Who will win the
midterm elections? Microsoft this week launched a new service that
predicts the winner of each Senate, House, and gubernatorial seat
over which politicians are fighting.
Called “Bing
Elections,” the tool anticipates that the Republican Party will
without question remain in control of the House and they will
likely the take control over the Senate. There’s only 10 percent
confidence in Democrats’ ability to keep the Senate, and in that
case, they’d only have two more seats than their counterparts.
Microsoft suggests that Democratic senatorial candidates will
easily win or retain seats in twelve states: Oregon, New Mexico,
Minnesota, Michigan, Illinois, Virginia, North Carolina, Delaware,
New Jersey, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and
Hawaii.
The New Republic recently gravely announced, “The fate of
the Senate could come down to Alaska.”
Well, if the
number crunchers at Microsoft are right, the fate of the Senate is
in Republicans’ hands. GOP candidate Dan Sullivan has a 81 percent
chance of winning.
Likewise, in nail-biter swing states Colorado and Iowa, Team Red
players have 10 percent leads over their opponents. In spite of
former President Bill Clinton’s cheerleading in Arkansas, the GOP
candidate has an 83 percent chance of winning.
Bing Corporate Vice President Derrick Connell explains why his
company got into the game of election forecasting:
According to a recent survey conducted on behalf of Bing, 50
percent of people said that they don’t feel confident about voting
this November with 70 percent stating they don’t feel informed on
all the issues. …Our goal with Bing Elections and the personalized Voter Guide is
to arm voters so they can make decisions based on the most
comprehensive and best information available. Whether
it’s the senate race at the national level or a proposition
affecting your city, we’re hoping to give you the confidence
to make the most out of your vote.
This isn’t Microsoft’s first foray into guessing games. The
company also operates the
Microsoft Prediction Lab, a crowdsourced “sort of online
betting parlor for everything from political races to the U.S.
military presence overseas” and apolitical things like NFL
games.
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