Flashback 2016 The Economist: Hillary Clinton has got this. Probably. Very probably

Flashback 2016. The Economist reports:

THE 2016 presidential campaign has featured the most volatile polls in recent memory. According to the averages compiled by RealClearPolitics, Hillary Clinton led Donald Trump by six percentage points in late June, trailed him by one a month later, was up by eight in mid-August, was nearly tied in late September, gained a fresh seven-point advantage in mid-October and saw it dwindle to two by last week. But at the end of this whiplash-inducing political roller coaster, the national polls have come into alignment—perhaps with the aid of a modest dose of herding—and settled right around their long-term averages. The most recent nonpartisan, live-interviewer surveys with strong performance records all put Mrs Clinton ahead, by margins ranging from one (Marist College) to six (Monmouth University) percentage points, with the bulk giving her a four-point lead. Plus ça change, that happens to be precisely Barack Obama’s edge over Mitt Romney in 2012.

A stupefying amount of (digital) ink has been spilled in recent days over just how safe a four-point lead is or isn’t. Among quantitative models, at the high end the Princeton Election Consortium and Huffington Post regard Mrs Clinton as a stone-cold lock to win, at 99% and 98%. At the other extreme, FiveThirtyEight is far more cautious, giving her a mere 71% chance. The New York Times’s Upshot forecast, as well as betting markets on both sides of the Atlantic split the difference, putting Mrs Clinton in the low 80’s—the same probability, it is often noted, as losing at six-shooter

Russian roulette.

Imagine that...