FBI Director James Comeys October Surprise doomed Hillary Clintons candidacy: analysis

[still_one]

Do you remember how you felt last October after you heard that FBI Director James Comey was reopening the FBI’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s possible illegal handling of classified communiqués while Secretary of State—just 11 days before the presidential election?

That news, which left me with a sinking feeling that all but erased the confidence I had in Clinton’s prospects after the three presidential debates, was the moment that Donald Trump won the election, according to an analysis released this week by a data firm that tracks the psychological elements below patterns of consumer behavior, moods and sentiment.'

“Many Americans—and particularly those of us working in data-driven businesses—would like to see a credible, fact-based explanation for why the polls seemed to indicate a Clinton victory, but the election instead produced President Trump,” wrote Brad Fay, an executive with Engagement Labs, in the Huffington Post. Fay notes that pollsters were not all wrong, as Clinton won the popular vote by nearly 3 million votes. “But I do believe it was possible to show that the possibility of a Trump victory was rising more rapidly in the final week than opinion polls—and related prediction models—showed.”

Fay said his firm’s behavior-tracking model found what many voters and analysts have suspected, that Comey’s “October surprise” was the tipping point that turned voter sentiment away from Clinton—because people inclined to give Clinton the benefit of the doubt lost their enthusiasm, just as Comey’s announcement buoyed Trump voters.

.........

.......Comey’s unprecedented interference in the election, which registered on a much deeper level than the political polls were probing, Fay said.

“Immediately afterward, there was a 17-point drop in net sentiment for Clinton, and an 11-point rise for Trump, enough for the two candidates to switch places in the rankings, with Clinton in more negative territory than Trump,” he said. “At a time when opinion polling showed perhaps a 2-point decline in the margin for Clinton, this conversation data suggests a 28-point change in the word of mouth ‘standings.’ The change in word of mouth favorability metric was stunning, and much greater than the traditional opinion polling revealed.”




http://www.rawstory.com/2017/03/fbi-director-james-comeys-october-surprise-doomed-hillary-clintons-candidacy-analysis/?comments=disqus

[Orrex]

1. Let me be the first here to say "well no shit"

[mnhtnbb]

2. I worried the entire month of October that the election needed to hurry up and be held

on the 1st of November. I feared it was going to drag on and HRC would lose momentum.

Damn.

[Orrex]

6. The media did its part to ensure Trump's victory

I posted here frequently during the campaign to lament NPR's daily repetition of the "she's untrustworthy" mantra, coupled with their utter failure to hold Trump accountable for everything. With even this keystone of the "Liberal media" working against her, what chance did she have?

[meadowlark5]

27. When I watch many of the cable news shows keeping the focus on Trump and Russia

I think to myself that it's almost like they're trying to make amends for the instrumental part they played in getting Trump elected. Trying to reverse their wrong.

I always said, the media could take Trump down in a week if they chose to. They chose ratings instead. They chose Trump instead of doing their job.

[caroldansen]

26. I wonder if his mother still loves him because no one else does.

[caroldansen]

28. Except maybe his dog if he has one. MAYBE.

[JI7]

3. yup. for those following this was when there was a change

People claim everyone right thought she would win but that started to be in question after this.

Combine that with fuckwad laying off twitter and shit media being impressed by it and how it showed he was presidential.

[uponit7771]

4. But but... this isn't enough evidence / sarcasm

[Orrex]

7. And let's not forget the emails.

THE EMAILS!!!!!1!

[Vinca]

5. But what is even stinkier is that they knew of the Trump/Russia connection and Comey

said nothing. That, of course, begs the question about whether Comey is on the Russian payroll. The big question for me is who is going to prosecute the Trump administration when all the dirt comes to the surface? Sessions appears to be bought and paid for, too.

[uponit7771]

8. +1, Comrade Comey is part of the treason

[MrModerate]

9. Comey needs to go to prison forever. n/t

[UCmeNdc]

10. I remember writing here on DU how bad this was for Clinton

I had people say I was a doom and gloom guy. Just like I am telling you right now Donald Trump stole this 2016 election. He used the ability of the Russians to both propagandize the US voters against Hillary Clinton plus used the Russians to hack the electronic voting machines.

There has to be a Special prosecutor with subpoena powers appointed to investigate Trump's administration Russian Spy contacts.


Trump and Putin will not stop unless they are made to pay for their hostile takeover of the US government.

[still_one]

12. yup, the day MSNBC reported this garbage I said something similar and was referred to as a concern

troll. That didn't bother me though, what bothered me was the media said the "FBI had reopened the email investigation", which was a LIE, and allowed every right wing politician airtime to propagate that LIE. I felt we were in trouble then

[metalbot]

13. There is no evidence of voting machine hacking by the Russians

Let me put it a slightly different way: there is at least as much evidence that President Obama wiretapped Trump's campaign as there is that the Russians hacked voting machines.

I mean, either one, I guess, is theoretically possible. There's a glimmering of circumstantial things that you could use to conclude either one is true.

Rational people would say that both are highly unlikely, but would be willing to change their minds in the light of new evidence.

