Yeah, it's pretty clear at this point that Trump has the ability to turn out low-propensity voters who are hard to capture in polls. Fortunately it seems like the left turned out just enough to counteract that this time.
It's an open question how much Trump's approach works without Trump on the ballot.
it very likely doesn't work without T on the ballot. It's the Celebrity thing. Low propensity voters are only voting because the Celebrity of the ballot is drawing them in.
Arnie won the recall of Grey Davis due to Celebrity. He then proceeded to be not awful as governor, and got re-elected. He was the last R to seriously be considered statewide.
He wasn't actually a Republican with an "R" but more of a Democrat or Republican "lite". Protecting the California coast from drilling and other Hollywood-like beliefs made him an acceptable, if not sensational, governor. If allowed to run for president he might actually have won. If so, his administration probably would have been OK for the country actually.
It did work to a degree -- there was pretty high turnout in red states to defeat Democratic Senators (egged on by Trump). But it was also reduced from the Presidential year, so yeah there is definitely a dropoff without Trump around.
I suspect that's the case. If so, once the celebrity element is gone Republicans may have major issues with the suburban voters they lost during this period.
I think an underappreciated part of the inaccuracy of the polls (although at aggregate levels most seem to be within the standard error) is the turnout, which typically accounts for some weighting in the polls. In 2016 turnout was way down and it's looking like 2020 will have the highest turnout in over a century (~67%).
Spent a day and a half as an election official. Didn't arrest anyone, to some people's disappointment. However, pro-gerrymandering laws really allow transparency to someone in my position. Granted, election night in a single purple district is a subsect of a sub-sample that has tons of biases (eg, Nov 3 voters tend to skew heavily to GOP). But that doesn't stop me from seeing interesting observations:
Balanced district. 75% already voted before yesterday. 8% voted on the day. Record smashing turnout.
About 1% of attempted voters yesterday were teenagers who had no idea you had to register to vote in order to have your ballot count. Another 2% were teenagers who didn't know you couldn't vote anywhere you wanted after you initially registered.
About 10% were first-time voters.
All Vietnamese voters were clutching GOP voting guides. About 1% of voters on the day.
Almost all of the provisional ballots (ie, usually registration problems) were registered Democrats or Unaffiliated. Zero were GOP. One was Indian teenager who was registered Libertarian.
Four people refused to wear masks. Two were a father/son duo who are known crazies, who dress like hippies. One was a young black man who I snapped at him to put his mask on. I was not supposed to do that, but it came out. The last was an 18-year-old who did a mouth-only job. Everyone else (60%) GOP voters wore masks.
Four warnings went to campaigners for interfering with voters within the exclusion zone. Ironically, the guy who got warned the most was a guy who was an anti-voter-interference advocate.
Who stood out for NOT voting? South Asians.
There are a certain subset of people who come out to vote who you don't meet with every day. There are a surprising number of unseen people who are clearly crazy or stupid.
Near the end of the night, we talked with Election Judge before hand what consistitutes closing time (eg, time on the Tabulator? per cell phone?). We all agreed that we never saw anyone stroll in at closing on election night (early voting yes, election night no). So I am sent to the parking lot to see if anyone is in the parking lot to avoid such a weird situation. Sure enough, a kid is sauntering through the parking lot at 7:29 pm. The DEM campaigners are telling him to hurry up. He breaks into a faster walk. I see him and I yell "RUUUUNNNN!!!" and he breaks into a slow jog. He makes it into the 50-foot non-perimeter by a step and the Assistant Judge yells out "POLLS CLOSED!". The GOP campaigners yell that he is not inside. The DEMS say 50-foot counts. It goes to the Election judge, who let's him vote. Lo and behold, he is not registered to vote in the county.
I am always curious about how people don't know the registration rules and such. Perhaps they don't learn by reading, because all that is on EVERY piece of official election information that gets sent out.
