I didn't really pay much attention to the polling and such in the run up to the presidential election, so this probably old news. (I was part of the 0.1%, apparently.) However, Nature ran this article (in conjunction with Scientific American), entitled "Why math is like the honey badger".

http://www.nature.com/news/why-math-is-like-the-honey-badger...

I liked the name, I found the article interesting, and I think it has some quotes I'm going to have to remember:

"Like the infamous honey badger, math don’t care. Math don’t give a s$%."

To be honest, I wasn't really familiar with the honey badger either. There's a movie if you aren't, so don't worry. It's an article about math, particularly statistical modeling, so you know it has to be cool. I think it's worth a read.

There was a related article in the LA Times:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-fi-electio...

I think this bit from Dean Chambers (a conservative commentator and consultant) sums up the problem with the current crop of conservatives:

"Chambers' own calculations showed Romney winning big. But the longtime commentator and consultant erred, he said, because he didn't take polls at face value, refusing to include some polls out of concern that they over-sampled Democrats. In other words, Chambers said, he threw out data that seemed to favor Obama too much."

Whether it's the election, the economy, global warming, etc., when conservatives "analyze" the data, they through out the stuff they don't like so they reach the conclusion that want to reach.

-Anthony