gazing off into the future. [sent-31, score-0.514]
3 Here’s a graph based on Doug Hibbs’s model: Sorry, but I don’t think the Democrats would’ve won the 1988 presidential election even if they’d had Burt Reynolds at the top of the ticket. [sent-38, score-0.487]
4 It was by the end of the campaign, at which point voters focused more on party and ideology (see this article ) and learned more about the candidates’ ideologies and issue positions, that they decided to go for the preppie from Connecticut over the wimp from Massachusetts. [sent-47, score-0.456]
5 And the political-science view of presidential campaigns has been gaining ground among knowledgeable reporters as well. [sent-50, score-0.265]
6 In the general election for president, the candidates are well-financed, are clearly distinguishable in ideology, and there are only two of them–thus none of the instability, associated with strategic voting, that we see in the primaries. [sent-60, score-0.273]
7 I don’t know what’s gonna happen in 2012, but political science research suggests that the Republicans could nominate a goofy short guy with glasses, or a rude fat guy, or whatever, and it wouldn’t make much of a difference. [sent-61, score-0.225]
8 I’m sure Chait means well and, yes, I know that most voters don’t know anything about the federal budget, probably half of them can’t find Miami on a map, etc. [sent-65, score-0.351]
9 But there’s no evidence that people vote based on candidates’ looks. [sent-66, score-0.186]
10 Certainly not in presidential elections where the stakes are high and their party identification is clear. [sent-67, score-0.393]
11 If you want to rail at the mistakes voters make and the problems with our political system . [sent-68, score-0.348]
12 But please please please please please don’t slam the voters for something they don’t do. [sent-73, score-0.764]
13 So why are you so so so sure that the ordinary undecided voters is doing so? [sent-78, score-0.294]
14 To think that they’re voting based on looks is just silly. [sent-81, score-0.226]
15 Chait also pulls out this line: A series of experiments has shown that subjects, even young children, can reliably pick the winners of races based solely on candidate photos. [sent-84, score-0.376]
16 As I wrote a couple years ago about a study that claimed an impressive 70% accuracy in predicting winners based on their looks: It’s a funny result: at first it seems impressive–70% accuracy! [sent-86, score-0.309]
17 –but then again it’s not so impressive given that you can predict something on the order of 90% of races just based on incumbency and the partisan preferences of the voters in the states and districts. [sent-87, score-0.475]
18 I can’t be sure what’s happening here, but one possibility is that the more serious candidates (the ones we know are going to win anyway) are more attractive. [sent-88, score-0.223]
19 I’m not saying that the study that David Brooks Jonathan Chait is citing is wrong, exactly, but I don’t think it provides evidence that Mitch Daniels would be dead meat in the presidential election. [sent-89, score-0.265]
20 Why this annoys me so much There’s some political science research on the importance of the fundamentals in presidential elections. [sent-91, score-0.394]
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same-blog 1 1.0 654 andrew gelman stats-2011-04-09-There’s no evidence that voters choose presidential candidates based on their looks
Introduction: Jonathan Chait writes that the most important aspect of a presidential candidate is “political talent”: Republicans have generally understood that an agenda tilted toward the desires of the powerful requires a skilled frontman who can pitch Middle America. Favorite character types include jocks, movie stars, folksy Texans and war heroes. . . . [But the frontrunners for the 2012 Republican nomination] make Michael Dukakis look like John F. Kennedy. They are qualified enough to serve as president, but wildly unqualified to run for president. . . . [Mitch] Daniels’s drawbacks begin — but by no means end — with his lack of height, hair and charisma. . . . [Jeb Bush] suffers from an inherent branding challenge [because of his last name]. . . . [Chris] Christie . . . doesn’t cut a trim figure and who specializes in verbally abusing his constituents. . . . [Haley] Barbour is the comic embodiment of his party’s most negative stereotypes. A Barbour nomination would be the rough equivalent
Introduction: Johathan Chait writes : Parties and candidates will kill themselves to move the needle a percentage point or two in a presidential race. And again, the fundamentals determine the bigger picture, but within that big picture political tactics and candidate quality still matters around the margins. I agree completely. This is the central message of Steven Rosenstone’s excellent 1983 book, Forecasting Presidential Elections. So, given that Chait and I agree 100%, why was I so upset at his recent column on “The G.O.P.’s Dukakis Problem”? I’ll put the reasons for my displeasure below the fold because my main point is that I’m happy with Chait’s quote above. For completeness I want to explain where I’m coming from but my take-home point is that we’re mostly in agreement. — OK, so what upset me about Chait’s article? 1. The title. I’m pretty sure that Mike Dukakis, David Mamet, Bill Clinton, and the ghost of Lee Atwater will disagree with me on this one, but Duka
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Introduction: Jonathan Chait writes that the most important aspect of a presidential candidate is “political talent”: Republicans have generally understood that an agenda tilted toward the desires of the powerful requires a skilled frontman who can pitch Middle America. Favorite character types include jocks, movie stars, folksy Texans and war heroes. . . . [But the frontrunners for the 2012 Republican nomination] make Michael Dukakis look like John F. Kennedy. They are qualified enough to serve as president, but wildly unqualified to run for president. . . . [Mitch] Daniels’s drawbacks begin — but by no means end — with his lack of height, hair and charisma. . . . [Jeb Bush] suffers from an inherent branding challenge [because of his last name]. . . . [Chris] Christie . . . doesn’t cut a trim figure and who specializes in verbally abusing his constituents. . . . [Haley] Barbour is the comic embodiment of his party’s most negative stereotypes. A Barbour nomination would be the rough equivalent
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