Didn't check anything until No 1 texted me that "Tommy Fucking Tuberville" won. I asked him how things looked and he said trending not good. Checked every so often until I went to bed around 11. At the time Biden was down maybe 5-10 pts in az, mi, wi, and pa. When I woke up he either is close or on top in those states so I guess most mail in ballots are Dem as predicted. Crossing my fingers.
Drank some beer and worked on a puzzle to keep our minds off the results. Finally gave in around 10:30pm and switched between PBS and BBC for about an hour. Went to bed feeling uncertain about how many paths to victory Biden had. Woke up at 2:30 to feed cf-98, checked FiveThirtyEight and NPR to see that Biden's path to victory continued to narrow. Woke up at 7:30 with cautious optimism that a feasible path to victory remains.
Turkey and mashed potato dinner on outside patio at Harry's Plaza Cafe on Upper State in Santa Barbara. A little pre-season in preparation for Thanksgiving.
Made it a point to do a late workout so I couldn't check the news at all. After that (and shower), I periodically checked for updates while focusing on a Scrubs rewatch. I learned my lesson after the collapse four years ago.
Couldn't really sleep, kept checking my phone for updates. That was long enough to see Wisconsin turn in Biden's favor, so I felt pretty confident at that point that he was winning.
But not the big win that would have really turned things around in this country. Just gonna be more gridlock now.
I tried to avoid the news, but people kept updating me. That is also my strategy for the rest of the week. One of my friends is particularly obsessive to the detriment of her mental health (I'm not saying she SHOULDN'T care/be angry), so I'm trying to distract her, too. We'll be watching GBBO and other things over Zoom together.
The Arizona Republic is saying 450k ballots (mail-in and provisional) remain in Maricopa County, which Biden leads 52-46. An additional 150k ballots from around the state remain as well. Biden leads by 93k votes, so a flip seems unlikely.
Huff Po says Biden, MSNBC says too close. MSNBC says MI to Biden, but not Huff Po yet. So, it might be over, or it might not. PA, GA, NC are all still too close, and PA has a shitton of counting still to do.
Also depends on where in "Atlanta" since there are some really white suburban areas surrounding the city that's either also in Fulton County or in some other counties.
Assuming Biden's lead holds in NV and WI, winning MI puts him at 270. Biden currently trails by 24k, but Wayne County (home of Detroit and the largest county in the state) has only reported 63% and it is a heavily Democratic leaning county at 67-32 so far.
And two years of Biden unable to appoint judges, pass legislation, appoint his administration officials, big Covid stimulus is dead, small Covid stimulus is dead etc.
I'll be curious to see if McConnell uses this opportunity to "get back to normal" in Washington. If he had become Minority leader, the Dems wouldve rammed everything through but since he can effectively stop that now, I wonder if he'll deal with Biden on some things with the expectation that the Trump years stigma will fade a bit. Him criticizing Trump for the early victory today was mildly unexpected. I think Biden is going to want to repair the relationships across the aisle and McConnell may use that opportunity to re-establish the old school Washington swamp (as opposed to the Trumpian cesspool).
Nope. His goal will be a one term Biden Presidency. Best outcome is that whatever weird heath thing he has makes it so he has to retire in the next few months.
Trump's lead is down to 330k with over 1 million mail-in ballots yet to be counted. Philadelphia County, largest in the state and currently a 80-20 Biden lead, still hasn't reported 28% of its ballots. 4 of the top-5 most populous counties lean blue by an average of 30 points and still have to report 12-30% of their ballots.
SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- One day before they are scheduled to play the Green Bay Packers on Thursday Night Football, the San Francisco 49ers shut down their facility because of a positive COVID-19 test Wednesday morning.
The Niners confirmed the positive test after a league source told ESPN's Adam Schefter that wide receiver Kendrick Bourne tested positive. League sources told ESPN that Thursday's game is expected to go on as scheduled, pending more contact tracing and information.
