Rant Two associates of Rudy Giuliani arrested

[soundforbjt]

So why wouldn't Republican victory be the most likely outcome in every presidential election?

Because this is one is with an incumbent, after two terms people are ready to try something new it seems.

 

[fskimospy]

The strategy does not work well when there are lots of smaller elections like the House. He still did rather well in the Senate because the strategy does better the more focused you can be on a single target. Sense Senate campaigns are larger elections that the press covers more aggressively allowing them to use the presses love of controversy as the weapon. House seats are smaller local elections that hardly get any press coverage.

This is not true, he did quite poorly in the Senate when you consider the map. The Senate map was almost comically favorable to Republicans - 25 Democrats up for election vs. 9 Republicans. 10 Democrats were up for election in Trump states and 5 of the Democrats were in states Trump won by more than 10 points. Only getting two seats out of a map that favorable is very bad.

Pretty much every poll showed Clinton winning by a landslide right up to election night. Polls do not capture the effects of this strategy well, it is one of the main reasons that no one has found a competent counter to it yet. It's effect is hard to measure, so it is hard to measure the effect of any counter.

This is simply untrue, the most recent polls before the election were within about 1 percentage point of the final outcome - they were very accurate. Clinton's lead did significantly decline from the commanding lead she had before but that came after Comey's ill-advised letter and press conference, not due to anything Trump did. It appears that polls captured the effects of his strategy very well.

 

[fskimospy]

Because this is one is with an incumbent, after two terms people are ready to try something new it seems.

So Democrats turn out in non-incumbent years after a two term Republican and in Democratic incumbent years but not in non-incumbent years after a two-term Democrat or Republican incumbent years?

 

[Fanatical Meat]

So Democrats turn out in non-incumbent years after a two term Republican and in Democratic incumbent years but not in non-incumbent years after a two-term Democrat or Republican incumbent years?

I think the point is democratic turn out is less dependable and particularly less dependable where it matters.

 

[fskimospy]

I think the point is democratic turn out is less dependable and particularly less dependable where it matters.

So then is the argument that Trump will lose by a smaller margin in 2020 or even win the popular vote?

 

[Zorba]

It’s strange that people think not that the re-election of the most enduringly unpopular president maybe in history who lost the most recent national elections by one of the largest margins in modern times is not just possible (which makes sense) but the most likely outcome.

What’s the basis for saying the guy with 42% approval who more than 50% of voters say they will definitely not vote for is the likely winner?

Because as 2016 showed, Republicans winning is the default. If a Democrat isn't perfect, then people will apparently vote for any republican instead. Not to mention the built in bias of the EC and Senate.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

So then is the argument that Trump will lose by a smaller margin in 2020 or even win the popular vote?

Not sure, no specifics.
I’m just running off history. Weird for a President to lose a second term, current President has no shame throwing shit around, current D candidates appear to have trouble dealing with shit being thrown and have little desire to throw shit.
Too early to say anything for sure other than opinion and my opinion is we will likely see a second term Trump, he will likely seat someone for RBGs seat. Shit storm will then occur.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Because as 2016 showed, Republicans winning is the default. If a Democrat isn't perfect, then people will apparently vote for any republican instead. Not to mention the built in bias of the EC and Senate.

Hillary was wildly unpopular with the general electorate and fared far worse against Trump than other candidates including Bernie. Oh she was the golden girl with hard core Dem partisans but that turned out to be not the case and some will say "but Russians". Partly I would agree, but not enough to have Hillary lose AND win at the same time.

This time around the Dem slate is much better but Trump is known in a bad way. Of those who voted for Trump the first time perhaps a third will slit their own throats for him, the remainder? I think 1/3 won't buy in on Trump again especially with Hillary being out, and half of the other third will be split. That leaves a minority even smaller. Outside of what we read about the worst of the worst, there is no monolithic voting bloc in either party.

The Senate doesn't vote for the President and the bias of the EC will lessen as there is not one state I know of that hasn't seen a significant fall of popularity, and even Trump states are wavering.

