Hillary won 6 out of 6 coin tosses in Iowa ??

[RTFirefly]

@amarinth

I kept wanting to scream “it’s a caucus, not an election! It’s not even a primary!” at the news yesterday. They work completely differently. I realize that it’s a lot easier to say “so-and-so won the caucus,” than to try to explain county delegate allocation and the party nomination system. But it’s really inaccurate and misrepresents what actually happened and what the results actually mean on every level.

No, you’ve got it backwards.

The winners of the early states (Iowa, NH, SC, NV) aren’t those who get the most delegates, because the nomination contest is unlikely to turn on who won the most delegates in those states. Winning is in bragging rights and the outsized effect that winning and losing those contests has on voting in the states where the delegate numbers start to matter.

Sure, eventually the precinct-level delegates will vote on county-level delegates who will vote for state delegates to the Democratic Convention. And by the time they do, the Democratic nomination is likely to have been settled already. Clinton won the Democratic caucus in Iowa by virtue of winning a few more precinct-level delegates than Sanders did, and being able to claim those bragging rights. And that, not Iowa’s actual delegates, will be the main effect of Iowa on the nomination process.

[Thudlow_Boink]

@Scandic

They flipped a coin six times, and Hillary won all six??

It seams very unlikely to me.:dubious:

Winning 6 out of 6 coin flips is indeed unlikely, but that’s not to say it can’t happen. (Every day, people play the lottery at much worse odds than that and genuinely believe they have a chance to win.) If you’re implying that there was some sort of cheating or rigging or skulduggery involved, how would that have been accomplished; and how do the chances of that compare to the chances of winning 6 honest coin flips?

[amarinth]

@RTFirefly

No, you’ve got it backwards.

What, exactly, do you think I have backwards?
I said caucuses are different than primaries, delegate allocation cannot be sufficiently explained in one sentence, and that “so-and-so won the caucus” is an inaccurate statement.

[RTFirefly]

@amarinth

What, exactly, do you think I have backwards?
I said caucuses are different than primaries, delegate allocation cannot be sufficiently explained in one sentence, and that “so-and-so won the caucus” is an inaccurate statement.

And I say that “so-and-so won the caucus” is an accurate statement, and for Iowa in particular, delegate allocation is incidental in terms of actual winners and losers.

IOW, I’m saying you have it backwards.

[Irishman]

@ElderSign

I love how apologists continue to say “it would make little difference in the outcome” in an election that was a virtual tie (50% vs 50%, one delegate difference).

Then they defend the absurd Iowa delegation rules.

It is evident you didn’t bother to read the link. The caucus votes on Monday were to select some 11,000 delegates to go to the county conventions. This is where the coin flips affected the outcome of 1 delegate per coin flip (i.e. per caucus precinct). Thus, out of 11,000 delegates, some handful were selected by coin flips. Say it was 6. That means 6 delegates out of 11,000 delegates were affected by coin flips.

Those delegates will later meet at the county conventions. Those conventions will then select 1400 delegates to send to the state level. These 1400 delegates had is where the 4 delegate equivalent difference in the vote was measured: 701 to 697.

Those 1400 delegates will then select the 44 state delegates to the National convention. They will assign a virtual tie to the delegates from Ohio. Ohio will effectively not matter in the overall selection of the party’s candidate. That will go to the winner-take-all states with big delegate counts to the national level.

As explained, Ohio’s big impact will be overestimating the importance of the Ohio voter as a reflection of the population of the country as a whole, and thereby assigning some meaning to “Hillary won shows she’s the more popular candidate” or to “Bernie came from nowhere and almost won, showing he’s really viable for the national election”.

@Thudlow_Boink

Winning 6 out of 6 coin flips is indeed unlikely, but that’s not to say it can’t happen. (Every day, people play the lottery at much worse odds than that and genuinely believe they have a chance to win.) If you’re implying that there was some sort of cheating or rigging or skulduggery involved, how would that have been accomplished; and how do the chances of that compare to the chances of winning 6 honest coin flips?

I don’t know enough about the process of conducting the flips, or of the process for reporting the information. If the coin flips are conducted with only a couple people able to actually see the result, that gives room to lie. Or, more possibly, if the person who reports the numbers to the party decides to lie, how does the rest of the caucus precinct know what they reported? But I’m assuming there are checks on those two possibilities.

What’s even more likely, however, is we only heard about 6 coin flips that went to Hillary, and we didn’t hear about other coin flips that went to Bernie. Which is the actual case reported by the party.

[Backwater_Under_Duck]

@BrainGlutton

What’s so hard to believe? Hillary is fuckin’ lucky.

Luckier than a dog with two dicks. Wait, what?

[glowacks]

@Irishman

Those 1400 delegates will then select the 44 state delegates to the National convention. They will assign a virtual tie to the delegates from Ohio. Ohio will effectively not matter in the overall selection of the party’s candidate. That will go to the winner-take-all states with big delegate counts to the national level.