In a statement, the Niners acknowledged the positive test and said they have entered the league's "intensive protocol."
Even if Biden pulls it out like I am cautiously optimistic he will, this was not the large rebuttal to Trumpism I was hoping for. There were no political statements, and I don't see the parties changing tack anytime soon.
Also, though much less powerful, Trump may be more annoying if he is not President.
Turns out the degree of outrage and backlash from some was mis-extrapolated to a much larger and broader population segment than it should have been. This is a repeat of sorts of the major error of 4 years ago. At some point, the Democratic party is going to need to come to grips with the fact that there are a lot of people who disagree with them vehemently, and figure out a way to work with at least some of them. Otherwise, the cycle is going to continue to repeat itself.
The frustrating thing is, if you're liberal, the Democratic party has already not done enough for the last however many years. I think a lot of that blame goes to Fox News (rather than the radical right). Inherently, I want to believe that a lot of the rural whites are not racist, but combating racism is just so extremely low on their priority.
Even some obviously needed election reforms, from just the ease to vote to abolish the electoral college, are unlikely to happen in the next 4 years, in my opinion.
I think there is something to the idea that Bernie-style economic populism is a strong argument (there are a lot of socially conservative but economically liberal voters out there for the taking). Just maybe from someone younger and more charismatic who doesn't call themselves a socialist.
I was hoping for a strong Biden win so that he could govern with a strong mandate from the voters. Looks like we won’t have that so things like court packing, getting rid of the filibuster, DC and PR statehood are probably all off the table.
Trump will be crying for the next 4 years that the election was stolen and will probably run again in 2024.
I've really struggled today with understanding how 48% of the country looks at the last 4 years (not to mention the last 8 months) and says "You know what, I want four more years of that." Despite a potential win, the Democratic Party needs to take a long, serious look at its party platform and how it appeals to voters.
Major Democratic tactical error to not invest just a little heavier in some states that wound up closer than they thought they would, Texas included, and as a result, they slipped through their fingers.
Appears there was only 1 net change in the US Senate as well, and it looked and sounded like there was a chance and expectation that there would be more. In light of the perceived outrage over filling the Supreme Court seat, vs what happened at the polls, this was another mix of mis-reading the situation and a missed opportunity.
Was it that close though? The big cities have yet to be fully counted, but there is a 6 point difference with 85% of the vote. This is in a populous state, where each percentage reflects a larger number of people that have to change their vote. Basically, I'm not sure that a 4 or 5 point difference would be overcome with 'greater outreach'.
In Texas, possibly, but it was a factor in some closer than expected losses elsewhere as well. The Republican side made some shrewd moves that made a difference in some key places (see Florida). I don't see much in the way of comparable key decisions by the Democratic party (see less than they expected outcomes in some congressional races as well). The current political climate is about game changers.
I thought it was tactical error to stop the door knocking and ground game. I know they did it due to the pandemic but they should have went out there and knocked on doors with mask, gloves and hand sanitizer in some states.
The curtailed Biden ground game was something that occurred to me as Trump once again ran up margins in harder-to-reach places (including Latino districts this time). I imagine those people are not easily contacted except person-to-person.
Kind of a weird situation this year, so I'm not sure how much to blame anybody for it.
Texas appears to be an example where the locals did their part pretty well, and turned a sure loss into a contest. I heard several analysts on different networks at different times make statements to the effect that Biden/DNC didn't spend much money in a given state, or even make an appearance in another given state, doubtless because they thought (erroneously) that it was a lost cause.
That could be an issue with what became evident polling inaccuracy in a lot of places. It quickly became evident that the combination of record participation and record polarization has obsoleted a lot of polling models that were built in a different time in a different world.
It also has highlighted the difference between trying to weaponize poll results to encourage adherence to the target outcome vs using accurate poll results, even ones you don't like, to better inform decisions and actions.