In the end, this is the Dems race to lose but this time they have advantages, Trump himself is a most important factor in their favor.

 

[SMOGZINN]

This is not true, he did quite poorly in the Senate when you consider the map. The Senate map was almost comically favorable to Republicans - 25 Democrats up for election vs. 9 Republicans. 10 Democrats were up for election in Trump states and 5 of the Democrats were in states Trump won by more than 10 points. Only getting two seats out of a map that favorable is very bad.

We can, and have, debated if the map was really as bad as it looked for Republicans. History has showed that American politics tend to balance a President by voting in the opposing party in the midterms, Trump managed to avoid that in the Senate. He won seats in an election that he would have historically been expected to lose them. Maybe the electoral map caused that and not anything to do with the Trump strategy, or maybe not. We simply don't know.

This is simply untrue, the most recent polls before the election were within about 1 percentage point of the final outcome - they were very accurate. Clinton's lead did significantly decline from the commanding lead she had before but that came after Comey's ill-advised letter and press conference, not due to anything Trump did. It appears that polls captured the effects of his strategy very well.

Polls made after the fact suffer from confirmation bias. They are almost useless. Every poll I saw up to the day of the election showed Trump losing, most of them by large margins. The best we can say about the polls when it comes to Trump's strategy is that they are unreliable.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I'm not dismissing Trump, I'm just questioning why people think his victory is the most likely outcome.

Fear leads to irrationality and that matters more than facts in risk analysis by the public. This BTW is a non-partisan statement, it just is.

 

[Jhhnn]

The strategy does not work well when there are lots of smaller elections like the House. He still did rather well in the Senate because the strategy does better the more focused you can be on a single target. Senate campaigns are larger elections that the press covers more aggressively allowing them to use the press' love of controversy as the weapon. House seats are smaller local elections that hardly get any press coverage.



Pretty much every poll showed Clinton winning by a landslide right up to election night. Polls do not capture the effects of this strategy well, it is one of the main reasons that no one has found a competent counter to it yet. It's effect is hard to measure, so it is hard to measure the effect of any counter.

2016 was a complete anomaly on a multiplicity of levels. It will be extremely difficult for Trump & the GOP to re-create that kind of cresting insanity in 2020.

 

[SMOGZINN]

Hillary was wildly unpopular with the general electorate and fared far

The reason she was so unpopular was because of the mudslinging campaign that the Republicans used and Trump based his entire strategy around. You can be sure that whomever the Democrats pick will face the same sort of smear campaign as Hillary did. That is what the entire Ukrainian thing is about. It looked like Joe Biden was going to be the pick, so they were lining up a conspiracy theory against him to give just enough 'what if' to make people not want to vote for him. If Warren is the candidate expect some sort of controversy over her as well. I'm sure the DoJ has already been tasked with finding something to accuse her of.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I think the point is democratic turn out is less dependable and particularly less dependable where it matters.

If that was the case then the Republicans would have kept the House and that was far from the case. As far as Republicans go? Right now the SDNY has handed them more problems than just Trump, but their people in Congress are in danger. No? Pete Seeger may disagree. Rudy may bring down a whole lot more than the Administration and covering their asses if going to take priority at some point. Trump protect them? No chance in hell and they know that. Trump will take everyone with him and those left are subject to potential criminal penalties.

Democrats? Hell, they'd have to be more stupid than ever to lose the election and even Fox polls show Darlin Donnie losing to the Dems.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

The reason she was so unpopular was because of the mudslinging campaign that the Republicans used and Trump based his entire strategy around. You can be sure that whomever the Democrats pick will face the same sort of smear campaign as Hillary did. That is what the entire Ukrainian thing is about. It looked like Joe Biden was going to be the pick, so they were lining up a conspiracy theory against him to give just enough 'what if' to make people not want to vote for him. If Warren is the candidate expect some sort of controversy over her as well. I'm sure the DoJ has already been tasked with finding something to accuse her of.

