Nate Silver
"Late Show" host Stephen Colbert had quite the introduction for fivethirtyeight founder Nate Silver Wednesday night.
"My next guest is the seer of seers, sage of sages, the prognosticator of prognosticators, and election prophet extraordinary," Colbert announced before bringing Silver on the show.
Of course, the host couldn't help but start off with the question everyone asks Silver.
"Who will win?" he asked the election prophet.
Silver doesn't have high hopes for Trump and believes we'll soon be done hearing about him
"Let's put it like this. Clinton came in with about a 7-point lead [tonight] before the [final presidential] debate and the polls showed... the scientific and the unscientific polls showed Clinton winning the debate," Silver told Colbert, adding "It's as though she was ready in the football game and Trump threw a pick-6, so it's not looking too good for Donald J. Trump."
But Colbert wasn't letting his guest off the hook so easily.
"Here's the thing," Colbert told him. "You have been surprisingly accurate over the last few elections with one exception, with one candidate, who is that candidate you got wrong?"
Silver knew where the conversation was headed
"We evolved. We were skeptical," he told the host.
"Who did you get wrong, what was his name?" Colbert teased.
"Donald J. Trump," Silver admitted.
Stephen was still shocked.
"Why did you get him wrong?" Colbert wanted to know.
"We had silly ideas and didn't look at the polls," Silver explained. "The polls were pretty accurate in the GOP Primary and had him ahead the whole way. A couple of states like Iowa where he was supposed to win, he didn't."
Now, the GOP's big problem is pretty simple.
"He only has about 38% of the vote. Clinton has 45% of the vote," Silver said, although admittedly there are some undecideds left.
"I don't think he did a good job of persuading them tonight," said Silver, though Colbert believes it's not "more information" the Ken Bones of America need but "more medication."
Aside from who will win, the most pertinent question for Americans is: Will our democratic system be accepted by this election's loser?
"What are the odds this is over on November 9?" Colbert asked Silver. "Because Trump says, 'Yeah, I'll let you know,'" he explained, referring to comments made by the GOP nominee when asked by moderator Chris Wallace in the debate.
Silver thinks it's safe to say Trump's bluffing.
"Trump has occupied so much space in my head for a year and a half and a lot of Americans' heads.... I can't swear, but people might have a certain reaction to tell him maybe to be quiet, to shut up [after the election]," Silver predicted.
And even though "Trump doesn't generally respond to those requests," as Colbert pointed out, historically he will.
"People are so exhausted by this election," Silver reminded the host, adding that accepting election results is a non partisan issue.
"Look even Al Gore, John Kerry, Mitt Romney, who all lost the elections by relatively narrow margins, probably narrower than Trump [will], they stood down," he said.
We'll see.
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