I think it is tough. If Biden and DNC focus more time and resources in Texas that is less time and resources in the Great Lake states and those are already razor thin. I fear more time in Texas would have just meant a closer margin of defeat in Texas and a loss in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
That's the tactical decision, but only if you assume its a near net-sum equation. Not convinced that is really the case, but its also looking more like Biden got it right, at least as far as 270, which is the big prize, if not so much the senate races.
For sure, it has shown that this wasn't as clear cut as a lot of people thought it was going to be.
I mean, how much s*** did people give Hillary Clinton for not visiting Wisconsin in 2016? Biden poured resources into Pennsylvania, thinking it was the most likely state to tip the election to him, and that thinking appears to be right. I can't really argue that that decision.
Maybe not allocating enough early resources to some stretch goals like Texas was a mistake. Hard to say.
After a quiet day yesterday, he's going all in on the predictable (and ludicrous) argument that votes counted overnight and this morning shouldn't count.
If he ends up losing, the next few months will be...interesting.
NV
no more results posted until tomorrow. If proportion of remaining is typical, Binden will carry. To close without counting though.
Polling error
repost from FB
regardless of outcome and political affiliation
Trump 2 - Pollsters 0
Yeah, it's pretty clear at this point that Trump has the ability to turn out low-propensity voters who are hard to capture in polls. Fortunately it seems like the left turned out just enough to counteract that this time.
It's an open question how much Trump's approach works without Trump on the ballot.
it very likely doesn't work without T on the ballot. It's the Celebrity thing. Low propensity voters are only voting because the Celebrity of the ballot is drawing them in.
Arnie won the recall of Grey Davis due to Celebrity. He then proceeded to be not awful as governor, and got re-elected. He was the last R to seriously be considered statewide.
He wasn't actually a Republican with an "R" but more of a Democrat or Republican "lite". Protecting the California coast from drilling and other Hollywood-like beliefs made him an acceptable, if not sensational, governor. If allowed to run for president he might actually have won. If so, his administration probably would have been OK for the country actually.
Yes, he was always lite on the politician scale. Which is why he could get votes from people who think the CA GOP doesn't exist.
He's the only kind of Republican that could win in CA these days.
Just look at the democrats and Obama.
Obama and trump are two sides of the same coin. Democrats suffered without Obama and the GOP will suffer without trump.
Agreed - look at the midterm elections.
It did work to a degree -- there was pretty high turnout in red states to defeat Democratic Senators (egged on by Trump). But it was also reduced from the Presidential year, so yeah there is definitely a dropoff without Trump around.
I suspect that's the case. If so, once the celebrity element is gone Republicans may have major issues with the suburban voters they lost during this period.
This is our best hope. Kill the King and his army of deplorables fade away. I don’t even think trumps kids can capture the same enthusiasm as trump.
Yep and the polling errors are even greater this time. All that talk about “fixing” and accounting for trump voters sure didn’t seem to work.
I think an underappreciated part of the inaccuracy of the polls (although at aggregate levels most seem to be within the standard error) is the turnout, which typically accounts for some weighting in the polls. In 2016 turnout was way down and it's looking like 2020 will have the highest turnout in over a century (~67%).
The higher the turnout, the more it multiplies the effect of polling error or distortion.
True and good point.
Your election night experience
Spent a day and a half as an election official. Didn't arrest anyone, to some people's disappointment. However, pro-gerrymandering laws really allow transparency to someone in my position. Granted, election night in a single purple district is a subsect of a sub-sample that has tons of biases (eg, Nov 3 voters tend to skew heavily to GOP). But that doesn't stop me from seeing interesting observations:
Balanced district. 75% already voted before yesterday. 8% voted on the day. Record smashing turnout.
About 1% of attempted voters yesterday were teenagers who had no idea you had to register to vote in order to have your ballot count. Another 2% were teenagers who didn't know you couldn't vote anywhere you wanted after you initially registered.
About 10% were first-time voters.