No, that is untrue. Hillary was popular with partisan Dems and not loved by a great many before Trump. Did Putin hurt? Probably enough, but she was ultimately a bad pick from the start.

OK, Putin, Republicans, whatever, this shows a wounded candidate BEFORE Trump. So is this all her fault? I don't really care at all because the point is about Presidential elections and saying "buttery males" doesn't alter the above graph one bit. It was what it was and it amounted to a loss. At least Warren and even Biden have nothing compared the vulnerability of Hillary.

Play your team most likely to win and don't find excuses of unfairness. Doesn't work in pro sports or politics.

 

[soundforbjt]

So Democrats turn out in non-incumbent years after a two term Republican and in Democratic incumbent years but not in non-incumbent years after a two-term Democrat or Republican incumbent years?

No, moderate Republicans and independents turn out after a two term Republican and vote for change and moderate Democrats and independents turn out more after a Democratic two term for a change. Why? I have no idea.
https://www.cbsnews.com/video/allan-lichtman-2020-election-impeachment/ Maybe this guy has the answers, he's predicted the last 9 elections correctly so far.

 

[fskimospy]

Not sure, no specifics.
I’m just running off history. Weird for a President to lose a second term, current President has no shame throwing shit around, current D candidates appear to have trouble dealing with shit being thrown and have little desire to throw shit.
Too early to say anything for sure other than opinion and my opinion is we will likely see a second term Trump, he will likely seat someone for RBGs seat. Shit storm will then occur.

I would argue that the throwing shit around is one of the reasons he's so unpopular.

 

[fskimospy]

No, moderate Republicans and independents turn out after a two term Republican and vote for change and moderate Democrats and independents turn out more after a Democratic two term for a change. Why? I have no idea.
https://www.cbsnews.com/video/allan-lichtman-2020-election-impeachment/ Maybe this guy has the answers, he's predicted the last 9 elections correctly so far.

He also may not:

Despite Keys, Obama Is No Lock

Allan J. Lichtman, a presidential historian at American University, has issued a prediction that, given an economy still teetering on the brink of recession and…

fivethirtyeight.com

A bunch of his 'keys' are pretty arbitrary and any model with that many IVs is generally the result of attempting to over-fit.

 

[fskimospy]

We can, and have, debated if the map was really as bad as it looked for Republicans. History has showed that American politics tend to balance a President by voting in the opposing party in the midterms, Trump managed to avoid that in the Senate. He won seats in an election that he would have historically been expected to lose them. Maybe the electoral map caused that and not anything to do with the Trump strategy, or maybe not. We simply don't know.

I think the actual composition of the map is far more important than a generic appeal to history. They had five races where Trump won by double digits two years earlier and they only picked up 2 seats!

Polls made after the fact suffer from confirmation bias. They are almost useless. Every poll I saw up to the day of the election showed Trump losing, most of them by large margins.

These were not polls made after the fact, they were polls before the election. The final pre-election polls were within around 1% of the actual margin so if every poll you saw up to the day of the election showed Clinton winning by large margins I'm not sure what polls you were looking at.

RealClearPolitics - Election 2016 - General Election: Trump vs. Clinton vs. Johnson vs. Stein

RealClearPolitics - Election 2016 - General Election: Trump vs. Clinton vs. Johnson vs. Stein

www.realclearpolitics.com

RCP final average was Clinton by 3.3, she won by 2.1.

The best we can say about the polls when it comes to Trump's strategy is that they are unreliable.

This is false - they were more reliable in 2016 than they were in 2012. Was Romney or Obama's strategy somehow even more poll-defying? We can and should say that the polls are reliable because history has proven that they are.

RealClearPolitics - Election 2012 - General Election: Romney vs. Obama

RealClearPolitics - Election 2012 - General Election: Romney vs. Obama

www.realclearpolitics.com

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I would argue that the throwing shit around is one of the reasons he's so unpopular.

