"FiveThirtyEight’s leaning more towards Biden every day."

Huh? I've been going to fivethirtyeight.com habitually in recent weeks, and the odds have been hovering between 75%-25% for Biden and 75%-24% for Biden. In other words, Nate and gang have been seeing this as a stagnant race.

Hopefully it will rain tonight.

Otherwise the air quality monitor (I'm one of the stations) says 308 right now.

Which is very very very very bad.

Sigh.

Was hoping for a Charles one today to see if Toots Hibbert would get a shout, although his reggae may be too mainstream for Charles.
Oh well.
"Reggae is a message of consolation; a message of salvation. The youth are going to the school and they have to listen to the words. The parents have to listen to the words. God has to listen to the words. So, we have to make it positive. If you sing nursery rhymes, it is nothing. You just blow up tomorrow, and the record dies at the same time. But if you give positive words, that song lives forever."

Will @3, what's your sense as to the first day it will be safe again to exercise outside?

The sneering, ugly item about gender reveal parties is beneath The Stranger. Using derogatory terms like "the hets" is the kind of thing I'd expect from a snotty, unfunny gay boy. Nobody needs that kind of crap right now. Also, I don't find anything wrong with gender reveal parties. They are harmless fun, or should be.

"his algorithm’s been wrong before, oh lord has it been wrong"

As a gambler, this annoys the hell out of me.

Let's say we're flipping coins. My prediction is that there's a 50% chance you get heads, 50% chance you get tails. George Badluck says there's an 92% chance it will be heads. John Fallacy says he's been on a lucky streak with tails, so there's an 80% chance it will be tails.

Now, whose prediction is right? Let's flip the coin, shall we?
....

It came up heads! That means Mr. Badluck was right, correct? His prediction was more accurate than mine, yes?

Fivethirtyeight said Clinton had a 69% chance of winning, Trump had a 31% chance.

Things that have a 31% chance of happening, happen all the time. I've seen someone roll doubles 4 times in a row. If another forecast said Clinton had a 30% chance of winning, and Trump won, that forecast wouldn't necessarily be more correct than fivethirtyeight's forecast, which said Clinton had a 69% chance of winning.

The misguided and annoying:

Trump supporters
Q-Anon
Furries

Sure, sure, harmless fun. Until you get your testicles blown up or start a massive wildfire with your harmless lil' 'splody.

And why are they even called "gender reveal parties" when in fact they're "biological sex reveal parties"?

“Hahaha no, it’s because school mostly exists to provide busywork daycare, and kids know it.“

Really? You are then part of Trumpland if you believe school is daycare. And that makes you an idiot.

@11: And should the child transition to the opposite sex later in life, these events become retroactively unfortunate.

@13 - they are "Penis Welcoming Ceremonies"

I'm with @8. Statements like Matt's, "his algorithm’s been wrong before, oh lord has it been wrong" shows exactly how little people understand math, probablity and reading.
The last model (note: it's not called a prediction) on 538 for the 2016 election gave Hillary a 71.4% CHANCE to win. https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/

Taking solace in the fact that Biden has a 74% chance right now is fine. Taking that to the bank is just proof that you don't learn from the past. Maybe you should go back to school, since it is actually more than daycare.

@8 If you're a gambling man you might like this.

MyBookie betting line:

Before Dem Convention:
Trump +130
Biden -110

September 2nd:
Trump -130
Biden +100

Now:
Trump: -105
Biden: -115

So a slight push towards Biden

"Not that Nate Silver is the Amazing Kreskin or anything — his algorithm’s been wrong before, oh lord has it been wrong "

Bullshit. You simply didn't understand the polls or the electoral system. Hillary Clinton's vote total was clearly within the margin of error (for the whole country). You just assumed that a lead that big would translate into an electoral victory. But very small wins in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin (all less than 1%) gave Trump the victory. In short, he lost the popular vote by a bunch, but got lucky in a few states.

That is why there is a lot more focus on statewide polling and why Silver went with a probability model. If Trump wins, it will again be because he got lucky (a roughly one in four chance). This is like calling heads twice, and winning both times. It could happen, but isn't likely.

@6 Lighting off incendiary devices to let people know your kid has a dick is harmless fun but using the term "the hets" is ugly? Ok boomer...

@10 "And why are they even called "gender reveal parties" when in fact they're "biological sex reveal parties"?

Because people are idiots. They don't want to use the word "sex" (too much giggling I guess), so they just use "gender". People then use the term wrong, like asking "what gender is your dog?", when in reality they want to know the sex. Gender has two meanings. The first is grammatical. Nouns in other languages have gender. The word "pen", in Spanish, is "pluma" and is feminine. The second meaning only applies to people, and it is what people consider themselves. For most people, sex and gender are the same, but the word gender makes it clear what you are talking about when it isn't.