All Vietnamese voters were clutching GOP voting guides. About 1% of voters on the day.
Almost all of the provisional ballots (ie, usually registration problems) were registered Democrats or Unaffiliated. Zero were GOP. One was Indian teenager who was registered Libertarian.
Four people refused to wear masks. Two were a father/son duo who are known crazies, who dress like hippies. One was a young black man who I snapped at him to put his mask on. I was not supposed to do that, but it came out. The last was an 18-year-old who did a mouth-only job. Everyone else (60%) GOP voters wore masks.
Four warnings went to campaigners for interfering with voters within the exclusion zone. Ironically, the guy who got warned the most was a guy who was an anti-voter-interference advocate.
Who stood out for NOT voting? South Asians.
There are a certain subset of people who come out to vote who you don't meet with every day. There are a surprising number of unseen people who are clearly crazy or stupid.
These kinds of stories are precisely why automatic voter registration (or at least same-day voter registration) should exist nationwide.
Near the end of the night, we talked with Election Judge before hand what consistitutes closing time (eg, time on the Tabulator? per cell phone?). We all agreed that we never saw anyone stroll in at closing on election night (early voting yes, election night no). So I am sent to the parking lot to see if anyone is in the parking lot to avoid such a weird situation. Sure enough, a kid is sauntering through the parking lot at 7:29 pm. The DEM campaigners are telling him to hurry up. He breaks into a faster walk. I see him and I yell "RUUUUNNNN!!!" and he breaks into a slow jog. He makes it into the 50-foot non-perimeter by a step and the Assistant Judge yells out "POLLS CLOSED!". The GOP campaigners yell that he is not inside. The DEMS say 50-foot counts. It goes to the Election judge, who let's him vote. Lo and behold, he is not registered to vote in the county.
Gen-Z/Millennial voters in a nutshell.
What a roller coaster!
I am always curious about how people don't know the registration rules and such. Perhaps they don't learn by reading, because all that is on EVERY piece of official election information that gets sent out.
Need info distributed on YouTube videos
They don't read the information, so it doesn't matter what it says.
Comedy.
"a mouth-only job"
DBD Late Night already?
Didn't check anything until No 1 texted me that "Tommy Fucking Tuberville" won. I asked him how things looked and he said trending not good. Checked every so often until I went to bed around 11. At the time Biden was down maybe 5-10 pts in az, mi, wi, and pa. When I woke up he either is close or on top in those states so I guess most mail in ballots are Dem as predicted. Crossing my fingers.
was in bed by 1000p. once it was clear that the polls were not correct (places like GA, OH, TX), i figured nothing would be decided for a while ...
Drank some beer and worked on a puzzle to keep our minds off the results. Finally gave in around 10:30pm and switched between PBS and BBC for about an hour. Went to bed feeling uncertain about how many paths to victory Biden had. Woke up at 2:30 to feed cf-98, checked FiveThirtyEight and NPR to see that Biden's path to victory continued to narrow. Woke up at 7:30 with cautious optimism that a feasible path to victory remains.
A throw back to my 20's; avoided the news when it didn't appear like a blue wave (ha!) and effectively self-medicated and had fun.
Must have been a doozy for DC-T; he hasn't been by to break down how the results affect EPL soccer relegation.
I fell asleep before 10.30 and woke up at 0345 this morning, I’m a little frazzled
Turkey and mashed potato dinner on outside patio at Harry's Plaza Cafe on Upper State in Santa Barbara. A little pre-season in preparation for Thanksgiving.
Sounds excellent!
Made it a point to do a late workout so I couldn't check the news at all. After that (and shower), I periodically checked for updates while focusing on a Scrubs rewatch. I learned my lesson after the collapse four years ago.
Couldn't really sleep, kept checking my phone for updates. That was long enough to see Wisconsin turn in Biden's favor, so I felt pretty confident at that point that he was winning.
But not the big win that would have really turned things around in this country. Just gonna be more gridlock now.
