Trump vs. Biden - the Final Showdown

[malchior]

And the Biden +5 that I'm talking about is not based on abstract electoral legitimacy models, it's based on Biden being up by about that amount in Florida and Pennsylvania, etc., which are disproportionately likely to be the states that decide who wins the electoral college majority. So it's not rough guesswork, it's based on the current state of the race based on state-level polling.

Ah I see. Still I think this is pretty patchy. The PA and FL polls are ok but not the highest quality firms generally according to 538's rankings at least. The highest quality poll in PA had a sampling of *400* likely voters. Meh. I'm not mollified just yet. I get being hopeful but this data isn't good enough to get me to comfortable yet.

Of course, the state of the race is subject to change, and this week and last week are high news weeks (from the conventions + Jacob Blake and Kenosha, among other things), so polling over the next couple weeks will be particularly significant.

I agree and the big players will jump in wholeheartedly now that the conventions are out of the way. I expect the next two weeks should sharpen the picture significantly.

[Smoove_B]

https://twitter.com/ASlavitt/status/1299393217633415168

BREAKING: The NBA just announced that all basketball arenas will he turned into 2020 voting locations.

Ample space for large amounts of people to vote safely.

[stessier]

I wonder if it add or subtracts from the danger that it will likely be at least a week before we have a final result. Probably depends on the result.

It 100% adds to the danger. Part of Trump's railing against mail-in voting is that he can then use any delay in the finally tally to sow mistrust of the result.

Right, but what if he's leading going into the mail-in counting and ends up winning? I mean, it would be darkly amusing that he would spend all that time railing against the votes only to come out on top, but I don't think it would increase the danger like the opposite result.

That doesn't really matter. If he's leading, he'll silently drop his argument upon winning. He'll just move to quickly consolidate more power immediately. Unrestrained he'll move onto to building out a personalistic autocracy. The entire purpose for the "warnings" are to prep for the high chance that he loses a fair election and then makes some move to keep power. He had parts of his family break the law on tv last night and Ivanka implicitly staked a claim as his successor. This is a very dangerous time. More dangerous than again I think people understand.

I've been busy, which laws did family members break last night? If it's the Hatch Act, how much of a law is it if there are no penalties or enforcement mechanisms?

Yes Hatch act. Ivanka is a federal employee. And there are penalties if enforced. She could be terminated from employment, she could be fined, or forbidden to work in the government if the OSC and DOJ did their jobs and the President acted on the recommendations. This is the point though. They are openly breaking the law because they can get away with it which is one of key indicators of late-stage fascism.

The penalty structure for violations of the Hatch Act by federal employees includes removal from federal service, reduction in grade, debarment from federal employment for a period not to exceed 5 years, suspension, reprimand, or a civil penalty not to exceed $1,000.

I don't know, I can see cases where it would clearly apply (like we don't want the head of an agency forcing subordinates to do political things), but all of the people you are calling out have jobs that are completely political in nature. At what point can they do anything and not violate the act? What they are really violating is the norms, which I agree is damaging, but any law that's structured where the President gets to choose whether or not to act is really just saying there are going to be political consequences. Now we just have to make sure there are some.

[Defiant]

I'm personally not bothering with tracking the polls or anyone's models until we start to get good data.

Are... Are you saying it's too early for polls?

I've been saying that for a while (well, too early to take them very seriously), but I think that's no longer going to be the case in a couple of weeks, because at that point:

1. People not paying attention usually start to pay attention (although, to be fair, this election cycle could easily be different from previous ones, and people may already be paying attention).

2. The conventions will be sufficiently behind us that we can see what the new normal in polling is (if it's different from before).

3. Much more polls get released starting now, which gives more data (which leads to more accurate polling averages, where single outliers will have less of an effect).

Of course, it's still worth pointing out that polls still shift around 5-6% between now and Election Day (although that can go both ways), and it's always important to keep in mind the margin of errors and other issues regarding polling.

