Election Betting Odds

When did it predict the french election? Because for weeks every single survey predicted a clear win for Macron.

 

Surveys are all fake news. #MakeFranceGreatAgain
#NvmFranceWasNeverGreat



FYI I actually do online political betting.

I started with $75 and now have about $700. It's very profitable and lots of fun. Made a lot of money on the French and US elections in particular. I use PredictIt which is different to the one linked above, probably less good for actual predictions because there's lots of dumb Trump supporters, but better than BetFair for making money if you know what you're doing, I think.

 

Macron was gonna win, it was really obvious

 

Macron was gonna win, but it would have been nice if the media didn't outright say LePen had no chance before the election and instead didn't pick f*cking sides.

 

Media's job is to report the truth. She had no chance.

You'd prefer it if they lied to you?

 

She came second in election polls why would they immediately discount her as a candidate?

That's like saying Donald Trump had no chance and that Hillary had a ~90% chance of winning even though he did exceedingly well in the elections.

...

Oh wait, Hillary was backed by the owners of the media reporting on the election? Macron has ties to the richest and most powerful banking family on the planet?

The media's job is to report news that makes them money. Truth is secondary. It is the job of the people to doubt literally everything they say. Not immediately, and not offhand dismissal, but don't accept it as truth.

Also note that selective truth telling is just as bad as a lie by omission. I.e. when there's as of yet unproven evidence that Trump and LaPen were hacked by Russia... every single news media outlet publishes that story as fact. But when there's proven ties to Macron's history as a banker and Hillary takes Saudi money, not a goddamn word?

 

Oh God you're a conspiracy theorist aren't you...

You're also just absolutely wrong in some places.

"She came second in election polls why would they discount her immediately"

Because there are two candidates... Macron consistently led in every poll by over 20% and a solid majority of the country dislikes Le Pen. She literally had a 1% chance from the start.

"That's like saying Donald Trump had no chance and Hillary had a ~90% chance of winning even though he did exceedingly well in the elections."

There's so much wrong with this sentence that I don't even know where to begin. It's true, some media outlets did have Hillary at really high odds and that was really stupid. In reality her odds were probably in the 65-85% range, different methods get difference odds. But to compare Trump to Le Pen is sheer stupidity and you really should do your research before you get so riled up. Trump always had a chance, and at times he has a strong one. He was never behind more than 10%, whereas Le Pen was pretty much always behind Macron by more than 20%. It's a completely false comparison.

And the other thing, that he did exceedingly well in the election. What are you talking about? Firstly, more people voted for Hillary than for Trump by something like two million votes, and secondly, Trump won the narrowest Electoral College victory since the Florida recount in 2000.

The rest of your post is just some shtick about Le Pen and Russia and whatever, I don't really know much or care about that stuff. But your analysis of Le Pen and Trump's election chances/results is just really really wrong. You talk about how people should doubt everything the media say, but where in god's name are you getting your information about these elections and why aren't you checking this stuff yourself?

You seem to be unfamiliar with this concept that the media should be biased towards the TRUTH. I don't care if it seems unfair that the media was already crowning Macron the President of France, so was everyone else who actually looked at the data.

I assume you got this pissy when the media said Gary Johnson or Jill Stein had no chance of becoming President? I'd say Gary probably had a similar chance to Le Pen at one point when he was polling well. Evan McMullin definitely had a similar chance to Le Pen, but the media never took any of these guys as really serious candidates and there's a reason for that.

In the end it just really worries me that you're not looking at the data...

 

I agree that anyone with one functioning brain cell would know that Le Pen had no chance of winning, largely because she comes from a widely disliked Party (and for good reason). However, Macron was treated far better than he deserved by the media. The man is essentially a libertarian, lax on social policy, but about as far right as they come on fiscal policy. Hardly the definition of a "centrist" as the media repeatedly called him (as if saying it enough times would make it true). Macron is a total tool of the establishment and has been sent by said establishment to make the rich richer and destroy France's socio-economic safety net (i.e. his policies supporting massive tax cuts for the wealthy and cuts to every social program under the sun, support of free trade, and embrace of the multinational oligarchy known as the EU).