I tried to avoid the news, but people kept updating me. That is also my strategy for the rest of the week. One of my friends is particularly obsessive to the detriment of her mental health (I'm not saying she SHOULDN'T care/be angry), so I'm trying to distract her, too. We'll be watching GBBO and other things over Zoom together.
Ohio...smh
Ohio isn’t coming back.
Dems needs to focus on Arizona, Great Lakes and NC going forward
Where...do you think the Great Lakes are?
Mostly not Ohio? But I take your broader point
Well, did not crack open the champagne
WI
AP has called WI for Biden, who now needs 22 more electoral votes (MI and NV, both uncalled, sum to 22)
That’s the path.
Conflicting reports about AZ, what are you guys seeing?
The Arizona Republic is saying 450k ballots (mail-in and provisional) remain in Maricopa County, which Biden leads 52-46. An additional 150k ballots from around the state remain as well. Biden leads by 93k votes, so a flip seems unlikely.
https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/04/least-400-k-ballots-left-count-arizona-republic-estimates-and-number-certainly-higher/6157997002/
Huff Po says Biden, MSNBC says too close. MSNBC says MI to Biden, but not Huff Po yet. So, it might be over, or it might not. PA, GA, NC are all still too close, and PA has a shitton of counting still to do.
GA
, Phở
236K outstanding mail in ballots, primarily from Atlanta, left to count. Biden needs 72% of those to pull Georgia
Is ATL mostly democratic? Sounds like that's the only hope in Ga.
Also depends on where in "Atlanta" since there are some really white suburban areas surrounding the city that's either also in Fulton County or in some other counties.
Its Fulton and DeKalb counties primarily. Georgia is in play still
massively democratic. Abrams won ATL by 36 points in the Governor race in '18. Question is, is it enough...
<<so you're saying there's a chance.gif>>
I also believe most of these are mail ballots, which should be even more heavily Democratic. Definitely a chance. I'd even call Biden a slim favorite.
He's back to -460....huge swing between midnight-4:00 am this morning
Unfortunately, despite this, we have a Governor Kemp in GA...
MI
Biden has eclipsed a 1% lead (roughly 60k votes) as 99% of precincts report.
Assuming Biden's lead holds in NV and WI, winning MI puts him at 270. Biden currently trails by 24k, but Wayne County (home of Detroit and the largest county in the state) has only reported 63% and it is a heavily Democratic leaning county at 67-32 so far.
Biden has taken a 1300-vote lead in MI.
its growing and all the remaining vote is all Detroit
CNN just called it for Biden.
#dominoes
Barring any weirdness in AZ (near-final counts should be announced late tonight), all that's needed is NV (which should announce tomorrow morning).
now ABC
now Fox
Because Fox still has AZ called for Biden, that brings Biden to 264 with Nevada still available with 6 to bring him to 270.
House
Senate
Looks we're stuck with at least 2 more years of McConnell as majority leader.
And two years of Biden unable to appoint judges, pass legislation, appoint his administration officials, big Covid stimulus is dead, small Covid stimulus is dead etc.
I'll be curious to see if McConnell uses this opportunity to "get back to normal" in Washington. If he had become Minority leader, the Dems wouldve rammed everything through but since he can effectively stop that now, I wonder if he'll deal with Biden on some things with the expectation that the Trump years stigma will fade a bit. Him criticizing Trump for the early victory today was mildly unexpected. I think Biden is going to want to repair the relationships across the aisle and McConnell may use that opportunity to re-establish the old school Washington swamp (as opposed to the Trumpian cesspool).
Nope. His goal will be a one term Biden Presidency. Best outcome is that whatever weird heath thing he has makes it so he has to retire in the next few months.
The GOP will wheel him out there like Strom Thurmond.
Gonna be two years of governing by executive order and recess appointments.
Yep. and the occasional Senate win, when too many of the GOPs have the 'rona.