[Zaxxon]

Of course, it's still worth pointing out that polls still shift around 5-6% between now and Election Day (although that can go both ways), and it's always important to keep in mind the margin of errors and other issues regarding polling.

Just to make it explicit--I'm joking. It's been 'too early for polls' around OO since somewhere in mid-2015 IIRC.

[Alefroth]

https://twitter.com/ASlavitt/status/1299393217633415168

BREAKING: The NBA just announced that all basketball arenas will he turned into 2020 voting locations.

Ample space for large amounts of people to vote safely.

That's great. Can they just do that, or did they have to get the okay of all the stadium owners?

[LawBeefaroni]

https://twitter.com/ASlavitt/status/1299393217633415168

BREAKING: The NBA just announced that all basketball arenas will he turned into 2020 voting locations.

Ample space for large amounts of people to vote safely.

That's great. Can they just do that, or did they have to get the okay of all the stadium owners?

They probably have to get special voting rules put in place. You can't just open up and host a polling station.

[Alefroth]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

[stessier]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

In this case, the "NBA" is the owners agreeing to do this. The actual statement says that the owners will work with the local governments to use their stadiums as polling places where possible. If it is too late to make this work, then the stadiums will be used to support voting rights by doing things like holding voter registration drives.

[Carpet_pissr]

Fuck the EC. We would be in a MUCH better position right now if we had a straight up democracy. With such a narrow base (and narrowing every day probably), the EC is more important than ever for Republicans and Trump to keep winning. They would not have a chance in this election without it.

[Smoove_B]

Prediction: there will be GOP initiated suits filed in various (D) cities claiming sudden interest in the rule of law, as it relates to the designation and use of voting locations.

I'd be hard pressed to make an argument against this. Between the parking, the size and overall layout they'd make idea locations to shuttle people through.

[Alefroth]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

In this case, the "NBA" is the owners agreeing to do this. The actual statement says that the owners will work with the local governments to use their stadiums as polling places where possible. If it is too late to make this work, then the stadiums will be used to support voting rights by doing things like holding voter registration drives.

Thanks

[LawBeefaroni]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

In this case, the "NBA" is the owners agreeing to do this. The actual statement says that the owners will work with the local governments to use their stadiums as polling places where possible. If it is too late to make this work, then the stadiums will be used to support voting rights by doing things like holding voter registration drives.

And the owners are all on board. Jordan has been an instrumental liaison between the players and owners (he's the most influential of both). I believe he told owners something like, "Now is the time to listen, not to talk.". And they've been listening.

I've never been an MJ fan (90 Pistons fan here) but he is the perfect guy for this right now.

[Kraken]

Right. But the 5% we saw last time isn't a hard level. It fluctuates depending on the turnout and importantly who and where they turnout. It might be 2% or 8% this year for all we know. That is why I just can't be bothered to care about national level polling except as a wide thumb in the air metric. 8% sounds great but until we get into the details it really isn't all that meaningful.

The 5% is based on current polling, not based on 2016 or anything. I agree that the 8% isn't consequential in and of itself, but it's useful as a supplement to state level polling, especially in states where there's less polling available (since there is at least a general correlation between state and national polling).

Right my reference to 5% wasn't intentionally picking up on the 5% you are mentioning. It just was about the level of imbalance in 2016. I'm personally not bothering with tracking the polls or anyone's models until we start to get good data.

What do you mean by "the level of imbalance in 2016"?

That is what I remember as being the imbalance some academics calculated between the electoral college and the popular vote in 2016 - as I recall it was based on some aggregate analysis. Trump got ~46% of the vote but got ~56% of the electoral college. So the theory (as I recall it) was that he had another 3% of runway to keep the majority of the EC. In other words, he could have lost by 5% and still gotten the EC majority. That number slides around a bit over time but generally persistently favors the GOP.

Edit: It isn't very predictive (at least for now) and you need to do a look back to calculate it. That's why I don't really care about the national polls. You can't really use them predictively. There is a correlation perhaps between a state and national but it has a major limitation that you can't fit it into the puzzle on its own.

