Nate Silver Cursed Out By Right-Winger

Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight interviewed John Ziegler, who commissioned a Zogby poll purporting to prove that Obama voters are uninformed. Things started off testy:

NS: What was the right answer to that [Palin] question?

JZ: The technically accurate question [sic] is that none of the four people said that, but we counted it as correct if they said Sarah Palin.

NS: Why would you commission a survey question with no correct response?

JZ: The purpose of the question, you pinhead, was we wanted to determine the Tina Fey Effect.

And it only got worse, ending with Ziegler telling Silver to "go fuck yourself."

NS: Would you consider yourself well-informed?

JZ: I'd consider myself extremely well-informed.

NS: Who are the two senators from South Dakota

JZ: Thune and, uh, Johnson.

Story continues below

NS: Very good. South Carolina?

JZ: Go fuck yourself. I'm done with this interview if you're going to ask me stupid questions like that. Obviously I know who Lindsay Graham is.

NS: Well, since you're running a website calling people misinformed, I'd like to see if -- there are certain things you've said that I would consider misinformed.

JZ: Misinformed? You're a piece of work! You are never going to have the guts to post a representative transcript on your website! I thought you actually ran a legitimate website!

NS: Thank you, have a good day.

JZ: Go fuck yourself.

Comments

[iBlog4Fun]

Nerds and statisticians everywhere rejoice!
I've watched him on MSNBC a couple times and I knew there was something special about this guy . Heard he just inked a couple of book deals.

[KQuarksSuperKollider]

Go Nate you are the man who not only kept be sane in the primaries but in the general election.

Nate is a perfect example of how tro//s cannot handle the truth and are all a bunch of no nothing li ars.

[momof3inGA]

LOLOLOLOL!!!!!

[JimGroom]

Obviously the truth hurts. LOL

[PalmG]

Why is it when I try to go to the fiverthirtyeight webiste, I NEVER get anything to come up? Just the polls on the side. Does anyone else have this issue? I've never seen anything more than the side pie charts on this site, the rest of the screen is blank. I'm confused...

[momof3inGA]

I've never had a problem seeing the blog and comments, which are in the middle of the page, between the charts.

[dharmagal108]

Just click on Electoral Projections Done Right at the top, this will give you all the updated info.

As always, well done Nate.

[frankcaprafan]

Hilarious! He interviewed him as an anthropologist would a neanderthal.

[ArthurTwoShedsJackson]

I think you owe those two nice GEICO caveman guys an apology for comparing them to John Ziegler. ;-)

[Owlygirl]

Awesome composure Nate. Can't say I'd be able to do the same. Lol!

[PlantGod72]

The NeoCons are LOSING IT big time!

[xrepublican]

Clearly another example of someone permanently damaged by ALWAYS being the last in everything - a victim of alphabetical order victimization. Ziegler is overcompensating for all the slights he's suffered in life...................

[2tootired]

Looks like Ziegler is now attacking Nate at fivethirtyeight.com...

Comment number 567.

Not quite sure what to conclude from his rant, other than, perhaps, asking questions is always a sign of weakness and ignorance. Which seems odd coming from a person who's core idea rests on a very faulty poll.

I think Nate's responses are polite, and that politness drove Ziegler more crazy than anything else. Also, Ziegler's responses really do seem to fit in that 'any publicity is good publicity' kind of thinking.

Nice job, Mr. Silver.

[frankcaprafan]

Where? I didn't find the comments numbered.

[Hayduke1969]

Nate's website was my only link to sanity for the 3 months leading up to the election. It's so great to see him now using his ample wits to help these pathological haters become even more unhinged.

In really high concentrations, fear actually becomes substantive. You can actually hold it in you hand. Just tonight, while visiting Free Republic, I cut off a piece of fear with a knife and ate it. It tasted like pickled herring.

[MIMom]

You better get the ipecac stat - that Freeper stuff is TO.XIC!!!!!!!

[iblog]

That is way too funny.

[lisakaz2]

Way to keep your cool, Nate. Much props. You rock.

[MIMom]

Stay classy, Ziegler.

Nate Silver is cool, but a nerd deluxe - who could look at that dude and say "F * U" unless the person saying it was a real a-hole. C'mon.

No other way to describe JZ - what a doosh.

[lisakaz2]

LOL. That was fun to read.

[WESTFIELD]

For those of who don't know, John Ziegler ran a talk show (surprise surprise) here in Los Angeles for a few years before being fired. He apparently had a run in with the #1 afternoon drive time talk hosts and lost his cool which he seems to have a pattern of doing. Ziegler like most rabid talking heads is that they are little kids. Whenever they don't get it their way, they totally freak out. Look how many times he curses in story above. That was him on radio too. He would call his listeners who didn't agree with him all sorts of names. Small brained idiots like John Ziegler are insecure close minded losers who have reached a point in their life (mid-life) and have nothing to show for it and that is why they are so angry and seething with hatred.

[ConfuciusSay-]

Not in his dreams could Ziegler approach the precision and cool rationality of Mr. Silver. The results speak for themselves, and we know which one to trust in the future. Surely that must rankle Ziegler almost as much as the election result itself.