Partisans will say that the action that supports their view is likely, and will use anything that supports their belief to confirm it disproportionately to the value of the evidence, and will likewise dismiss evidence as unreliable if it doesn't support their view.

I think the key here is that when you decide that you are going to accept something as true, you should probably be thinking about whether you would accept as true a premise that you don't want to be true based on the same evidence.

Your willingness to accept that Russians hacked the voting machines basically explains why the alt-right is willing to accept Trump's assertion of wiretapping. I'm not in particular calling you out on this, but pointing out that we all have confirmation biases that we should be aware of in the context of your post.

A fascinating read on how our political views force us to think irrationally:

http://lesswrong.com/lw/gw/politics_is_the_mindkiller/

[mythology]

15. There is no evidence to suggest the voting machines were hacked

Repeatedly claiming it was doesn't make your claim any less conspiracy theory nonsense. During the Wisconsin recount there was no statistically significant difference in those counties recounted by hand versus by machine.

[Bear Creek]

21. Too much evidence

[link:https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=1thcO_olHas|
https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=1thcO_olHas
This needed taken care for the last 8 yrs. I remember Rove having a fit about Obama because he knew Ohio had voted republican. Triad is a little company to do some searches on. There was a lawsuit and Bush put a gag order on the verdict. Then there was the programmer from northern Ohio who was supposed to testify before congress who conveniently died in an air plane crash.

[Merlot]

22. But there is evidence to suggest votes were not counted

And the votes most likely not counted were democratic.

But since this comes from inside the US, it's not as easy of a sell. Easier to blame Russia than crosscheck.

[Bear Creek]

25. In Ohio

Early voting the envelopes were filled out by poll workers if anything was misspelled they were not counted. But for the machines look for districts that were unusually late.

[mountain grammy]

11. I remember the day this came out..

a facebook "friend" (I actually know her personally) who claimed to be "undecided" came out and said that was it impossible for her to "trust Hillary Clinton." This did it for her.. I call bullshit on this one. She was a pussy grabbee, trump lover from the get go..racist bitch.. I do believe I might have said most of that to her, but she hasn't unfriended me, so she gets it.. she has a daughter (my late friend's granddaughter) in an exchange program living in Amsterdam for a year.. I think she'll get an education from her. The only reason I still follow the dummy is to keep track of my best friend's granddaughter, whom I adore and the fact she's much more like her grandmother.

[2naSalit]

14. Something

came into my mind about that upon awakening this morning...

HRC won the election. I don't think the polls were very accurate and I'm confident that state voting procedures were manipulated. Comey came out and dropped that potential bomb to blow smoke over the election rigging issue. If you can fling enough BS at someone so close to the election - before the victim can wipe off enough of the BS to recover and respond - the loss of the election can be explained away by this faux info-bomb and deflect attention from the election fraud long enough to get as far as these assholes have to date.

I think Comey is either one of "them" or trying to defeat the faction within his agency who are "them" and falling into some of the potholes placed in his path. And then, he could be working both sides which will probably not end well for him. Having been the right hand man of Ken Starr in trying to destroy the Clintons back in Bill's admin, I think he's more foe than friend of the US.

And then, one could also ask why there was such a decades long campaign to destroy the Clintons then and now? Could it be that they saw this coming somewhere along the line and could actually spare us the worst of it? I do see factions are formed with regard to the future of our nation, I'm not liking what I'm seeing.

[mythology]

16. Oh for fuck's sake, this conspiracy bullshit needs to stop

The national polls were closer to the election outcome than in 2012. I really wish people would at least bother to look up basic facts before spouting off nonsense.

[2naSalit]

17. Interesting username, it fits....nt

[DK504]

18. Didn't break a sweat on that one did he?

[yallerdawg]

19. Add in the targeted disinformation and fake news...

bombarding Hillary's primary opponent supporters-

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-fake-news-russia_us_58c34d97e4b0ed71826cdb36?63g&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

-and we have a perfect storm which swung a couple states and put a couple in play.

"October surprise" is a real thing - even if the surprise is not real.

[Squinch]

20. Kick

[NastyRiffraff]

23. We all knew this, but

I for one am glad to see some data confirming it. Comey's "October Surprise" wasn't the only factor, of course, but it was a major one. Thanks for posting this, still_one.

BTW, this month's Vanity Fair has an interesting article on Comey. It says (among other things...it's a long article) although Loretta Lynch was technically his boss, he dominated her and never bothered to tell her that he was about to interfere in a presidential election. I always wondered why she didn't step in and tell him to stop NOW.

[aikoaiko]

24. Still, this analysis is on the national level -- not the flipped states

I get it that the national view is where they see the flip and finger pointing, but they same data so a much worse dip in for Clinton when (net -26) during the "pussy grabber tape" time period than during the "Comey letter" period (net -17). These data show that Trump only took a net -9 point hit for the "pussy grabber tape" October surprise.

I recognize that the analysis is trying to show an ordinal shift at the end, but these data are not as convincing as they purport.

Or maybe put another way, if the Comey letter was the reason, then why did it have a bigger impact in the flipped, rust-belt states?