PA
Trump's lead is down to 330k with over 1 million mail-in ballots yet to be counted. Philadelphia County, largest in the state and currently a 80-20 Biden lead, still hasn't reported 28% of its ballots. 4 of the top-5 most populous counties lean blue by an average of 30 points and still have to report 12-30% of their ballots.
Elsewhere in college
Wisconsin had to cancel another game, this time this Saturday's home game vs Purdue, due to continuing Covid infections.
PRO
As if it couldn't get worse for the 9ers.
Source: San Francisco 49ers shut facility after WR Kendrick Bourne tests positive for COVID-19
https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/30256100/san-francisco-49ers-shut-facility-kendrick-bourne-tests-positive-covid-19
SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- One day before they are scheduled to play the Green Bay Packers on Thursday Night Football, the San Francisco 49ers shut down their facility because of a positive COVID-19 test Wednesday morning.
The Niners confirmed the positive test after a league source told ESPN's Adam Schefter that wide receiver Kendrick Bourne tested positive. League sources told ESPN that Thursday's game is expected to go on as scheduled, pending more contact tracing and information.
In a statement, the Niners acknowledged the positive test and said they have entered the league's "intensive protocol."
Do they really have to play any more games? Really?
ummm, Im 7-1 in my Fantasy football cash league so the answer is clearly "yes"
CAL
Go Bears!!!
Go Bears!
Biden up by almost 4 million and at least 30%.
Here's an intro ballet livestream for those looking to do some exercise/for a distraction https://www.facebook.com/BerkeleyBalletTheater/videos/702704093702213
Even if Biden pulls it out like I am cautiously optimistic he will, this was not the large rebuttal to Trumpism I was hoping for. There were no political statements, and I don't see the parties changing tack anytime soon.
Also, though much less powerful, Trump may be more annoying if he is not President.
Turns out the degree of outrage and backlash from some was mis-extrapolated to a much larger and broader population segment than it should have been. This is a repeat of sorts of the major error of 4 years ago. At some point, the Democratic party is going to need to come to grips with the fact that there are a lot of people who disagree with them vehemently, and figure out a way to work with at least some of them. Otherwise, the cycle is going to continue to repeat itself.
The frustrating thing is, if you're liberal, the Democratic party has already not done enough for the last however many years. I think a lot of that blame goes to Fox News (rather than the radical right). Inherently, I want to believe that a lot of the rural whites are not racist, but combating racism is just so extremely low on their priority.
Even some obviously needed election reforms, from just the ease to vote to abolish the electoral college, are unlikely to happen in the next 4 years, in my opinion.
I think there is something to the idea that Bernie-style economic populism is a strong argument (there are a lot of socially conservative but economically liberal voters out there for the taking). Just maybe from someone younger and more charismatic who doesn't call themselves a socialist.
Expect the launch of the Trump TV network. Can't imagine what the content would be, except for Trump.
I was hoping for a strong Biden win so that he could govern with a strong mandate from the voters. Looks like we won’t have that so things like court packing, getting rid of the filibuster, DC and PR statehood are probably all off the table.
Trump will be crying for the next 4 years that the election was stolen and will probably run again in 2024.
If he's not in prison.
or actually does run away to another country. But I don't see that actually happening.
Or dead.
Man, Texas shit the bed. Really shocking at how the Latinx population in the Valley flipped. Really shocked and despondent over that
I think it's similar to what I heard in Florida. Trump pushing Biden being socialist probably turned the Cuban vote.
Texas? The whole fucking county, after the complete shit-show that is the Trump presidency, 67 million Americans still voted for him.
I don't understand that, I really don't.
I've really struggled today with understanding how 48% of the country looks at the last 4 years (not to mention the last 8 months) and says "You know what, I want four more years of that." Despite a potential win, the Democratic Party needs to take a long, serious look at its party platform and how it appeals to voters.