No wonder the several million voters who supported moderate leftist Jean Luc Melenchon didn't support him - let alone the semi-fascist Le Pen. Potentially millions more wouldn't have voted Macron had his extraordinarily dangerous platform and its possible ramifications had been more widely known, instead of constantly downplayed in the mass media (interestingly much of said media is also controlled by the rich and powerful).

The funny thing is, Gary Johnson and Emmanuel Macron are almost the same candidate (although Macron is more of a genuine libertarian whereas Johnson is a former hard-line Republican). They have so much in common. Yet here Macron is, the new President of France, elected entirely because "he's not Marine Le Pen" (43% of Macron voters supported him out of fear of Le Pen).

You can, in part, thank the media narrative pushing for that.

The media takes candidates seriously when 1) they'll push policies that their owners like (i.e. 90%+ of the media backed Clinton in the U.S. election, awful candidate as she was, because her neoliberal policies were wonderful for their bottom lines) or 2) they garner enough support to scare the hell out of said owners/oligarchy so they start churning out hit pieces against them, as they did to Le Pen, Johnson, Stein (especially Stein), and Bernie Sanders. The media isn't some objective spectator. They are very much involved in pushing their own interests, which is why you can read dozens upon dozens of articles of hacks nattering about how "Clinton is more electable than Sanders" even though Bernie consistently polled much better against Trump than she did.

 

Yeah I'm sorry but I have to say I think you're biased when you're calling Macron more libertarian than Johnson, and Melenchon a "moderate leftist". He wants a maximum wage. That's ballsy AF and I would support it if it would work but it wouldn't.

You'll see I responded to you about these candidates on another thread but let's just keep it on here for ease.

 

Johnson only recently came around on (some) social issues. He used to be closer to Fillon.

I like Melenchon. But he's not as "far left" as some in the media have portrayed him.

 

If he's not far left, then what is? Also tell me, who would you have voted for in the first/second rounds? I'm curious.

I'd have chosen Macron in both rounds probably, but I suppose I wouldn't have ruled out Hamon or Melenchon in the first.

By the way your signature is GOLDEN. ABSOLUTELY HILARIOUS.

Gehenna really is a moron (sorry Gehenna, it needs to be said).

 

I'm further left then he is.

Melenchon in the first round. In the second, if I were forced to choose, I'd pick Le Pen simply because of the massive damage neoliberal policies have done both in America and the UK (where I'm from). Her economic platform is reasonable, but her social platform is too authoritarian so I can't say I was ever enthusiastic about her.

 

My god, how left we talking here?

I could never vote for Le Pen. She's a nationalist, which I despise and her economic platform is iffy to me. Protectionism, lowering the retirement age, they're not really good solutions to me.

We need to be raising the retirement age, not lowering it.

 

What really is interesting is that with all the incresement wealth and productivity of the workforce, we still have to do these cutting policies.

It is a wealth distribution problem, not a lack of wealth problem. I myself come from a "democratic socialist" country, finland. Our wealth distribution is far more equal here, we have single payer health care, no private schools etc. Big sectors of our economy are nationalized. And this do result in one of the happiest populations on the face of this earth - i think a little suprisingly to you. We have also traditionally had the most free press in the world according to the un (busting the myth of socialism beeing bad and kapitalism good for press freedom).

Its fun how you portray munsons leftism as extreemism, as it means you think having a working system would be extreemism :V

 

Dude I'm a democrat socialist and I love Finland. I think your country is awesome

I just think if Munson is further left than Melenchon, he is a sort of extremist.

 

Didnt read his post :V

From his earlier posts on threads of similar topics I would say he is in no way extreme tho. And even if he was, thats not a valid argument for anything.

 

Yeah just calling him an extremist doesn't really mean anything but I can talk policy. Melenchon wants 100% tax rate on wealth over £360,000 I believe? Munson says he's further left. I wonder what is further left aside from communism

 

I am not a communist myself, but would consider that reasonable. I would still call myself a democratic socialist :V