This is why they wrote thesauruses. It wasn't to find a word that means the same thing, it was to figure out the subtle differences between words. Of course the more that people substitute the wrong word, the more it becomes simply a second meaning to the word, and the whole thing is stupidly muddled.

Trump loyalist/unqualified appointee goes off rails. Claims government scientists are working in secret to block Trump attempts to contain virus(???), calls for Trump supporters to arm themselves for conflict because Biden won't accept results of election, and shadows on his ceiling are following him. Only the best!

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/14/us/caputo-virus.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

Agreed with "the hets" phrasing sounding a bit hateful. Don't forget, Stranger, that at least a few of us readers are also het, and if we're on the Stranger site, we are almost guaranteed to agree that the gender reveal stuff is stupid nonsense. No need to make it into an us-vs-them thing.

@3: I was checking the AQI on airnow.gov, because that number seemed to high to me, and I see that it's not even close to the worst area reporting. At 10am, Chelan was reporting 501, which is off the goddamn scale. Jeez.

@21: I'd like to follow the Swedish model of healthcare, where everyone, you know, actually gets healthcare. Until that time, do us all a favor and volunteer in the COVID wing at your closest hospital without wearing a mask. It'll really own us libs, and I know that's all you live for.

@21 -- Jesus you are an idiot. Where to begin.

Just because Trump says he knows something about forest management, doesn't mean he does, or is willing to do something about it. He has had almost four years to convince his own party to spend money on reducing fire risks, but he hasn't done shit.

Second, here are the death per capita totals for Sweden, compared to similar Nordic countries:

Sweden: 578
Norway: 49
Finland: 61
Iceland: 29
Denmark: 109

Meanwhile, Sweden's approach didn't help their economy. It is still fucked, as expected: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/sweden-didnt-impose-a-lockdown-its-economy-is-just-as-bad-as-its-neighbors-who-did-2020-06-25

You are completely missing the point with regards to Sweden: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/business/sweden-economy-coronavirus.html. To quote the summary:

Its decision to carry on in the face of the pandemic has yielded a surge of deaths without sparing its economy from damage — a red flag as the United States and Britain move to lift lockdowns.

@21 Ha ha! Yes, we should all trust a real estate developer for expertise on forest management. Much like how a radiologist should be our most trusted source for all things pandemic related.

Sweden ranks very high in number of deaths per capita AND their economy still shrank by 9%. So I'd hardly say the herd immunity approach was the BEST course of action. And the Midsommar-esque result of sacrificing the elders probably wouldn't go over well with the AARP crowd. But Sweden's universal healthcare and generous social services are something we would be wise to adopt.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/denmark-and-sweden-responded-differently-to-the-pandemic-how-did-they-fare

I'm eagerly waiting for the day that Trumpty Dumpty, Dencey, Pencey, Mooch McDumbbell, Babyface Kavanaugh, their male offspring, ad nauseum get shot in the nads. Here's to the entire GOP Evil Empire going sterile.

Never mind the fact that even if we accept the bullshit platitude that "it's down to forest management", what is the Trump Administration doing to improve forest management so this doesn't keep happening?

A) Fuck all.
B) Blathering on about it pointlessly but actually doing fuck all.
C) Actively making it worse by pretending climate change isn't a factor.
D) Other (and you're gonna have to show your fucking work if you pick this option)

@21: Quit snorting hydroxychloroquine, Doofy.

@16:

Wasn't very welcoming to that soon-to-be-a-dad-again's penis...

@5 Every weather blog and Tweet I've read says that the smoke will be around until Friday.

What is lacking in straight people’s lives that they need to make a huge life-endangering spectacle over learning the shape of their child’s genitals? This gender reveal mania feels like a cry for help.

You must be young. Young enough that this world of 'show off every damn life event on social media no matter how trivial' is 'normal' to you, and the only time it is offensive is when straights do it.

New flash: all of you are crying for helpwith your constant need for social media validation every time you fart of make a really good poop.

RE: Nate Silver's 2016 election algorithm

Several people above have already correctly commented on statistics and probability so I won't reiterate there, but Nate Silver actually had one of the MOST accurate predictive models out there, not one of the worst.

And, we also don't know for sure about re-infection.

Gender reveal parties: Regardless of the sex or gender of the parents, let people have their fun as long as they're not causing harm or destruction in doing so. Gender reveals (as a concept) don't hurt anyone, and it's no one else's beeswax.

As a society, let's focus on the "acceptance" part if a person does choose to identify differently than what was assumed at birth.

I have to hand it to you, P&P, that's a better take on the matter.

@47: The buck stops with God.

Lot of talk about "the hets." I don't find that all that offensive, but have to wonder. Do gays never have gender reveal parties?

"[Massachusetts man was shot in the nads by a flare that was supposed to reveal the gender of his child.]" --@10

[omg -- the kid's gonna be a eunuch?]

ouch.