Nate Silver Snarks His Best Snark in Response to Paul Krugman

Paul Krugman has been noticeably critical of Nate Silver and FiveThirtyEight recently, saying that it’s not good enough to present statistics and data, you need to “tell me why the data matter!” He’s calling the new version “like something between a disappointment and a disaster” and critiques it for “sloppy and casual opining.” Well, not taking this lying down, Silver shot back with a post on the FiveThirtyEight blog today in which Silver plants tongue firmly in cheek.

Silver goes through all the times Krugman has referenced him and FiveThirtyEight on his blog, and using the statistical analysis Krugman finds lacking, he concludes that Krugman’s coverage over FiveThirtyEight was almost entirely positive when Silver was at The New York Times and universally negative since he left. Silver mockingly suggests Krugman could be right in his suggestion FiveThirtyEight’s simply gotten worse in the intervening time.

To be sure, the difference in Mr. Krugman’s views could reflect a decline in quality for FiveThirtyEight. The web site has brought on almost two dozen new employees and contributors. And it has expanded its coverage beyond politics into sports, economics and other areas.

Oh yay, a nerd fight…

[photo via ESPN, Commonwealth Club]

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Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

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