What do you get when you cross the college basketball March Madness tournament with politicians? November Nonsense!!!
November Nonsense is for political junkies. It’s for those of you who follow politics closely and think they have a good idea of what the results are going to be. It’s for nutcases who look at Election Night the same way some people view Oscar night, Super Bowl Sunday or New Year’s Eve. It’s for the people who plan on taking Wednesday, November 3rd off so they can stay up late Tuesday night to watch the results roll in from Hawaii.
November Nonsense is THE contest for pitting your political insight against others. Contestants will submit their predictions on the 2010 US House and Senate elections and the winner will be crowned the 2010 Political Prediction God (or some other silly title that I haven’t come up with yet) and be entitled to all the boasting and bragging that comes with that honor.
I haven’t finalized the details and am interested in feedback. However, here’s the basic process: 1) Select your predictions for each race in the MS-Excel sheet I will post at a later date 2) Submit your entry by October 31st 3) I’ll collect the entries and publish the results 4) To avoid any conflict of interest issues, you are not allowed to submit predictions for any election you can actually vote in. When submitting your entries, identify which (if any) races you are eligible to vote in and you will automatically be given credit for predicting the correct winner (no prediction necessary for those races) 5) One entry per person 6) Should there be a tie-breaker?
March Madness normally has 64 predictions total. This could have close to 500 if all the Congressional and Senate races are included. Then there are the state governor races… In order to keep it manageable and not become so huge no one plays, I’ve decided to limit the number of races to just the Senate races and the “in play” House races. In other words, Nancy Pelosi’s and John Boehner’s races are not included. I would appreciate input for how large to make this. I’ve come up with 3 options: A) About 153 races consisting of the 131 “in play” House and 22 “in play” Senate races. In Scenario A, “in play” is defined as spanning from “Likely Dem” to “Likely GOP” but not including “Solid Dem/GOP”. B) About 103 races consisting of 89 “in play” House and 14 “in play” Senate races. In Scenario B, “in play” is defined as spanning from “Leans Dem” to “Leans GOP” but not including “Likely/Solid Dem/GOP”. C) 41 races consisting of 35 “toss-up” House races and 6 “toss-up” Senate races. I’m leaning towards Scenario B because that opens up a lot of close races that could have upsets without making November Nonsense too huge.
Like I said, I would like some input, thoughts and commentary on whether anyone is interested in participating. As long as the number of contestants is not outrageous, I’ll leave it an open contest. I’m not planning on having an entry fee or awarding any prizes other than bragging rights.
Lastly, I’ve got most of Scenario B complete. All the primaries finished up this past weekend. I’ll target posting the beginning of October for posting the final rules, spreadsheet and directions.
This blog is long overdue.
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What do you get when you cross the college basketball March Madness tournament with politicians? November Nonsense!!!
ReplyDeleteNovember Nonsense is for political junkies. It’s for those of you who follow politics closely and think they have a good idea of what the results are going to be. It’s for nutcases who look at Election Night the same way some people view Oscar night, Super Bowl Sunday or New Year’s Eve. It’s for the people who plan on taking Wednesday, November 3rd off so they can stay up late Tuesday night to watch the results roll in from Hawaii.
November Nonsense is THE contest for pitting your political insight against others. Contestants will submit their predictions on the 2010 US House and Senate elections and the winner will be crowned the 2010 Political Prediction God (or some other silly title that I haven’t come up with yet) and be entitled to all the boasting and bragging that comes with that honor.
I haven’t finalized the details and am interested in feedback. However, here’s the basic process:
1) Select your predictions for each race in the MS-Excel sheet I will post at a later date
2) Submit your entry by October 31st
3) I’ll collect the entries and publish the results
4) To avoid any conflict of interest issues, you are not allowed to submit predictions for any election you can actually vote in. When submitting your entries, identify which (if any) races you are eligible to vote in and you will automatically be given credit for predicting the correct winner (no prediction necessary for those races)
5) One entry per person
6) Should there be a tie-breaker?
March Madness normally has 64 predictions total. This could have close to 500 if all the Congressional and Senate races are included. Then there are the state governor races… In order to keep it manageable and not become so huge no one plays, I’ve decided to limit the number of races to just the Senate races and the “in play” House races. In other words, Nancy Pelosi’s and John Boehner’s races are not included. I would appreciate input for how large to make this. I’ve come up with 3 options:
A) About 153 races consisting of the 131 “in play” House and 22 “in play” Senate races. In Scenario A, “in play” is defined as spanning from “Likely Dem” to “Likely GOP” but not including “Solid Dem/GOP”.
B) About 103 races consisting of 89 “in play” House and 14 “in play” Senate races. In Scenario B, “in play” is defined as spanning from “Leans Dem” to “Leans GOP” but not including “Likely/Solid Dem/GOP”.
C) 41 races consisting of 35 “toss-up” House races and 6 “toss-up” Senate races.
I’m leaning towards Scenario B because that opens up a lot of close races that could have upsets without making November Nonsense too huge.
Like I said, I would like some input, thoughts and commentary on whether anyone is interested in participating. As long as the number of contestants is not outrageous, I’ll leave it an open contest. I’m not planning on having an entry fee or awarding any prizes other than bragging rights.
Lastly, I’ve got most of Scenario B complete. All the primaries finished up this past weekend. I’ll target posting the beginning of October for posting the final rules, spreadsheet and directions.