Stossel the Fool

Townhall.com ^ | November 16 | John Stossel

[Kaslin]

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I was so dumb last week.

I wrote my column Tuesday -- before election results were in. I assumed Hillary Clinton would be president-elect.

I looked so stupid.

On Facebook, commenters pounced: You owe Trump an apology! I'm sorry for the lies you continued about him! You were never fair! You're nothing but another left-wing mouthpiece. You're a washed up, anti-American gutless TV host!

I was wrong because I trusted the bettors.

That's usually not dumb. The best predictor of things has been betting markets. They are more accurate because they reflect the wisdom of crowds. Crowds can be an ignorant mob, but crowds do have wisdom. Know the TV show "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire"?

When contestants are stumped, they may ask the audience for help or an expert. The experts are often brilliant specialists. The audience -- well, they are the kind of people who wait in line in the rain to watch a game show. Still, the audience gets the answer right 91 percent of the time, the experts succeed just 65 percent of the time.

With betting markets, the crowd is made up of people willing to put their money where their mouths are. That makes them extra careful.

Most of these "prediction markets" are based overseas because, useful as they are, American law calls them "illegal gambling."

So producer Maxim Lott and I converted European betting into an easy to understand website, Electionbettingodds.com, and I've come to trust it. Again and again, betting is more accurate than pundits and polls -- until this election.

I'm not the only one who got it wrong. The Huffington Post's statistical model gave Clinton a 98 percent chance of winning. The prestigious Princeton Election Consortium gave Clinton a 99 percent chance.

People just lie to pollsters when they think the pollster will sneer at them if they say they're voting for someone smugly described as racist and sexist.

This was the second time this year that betting markets were wrong. Most bettors thought Brexit would never happen -- people in Britain would vote to stay in the European Union. Again, British voters lied to pollsters because they were embarrassed to admit they would vote for Brexit after months of the elite telling them they were xenophobes and racists if they wanted a change.

Relying on the betting markets, I also wrote that it was sad that freedom-loving senators like Wisconsin's Ron Johnson lost to command-and-control bureaucrats like Russ Feingold.

Oops, wrong again.

But the prediction markets are right most of the time.

Consider what happened early in this year's Republican primary. Ben Carson surged to first place in polls, but the bettors knew better. They never gave him more than a 9 percent chance. In 2012, when Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich and then Herman Cain surged to first place in polls, prediction markets correctly said Mitt Romney will win. In 2008, bettors correctly predicted results in every state but two. In 2012, it was every state but one.

The markets even predicted when Saddam Hussein would be captured. Right before his hideout was found, the odds on that date tripled in price. Somehow, people with skin in the game pay more attention and intuit the right outcome.

Even last week, when bettors were wrong, the betting odds still adjusted faster than pundits on TV did. The bettors saw what was happening and quickly hedged their bets, while many in the media -- mostly Clinton supporters -- still clung to their failed expectations.

My failure won't make me abandon prediction markets and go back to trusting pundits or opinion polls -- or internet commenters who had fun trashing me:

"Dewey beats Truman ... oh wait."

"I can't laugh enough at this article."

"I liked Stossel ... but he is as clueless as the liberal media."

I sure was! But I will still trust prediction markets over everything else.

There is wisdom in crowds, especially crowds that put their own money on the line.

[Kaslin]

BTTT

Thanks

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I consider myself a, ‘ConservaTarian.’

It’s a Libertarian without all the dope smokin’! ;)

[marktwain]

Yes, he has done a lot of good work.

He will be around a while.

[1Old Pro]

whatever

[catnipman]

John’s problem is he doesn’t understand the betting markets were rigged. For example, on Predictit.com the total bet in a marketplace is limited to one million bucks. This is easy for a pro-Hillary person to manipulate with a relative small amount of money, and it’s apparently worth it for them to lose that relative small amount of money to get fools like Stossel to go on air and yammer about how the betting markets practically guarantee a Hillary win.

It was obvious the betting odds were massively skewed from reality, instead of 5-1 against Trump, actual odds should have been closer to 50-50. Another tip-off was that the odds never shifted much no matter what the news: bad news for Trump, odds don’t move much; bad news for Hillary, odds don’t move much.

I decided those rigged odds were too good to pass up, and made A BUTTLOAD of money by betting max amounts allowed in all four predictit.com markets tied to Trump’s election.

Stossel needs to quit putting blind faith in the shiny new paint job on the betting car, and look under the hood to see what’s really going on. Otherwise, he’ll be writing many more “Stossel the Fool” articles in the future.

[InABunkerUnderSF]

Easier to read:

But not as poetic. :-)

[Grampa Dave]

Clueless Stossel trying to get on the Trump Train!

[Kaslin]

And they were all betting sites from overseas.

[JonPreston]

Stossel took 700+ words to say what could have been accomplished in few, "as a Libertarian I am a member of the 0.001% and as clueless as they come."

[Leep]

The Caboose on the Trump Train is getting mighty crowded.

[Alas Babylon!]

Also, I think a lot of bettors, sensing a sure thing, came out of the woodwork to cash in on Hillary.

Normally, people like this wouldn’t bet at all, at least online.

Think: The people who rushed out to buy Dutch tulips, because everyone else was doing so, for example.

[Kaslin]

You know what?

You can do what I tell these "Trump is not my President" morons, which is they can jump down from a cliff for all I care.

[Emergencyawesome]

No doubt he didn’t know person who voted for Trump

[luvbach1]

Let’s face it, while most Freepers were hoping against hope that the polls were wrong, many had the sinking feeling that they might have been right. And then there were those who were confident of a Trump win and had their confidence fully justified by the results.

[Beagle8U]

Stossel is a Liberaltarian moron.

[HarleyD]

The ones who I heard even mention that Hillary might lose were people who used non-polling information such as the stock market, AI, Twitter feeds, and even a monkey in China. Polling is nothing but crap-just like the poll that says Obama has a 54% popularity rating. They keep repeating the polls over and over and we’re expected to believe them.

[SuziQ]

Given all that, I would have bet the farm on OH at least going for Trump and perhaps winning it all.

I thought he DID win Ohio. I watched the election returns, and haven't really watched much since, cause I was out of town all last week, and wasn't paying much attention to the news.

[DoughtyOne]

The Stossel odds showed Hillary Clinton at 84% and Trump at 15% at 17:55 EST on November 8th, 2016. That’s right, just a few hours before the polls closed.

I knew from watching the forum for just less than two months that it was being gamed by the Clinton camp. They thought it was a great ploy to drive her percentages up there and bad mouth anyone buying the other direction as absolute fools. They did this for months on end.

Who bets $84.00 to win $100? They did this for months while betters (Conservaives) were paying $20 to win $100 if Trump prevailed.

It was his forum that I won $1,100 dollars on.

Easiest $1,100 dollars I ever earned, and it was 100% Liberal money all the way.

How can you beat that.

Stossel is usually pretty savvy, but he missed this one by a country mile.

Clinton camp, cheating again! Love it!

Thanks for the money!

[Vendome]

Stossel is a great guy and this was very classy...

[DoughtyOne]

It was basing it’s odds on PredictIt.com at least in part.

That’s U. S. based.