Thanks for that explanation. I vaguely remembered reading that Democrats need to win the popular vote by 6% to take the EC, but I couldn't remember why, or where I read it.

[ImLawBoy]

Prediction: there will be GOP initiated suits filed in various (D) cities claiming sudden interest in the rule of law, as it relates to the designation and use of voting locations.

I'd be hard pressed to make an argument against this. Between the parking, the size and overall layout they'd make idea locations to shuttle people through.

As someone who has inspected polling places and seen all too often how they are not terribly accessible for those with disabilities or the elderly, this seems great to me, too. Most of these arenas are pretty modern and should be relatively accessible.

[El Guapo]

https://twitter.com/mulvihill79/status/ ... 6767792128

I'm sure that this won't bother Trump.

[coopasonic]

Fake news! Best ratings ever.

[LawBeefaroni]

PBS! They left out PBS! PBS aways swings Trump.



(Why would they leave out PBS though? It has the best coverage.)

[Zaxxon]

Fake news! Best ratings ever*.

* - Among Republican conventions held in 2020.

[Ralph-Wiggum]

But 5 million households watching an hour long speech is like 15 million watching a 20 minute speech. Isn't that how the math works?

[malchior]

I wonder if it add or subtracts from the danger that it will likely be at least a week before we have a final result. Probably depends on the result.

It 100% adds to the danger. Part of Trump's railing against mail-in voting is that he can then use any delay in the finally tally to sow mistrust of the result.

Right, but what if he's leading going into the mail-in counting and ends up winning? I mean, it would be darkly amusing that he would spend all that time railing against the votes only to come out on top, but I don't think it would increase the danger like the opposite result.

That doesn't really matter. If he's leading, he'll silently drop his argument upon winning. He'll just move to quickly consolidate more power immediately. Unrestrained he'll move onto to building out a personalistic autocracy. The entire purpose for the "warnings" are to prep for the high chance that he loses a fair election and then makes some move to keep power. He had parts of his family break the law on tv last night and Ivanka implicitly staked a claim as his successor. This is a very dangerous time. More dangerous than again I think people understand.

I've been busy, which laws did family members break last night? If it's the Hatch Act, how much of a law is it if there are no penalties or enforcement mechanisms?

Yes Hatch act. Ivanka is a federal employee. And there are penalties if enforced. She could be terminated from employment, she could be fined, or forbidden to work in the government if the OSC and DOJ did their jobs and the President acted on the recommendations. This is the point though. They are openly breaking the law because they can get away with it which is one of key indicators of late-stage fascism.

The penalty structure for violations of the Hatch Act by federal employees includes removal from federal service, reduction in grade, debarment from federal employment for a period not to exceed 5 years, suspension, reprimand, or a civil penalty not to exceed $1,000.

I don't know, I can see cases where it would clearly apply (like we don't want the head of an agency forcing subordinates to do political things), but all of the people you are calling out have jobs that are completely political in nature. At what point can they do anything and not violate the act? What they are really violating is the norms, which I agree is damaging, but any law that's structured where the President gets to choose whether or not to act is really just saying there are going to be political consequences. Now we just have to make sure there are some.

Isn't this just a way of saying the President can sanction who has to obey the law? WaPo shows that they do punish people throughout the government. Just not the ones that are in the President's lawless umbrella. I don't think that is just norm breaking. It is corruption. They may only be doing political work but they are paid by us. They should essentially only use our dollars to cover work done directly for the people of the United States and certainly not electoral activity.

[Isgrimnur]

Norms only matter to those that think that they matter.

[Carpet_pissr]

Norms only matter to those that think that they matter.

This. Thank you.