I see my comment yesterday about you setting me up for disappointment was appropriate.
just lump me in with every woman you've ever known, my man
Stop talking about women's lumps
Only men can have lumps?
Maybe Kelly-O'Rouke 2024/2028?
Major Democratic tactical error to not invest just a little heavier in some states that wound up closer than they thought they would, Texas included, and as a result, they slipped through their fingers.
Appears there was only 1 net change in the US Senate as well, and it looked and sounded like there was a chance and expectation that there would be more. In light of the perceived outrage over filling the Supreme Court seat, vs what happened at the polls, this was another mix of mis-reading the situation and a missed opportunity.
Was it that close though? The big cities have yet to be fully counted, but there is a 6 point difference with 85% of the vote. This is in a populous state, where each percentage reflects a larger number of people that have to change their vote. Basically, I'm not sure that a 4 or 5 point difference would be overcome with 'greater outreach'.
In Texas, possibly, but it was a factor in some closer than expected losses elsewhere as well. The Republican side made some shrewd moves that made a difference in some key places (see Florida). I don't see much in the way of comparable key decisions by the Democratic party (see less than they expected outcomes in some congressional races as well). The current political climate is about game changers.
The difference will probably close in the late counting, but nowhere near enough to flip the state.
I thought it was tactical error to stop the door knocking and ground game. I know they did it due to the pandemic but they should have went out there and knocked on doors with mask, gloves and hand sanitizer in some states.
The curtailed Biden ground game was something that occurred to me as Trump once again ran up margins in harder-to-reach places (including Latino districts this time). I imagine those people are not easily contacted except person-to-person.
Kind of a weird situation this year, so I'm not sure how much to blame anybody for it.
Yeah I agree. This election could be an outlier and a anomaly due to Covid.
Texas appears to be an example where the locals did their part pretty well, and turned a sure loss into a contest. I heard several analysts on different networks at different times make statements to the effect that Biden/DNC didn't spend much money in a given state, or even make an appearance in another given state, doubtless because they thought (erroneously) that it was a lost cause.
That could be an issue with what became evident polling inaccuracy in a lot of places. It quickly became evident that the combination of record participation and record polarization has obsoleted a lot of polling models that were built in a different time in a different world.
It also has highlighted the difference between trying to weaponize poll results to encourage adherence to the target outcome vs using accurate poll results, even ones you don't like, to better inform decisions and actions.
I think it is tough. If Biden and DNC focus more time and resources in Texas that is less time and resources in the Great Lake states and those are already razor thin. I fear more time in Texas would have just meant a closer margin of defeat in Texas and a loss in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
That's the tactical decision, but only if you assume its a near net-sum equation. Not convinced that is really the case, but its also looking more like Biden got it right, at least as far as 270, which is the big prize, if not so much the senate races.
For sure, it has shown that this wasn't as clear cut as a lot of people thought it was going to be.
I mean, how much s*** did people give Hillary Clinton for not visiting Wisconsin in 2016? Biden poured resources into Pennsylvania, thinking it was the most likely state to tip the election to him, and that thinking appears to be right. I can't really argue that that decision.
Maybe not allocating enough early resources to some stretch goals like Texas was a mistake. Hard to say.
Like I said, it is the ultimate blue ball, political tease state. Texas isn’t going blue until 2032 at the earliest.
Aint no hope.
Abandon all hope, ye who enter.
I am quietly confident Biden has done enough to win
just barely .. but it would appear that way pending all the legal stuff
The legal stuff scares me and even if trump leaves, trump actually leaving office scares.
After a quiet day yesterday, he's going all in on the predictable (and ludicrous) argument that votes counted overnight and this morning shouldn't count.
If he ends up losing, the next few months will be...interesting.
Yet ironically insisting that votes continue to be counted in AZ and NV.
Yeah, the irony is that if every state stopped counting right now Biden would win.
Predictable and ludicrous, but still getting play, and as a result, actually reaching some.