FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver, one of the most respected numbers guys around, like most of us thought Maine’s marriage law would not be repealed. It was. Before you sharpen your pen – or your sword – read his analysis. The key part is this:
“We had given Question 1 about a 70 percent chance of being defeated based on a combination of an analysis of the polling and a statistical model. I don’t know how much time I’m supposed to spend defending being on the wrong side of a 70:30 bet — we build in a hedge for a reason — but here comes a little self-reflection. As for the polling, I think we have to seriously consider whether there is some sort of a Bradley Effect in the polling on gay rights issues… I’ll need to look whether the urban-rural divide is a significant factor in a state in addition to its religiosity: Maine is secular, but rural. At the end of the day, it may have been too much to ask of a state to vote to approve gay marriage in an election where gay marriage itself was the headline issue on the ballot. Although the enthusiasm gap is very probably narrowing, feelings about gay marriage have traditionally been much stronger on the right than the left, and that’s what gets people up off the couch in off-year elections.”
I’ll just emphasize one point: The Roman Catholic Church’s dioceses (I have to use the word “dioceses” or I’ll get into trouble) spent a lot of time and money lying to people about us. And yet we’re supposed to turn the other cheek?