I’d counter that he won once by throwing shit around.
But enough of this topic

Edit: this has predicted every winner correctly since 1980 with one exception 2016 in this case it could be good news

Presidential election model that got it wrong once in 40 years predicts Trump 2020 win

 

[fskimospy]

Fear leads to irrationality and that matters more than facts in risk analysis by the public. This BTW is a non-partisan statement, it just is.

I tend to agree with this, also I think people are more confident predicting pessimistic results than optimistic ones generally in life.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I tend to agree with this, also I think people are more confident predicting pessimistic results than optimistic ones generally in life.

Confidence, however, isn't correctness as I'm sure you understand. If people evaluated things in terms of real benefit or harm we'd have an entirely different society focused on prioritization based on realities. That will never happen and fear will be used to set the agenda against reason.

 

[Zorba]

Hillary was wildly unpopular with the general electorate and fared far worse against Trump than other candidates including Bernie. Oh she was the golden girl with hard core Dem partisans but that turned out to be not the case and some will say "but Russians". Partly I would agree, but not enough to have Hillary lose AND win at the same time.

This time around the Dem slate is much better but Trump is known in a bad way. Of those who voted for Trump the first time perhaps a third will slit their own throats for him, the remainder? I think 1/3 won't buy in on Trump again especially with Hillary being out, and half of the other third will be split. That leaves a minority even smaller. Outside of what we read about the worst of the worst, there is no monolithic voting bloc in either party.

The Senate doesn't vote for the President and the bias of the EC will lessen as there is not one state I know of that hasn't seen a significant fall of popularity, and even Trump states are wavering.

In the end, this is the Dems race to lose but this time they have advantages, Trump himself is a most important factor in their favor.

This is my point, the made up problems about Hillary weren't half as bad as Trump's known problems, yet people just defaulted to voting for him. Bernie would've gotten shat on too if he were the nominee.

I mean seriously, people are talking about Biden's son getting advantages because of who he is while completely ignoring the Trump kids, or all the other insane cronism going on with republicans.

I didn't mean that the senate voted for presidents, just that it's default state is a republican majority.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

This is my point, the made up problems about Hillary weren't half as bad as Trump's known problems, yet people just defaulted to voting for him. Bernie would've gotten shat on too if he were the nominee.

I mean seriously, people are talking about Biden's son getting advantages because of who he is while completely ignoring the Trump kids, or all the other insane cronism going on with republicans.

I didn't mean that the senate voted for presidents, just that it's default state is a republican majority.

There are two Trumps. The first one is an ignorant asshole and that's who was running in 2016. He was a completely unknown political entity back then. Now there's an admitted criminal in the mix. Remember the demographics here and the participants in the elections in 2016 and 2018.

Last time Trump won there was the die-hard supporters which are definitely still there but a distinct minority. That leaves the "What the hell" group who pulled the lever like a slot machine. Trump went bust with a lot of those who aren't strongly partisan. A good many who are registered Republicans that I know are that way because they aren't Democrats and don't really care much one way or another. A lot of them are hopping mad and now we have Evangelicals and "Trump leaning" evangelicals. That doesn't mean they'll slobber at Warren's feet, indeed not, but actually picking Trump? Best to order a pizza and stay home, or they can vote write in a guaranteed loser.
Bottom line is that Trump is losing some nominal voters and independent support and in the last election that would have led to him losing.

Now we have better choices for a win, Trump losing less loyal types and increasing evidence of not only the impeachable but the criminal, and the DOJ can prevent him from being prosecuted now, but not erase history, at least not yet.

 

[UNCjigga]

How much advantage in terms of national popular vote percentage are you giving to the electoral college? Seems like a lot.

Read it and weep:

The astounding advantage the Electoral College gives to Republicans, in one chart

In close elections, Republicans are favored to win even when they lose the popular vote.

www.vox.com

 

[fskimospy]

Read it and weep:

The astounding advantage the Electoral College gives to Republicans, in one chart

In close elections, Republicans are favored to win even when they lose the popular vote.

www.vox.com

I'm confused - that supports my position that the electoral college advantage is not sufficient to overcome his current approval deficit.