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Dan Hintz

Dan Hintz's picture
St.. Paul, MN
Commenter for
5 years 16 weeks

Recent Comments

Posted on 05/22/13 at 10:39 am in response to Poll: Franken has big lead over 'opponents'

While I appreciate your discussion of polling of elections that occurred 35 and 44 years ago, I would think that more recent election polling would be more relevant. In a study of final polls for the 2012 presidential election, PPP (the polling company currently used by the Star Tribune) was actually the most accurate pollster.

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Posted on 05/22/13 at 12:37 pm in response to Poll: Franken has big lead over 'opponents'

You forgot to mention that PPP conducted another poll in that race right before the election, which showed that in the two weeks, Sanford had closed that gap and taken the lead.

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2013/05/sanford-has-momentum-in-...

I don't know what you mean by it is "...

Posted on 05/17/13 at 03:47 pm in response to Ranked-choice voting: Minneapolis data show people use it with sophistication

Jacobs asserts that no more than a quarter or a third of voters will rank multiple candidates. In arguing that Jacobs is wrong, instead of providing data that proves it, the author substitutes a completely different question. The author states:

"Of the 832 people who voted for one of the third- and fourth-place candidates or write-ins, 525 had a second choice counted. That’s 63 percent."

and

"Of the 498 people who voted for one of the candidates who got the fewest...

Posted on 05/18/13 at 05:10 pm in response to Ranked-choice voting: Minneapolis data show people use it with sophistication

"that his thesis does nothing to explain the cases of competitive elections cited, where a large majority of voters did indeed rank their choices."

That's the problem here - for the competitive elections cited, what was discussed was not the percentage of voters who ranked their choices, but rather the percentage of voters who ranked who had their votes actually count. Its a different question, and one that is irrelevant to Jacobs's point. The only race cited where that information...

Posted on 05/19/13 at 11:47 am in response to Ranked-choice voting: Minneapolis data show people use it with sophistication

If you look back at my initial comment, I wasn't claiming that Jacobs was right or wrong. My complaint was that the author was mocking him without presenting any evidence. Presenting an additional datapoint, as you did, doesn't qualify either. I think the best comment here was by Connie Sullivan, who said "[c]iting a second-hand media account of Larry Jacobs and using that to challenge his professional knowledge of how Americans vote is sophomoric, at best." Given that Fairvote is an...

Posted on 05/19/13 at 08:48 pm in response to Ranked-choice voting: Minneapolis data show people use it with sophistication

Lee did not get 61.2 percent of the vote. He got 43.4 percent - a plurality. 194,418 votes were cast in the election. 84,457 ballots named Lee as their first, second or third choice. The second place candidate, John Avalos, was named as a first, second or third choice on 57,160 ballots. 52,524 ballots did not name either Lee or Avalos. If you only count the votes that went to the first and second place candidates, then Lee had a majority. But that's no different than saying that Mark...

Posted on 05/14/13 at 05:41 am in response to Minnesota Senate joins House in approving same-sex marriage

The governor has actually signed dozens of bills this session. That is something you can actually look up.

Posted on 05/10/13 at 05:20 pm in response to House's historic same-sex marriage vote greeted with eerie silence — and then roar from the masses

to have that kind of insight about God. To know that you are right about God and those who disagree with you are wrong.

Posted on 04/16/13 at 03:13 pm in response to Vaccine fear-mongering has muffled legitimate research on vaccine safety

If you want better vaccine research, stop promoting criminals like Andrew Wakefield. This isn't about malfeasance or mediocrity. Wakefield is a fraud and a liar who was stripped of his medical license. If you are unwilling to accept that there is and never has been a proven link between vaccines and autism, you have no business criticizing anyone else's research.

Posted on 04/16/13 at 07:02 pm in response to Vaccine fear-mongering has muffled legitimate research on vaccine safety

First of all, its not Dr. Wakefield. His medical license was taken away and has not been reinstated. He remains unable to practice medicine, not that he was doing that anyway.

I actually read the link you provided, and the reason that Walker-Smith got his license back was that they could not prove that he was guilty of the transgressions that Wakefield was guilty of. The article indicates that Walker-Smith tried to distance himself from Wakefield's conclusion even early on....