As explained, Ohio’s big impact will be overestimating the importance of the Ohio voter as a reflection of the population of the country as a whole, and thereby assigning some meaning to “Hillary won shows she’s the more popular candidate” or to “Bernie came from nowhere and almost won, showing he’s really viable for the national election”.

Ohio? Where did Ohio come from? The correct state is in the thread name even.

[That_Don_Guy]

@Irishman

Those 1400 delegates will then select the 44 state delegates to the National convention. They will assign a virtual tie to the delegates from Ohio. Ohio will effectively not matter in the overall selection of the party’s candidate. That will go to the winner-take-all states with big delegate counts to the national level.

Democratic Party rules specifically prohibit winner-take-all (what they call “the unit rule”) at any level, and have done so since 1972 (except that California was allowed to remain WTA in 1972 for some political reason).

Every Democratic primary works the same - about 3/4 of the state’s delegates (I say “about” because the “pledged Party Leader and Elected Officials” - they’re appointed by the state party, but, unlike “superdelegates”, they are still required to vote for a particular candidate on the first ballot - aren’t included in the total) are divided among the Congressional districts, and each district’s delegates are given proportionally to the candidates that get at least 15% of the vote in that district; the rest are given proportionally based on the statewide vote to the candidates that get at least 15% statewide. The only way a primary is winner-take-all is if only one candidate gets 15% both statewide and in every Congressional district.

[amarinth]

@RTFirefly

And I say that “so-and-so won the caucus” is an accurate statement, and for Iowa in particular, delegate allocation is incidental in terms of actual winners and losers.

If, as you say, delegate allocation is incidental, then calling someone the winner because they got more delegates isn’t accurate. The news stories that I saw were doing exactly that. Perhaps we watch/read different media.

I mostly agree with you, that this caucus is mostly about setting and meeting expectations, gaining momentum, convincing donors, and setting the next round of media coverage. But the news that I saw used “won” for candidates solely based on delegate count.

Also, the stories that I saw implied that this was a winner take all event, that whoever “won” got Iowa. To me, that’s also not accurate. If you came across different stories, then you may not have seen that slant.

[tim-n-va]

@Damuri_Ajashi

OK, we will flip a coin 6 times and if they all come up heads, you give me $1000 and if they don’t then you give me $1000.

That is a different question than the one you responded to. If someone flips a coin five times and gets heads five times, what would you be willing to bet on the next toss?

[DSeid]

I am stuck deciding which is more pathetic … those who are trying to spin fantasies of coin flip runs that did not occur and that would have had no measurable outcome impact on reported results of any sort even if they had as something nefarious, or Trump’s crybaby “I wuz robbed!” moment. It is pretty close.

[Sherrerd]

@tim-n-va

That is a different question than the one you responded to. If someone flips a coin five times and gets heads five times, what would you be willing to bet on the next toss?

The ‘Hillary cheated’ storyline isn’t about five (or six) tosses of one coin, though. It’s about six separate, geographically separated coins (and their tosses).

[Corporal_Clegg]

And each time she chose to receive.

But seriously folks, if the “win” was a matter of the outcomes of coin tosses, is it really a win? This ain’t football where a one point win counts at the end of the season as much as a 55 point romp. Politically Bernie won a victory of sorts. Perhaps they’ll change the decision. That state is weird that way.

[Sherrerd]

@Corporal_Clegg

Perhaps they’ll change the decision. That state is weird that way.

True, but given past history (such as Santorum being declared winner in 2012, 17 days after the caucus had taken place), several primaries may go by before they announce any change (if they do).

[DSeid]

And if comprehending that the win, such as it was, was not a matter of coin tosses, is something that you still cannot do, then is it really worth discussing?

Sanders needed to minimally not significantly lose. He hit the that minimum. No matter how hard it gets spun it is no way a victory of any sort. With this result he can take his to come expected blow out in NH, get past expected significant losses in NV and SC (especially if he loses by less than expected), and have a sales pitch to make going into Super Tuesday. And any given Tuesday … small but non-zero chance of coming out of that a still viable candidate.

Whining about imagined ways that you wuz robbed though (even if by your surrogates and not yourself) does not play to the Presidential image that he should be cultivating. It takes away from minimal value the result gave him.

[RTFirefly]

@amarinth

If, as you say, delegate allocation is incidental, then calling someone the winner because they got more delegates isn’t accurate. The news stories that I saw were doing exactly that. Perhaps we watch/read different media.

That’s some world-class nitpicking you’re doing there, not to mention you’re blurring the difference between precinct-level delegates (the closest we can come on the Dem side to a count of the participants’ preferences) and the state delegates to the Dem convention this summer.

I mostly agree with you, that this caucus is mostly about setting and meeting expectations, gaining momentum, convincing donors, and setting the next round of media coverage. But the news that I saw used “won” for candidates solely based on delegate count.

Because it was the closest they could get to a count of the actual participants’ preferences.

Also, the stories that I saw implied that this was a winner take all event, that whoever “won” got Iowa. To me, that’s also not accurate. If you came across different stories, then you may not have seen that slant.

Look, an Olympic event hands out gold, silver, and bronze medals for first, second, and third places. The winner of the gold did not ‘take all’ because there are two other medals. But it is normal English usage to say the winner of the gold ‘won’ the event, without any further qualifiers. It’s optional but hardly necessary to say they won the gold.)

IOW, saying someone ‘won’ a primary doesn’t imply winner-take-all. It just means that person did better than anyone else.

[doorhinge]

@steronz

I just saw that NPR debunked this this morning, I didn’t read it that closely because this is just reddit trash.

More details in the link.

NPR story doesn’t seem to debunk the coin flip story. According to the linked article:

It’s been reported that there were as many as six sites where ties were decided by the flip of a coin — and Clinton won every single one.

NPR provides a video of one of the coin tosses, which Hillary wins.

https://amp.twimg.com/amplify-web-player/prod/source.html?video_url=https%3A%2F%2Fvideo.twimg.com%2Fext_tw_video%2F694345570148679681%2Fpu%2Fvid%2F1280x720%2Fzpa7cMFDDNd6Zm7g.mp4&content_type=video%2Fmp4&scribe_playlist_url=http%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FFernandoPeinado%2Fstatus%2F694345745420320768%2Fvideo%2F1&image_src=https%3A%2F%2Fpbs.twimg.com%2Fext_tw_video_thumb%2F694345570148679681%2Fpu%2Fimg%2FlSC0Qt0-jTcEJGyl.jpg&video_owner_id=47785664&language_code=en&media_id=694345570148679681&json_rpc=1

That’s one.

The NPR story also mentions a second coin toss that Hillary won.

*As NPR’s Jessica Taylor reports, the Des Moines Register explained how a tie happened at one precinct: After 60 registered caucusgoers were missing since the initial tally, and O’Malley’s supporters had been redistributed, Clinton was assigned four delegates and Sanders got three. But one remained unassigned based on the initial count:

"Unable to account for that numerical discrepancy and the orphan delegate it produced, the Sanders campaign challenged the results and precinct leaders called a Democratic Party hot line set up to advise on such situations.

“Party officials recommended they settle the dispute with a coin toss. A Clinton supporter correctly called ‘heads’ on a quarter flipped in the air, and Clinton received a fifth delegate.”*

That’s two.

The NPR article references a Des Moines Register article (linked below) that mentions several more coin tosses.

*In a handful of Democratic caucus precincts Monday, a delegate was awarded with a coin toss.

It happened in precinct 2-4 in Ames, where supporters of candidates Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton disputed the results after 60 caucus participants apparently disappeared from the proceedings.

As a result of the coin toss, Clinton was awarded an additional delegate, meaning she took five of the precinct’s eight, while Sanders received three.

…Similar situations were reported elsewhere, including at a precinct in Des Moines, at another precinct in Des Moines, in Newton, in West Branch and in Davenport. In all five situations, Clinton won the toss.*

That’s three, four, five, six, and seven. (The “a precinct in Des Moines” is a repeat of another listed coin toss).

Sometimes, Iowa Democrats award caucus delegates with a coin flip

Sage Rosenfels

Trip Gabriel

Just Julia

https://twitter.com/andytadlock/status/694340486908088320

Hillary was very lucky that night.

I’m hearing that the Des Moines Register is now calling for a complete recount of the caucuses.

[doorhinge]

@DSeid

I am stuck deciding which is more pathetic … those who are trying to spin fantasies of coin flip runs that did not occur and that would have had no measurable outcome impact on reported results of any sort even if they had as something nefarious, or Trump’s crybaby “I wuz robbed!” moment. It is pretty close.

It appears that the Democrat coin flips did occur and are not fantasies.

AFAIK, Trump is suggesting that Cruz surrogates were telling caucus attendees that Ben Carson had dropped out of the race. Carson supporters may have then chosen to vote for other candidates, such as Cruz. Which could explain why the polls were wrong???

[Telemark]

@doorhinge

It appears that the Democrat coin flips did occur and are not fantasies.

No one ever claimed they were - it’s right there in the rules that coin flips are the way to resolve those issues, and they were to be expected. The question here is were there only 6 (all won by Clinton) or were there more, some won by each candidate?

[CarnalK]

@doorhinge

AFAIK, Trump is suggesting that Cruz surrogates were telling caucus attendees that Ben Carson had dropped out of the race. Carson supporters may have then chosen to vote for other candidates, such as Cruz. Which could explain why the polls were wrong???

That is what happened. Cruz apologized and said it was a mistake because it was announced Cain was not travelling to New Hampshire. I doubt enough people switched to make a difference in the final result though.