It’s way past time we stopped hand-wringing about “norms” and shouting “Unprecedented!(TM)” as if it matters now. It’s also not effective, as Is so eloquently stated above. (Also, it’s been almost four years of this bs, we REALLY should not still be shocked by this behavior)

Every time I hear or read ‘unprecedented’ (usually from the media in the form of a leading question) as if someone was pronouncing a guilty verdict, my mind immediately goes to “OK? And?!”

There should not be a full stop, rhetorically, after making such a statement, but I get the feeling that we (pl) assume that’s enough to condemn this constitutional Kraken. (Sorry Kraken, no slam intended )

[malchior]

Norms only matter to those that think that they matter.

This. Thank you.

It’s way past time we stopped hand-wringing about “norms” and shouting “Unprecedented!(TM)” as if it matters now. It’s also not effective, as Is so eloquently stated above. (Also, it’s been almost four years of this bs, we REALLY should not still be shocked by this behavior)

Yep. We know this administration isn't normal. If you don't know it by now then you haven't been paying attention. What is incredibly dangerous and much more noteworthy is how they selectively violate the law. The Hatch Act violations are an in your face message saying 'we break the law. Stop us. Oh you can't because I'm in charge'.

It is a classic indicator of *fascism* or whatever we are going to call it now. The technical term the authoritarian experts are throwing around is personalistic autocracy. Which is more dangerous because the family at the head has to become increasingly brutal because otherwise they will at first face prison for their lawlessness and eventually face getting dragged through the street or strung up from light pole depending on how terrible they've gotten. We are trending towards the beginning of this. They are only springing friends from legal peril but if he gets re-elected we'll start seeing enemies prosecuted. And so on.

The danger is incredibly real and because the media focuses on the norms and the Democrats are afraid to appear alarmist a good portion of the population isn't getting it. This election is for all the marbles and even then we're just dodging a bullet. We're still on the decline unless we can figure out how to fix our politics.

[Yojimbo]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

In this case, the "NBA" is the owners agreeing to do this. The actual statement says that the owners will work with the local governments to use their stadiums as polling places where possible. If it is too late to make this work, then the stadiums will be used to support voting rights by doing things like holding voter registration drives.

And the owners are all on board. Jordan has been an instrumental liaison between the players and owners (he's the most influential of both). I believe he told owners something like, "Now is the time to listen, not to talk.". And they've been listening.

I've never been an MJ fan (90 Pistons fan here) but he is the perfect guy for this right now.

I'm not sure how this works - voting (in my area) is done in your precinct. This makes is easier for people (me, for example) to inspect the polls and make sure that no one is violating rules. So this could be good for 29 precincts (or maybe immediately adjacent precincts?) across the US where arenas are at.

I think any benefit might be offset by the chaos of people from the 'burbs interested in the novelty of voting in a stadium. Said voters show up (in ignorant good faith) at the stadium and wait in line only to find out that you cannot vote 30 miles from your home (ie you aren't on the registration list at the stadium). If we allow people to vote outside of their home precincts, then how do the workers ensure that I didn't vote twice? Or, how many people will miss their chance to vote because of this (went to the Arena and got sent to home precinct 10min before polls close)?

My experience may be tainted by a largely manual process in my state. Having had to ask poll workers to remove candidate paraphernalia before the opening of my local polls before, I can assure you that humans are capable of bad election judgment.

I think its novel and they likely mean well, but not all help helps.

[YellowKing]

We rode past a caravan of Trump rally people today. Apparently they had assembled at a local defunct K-Mart parking lot until the police ran them off. So they took to just driving up and down one of our main roads waving Trump 2020 flags and blasting their shit propaganda.

[stessier]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

In this case, the "NBA" is the owners agreeing to do this. The actual statement says that the owners will work with the local governments to use their stadiums as polling places where possible. If it is too late to make this work, then the stadiums will be used to support voting rights by doing things like holding voter registration drives.

And the owners are all on board. Jordan has been an instrumental liaison between the players and owners (he's the most influential of both). I believe he told owners something like, "Now is the time to listen, not to talk.". And they've been listening.

I've never been an MJ fan (90 Pistons fan here) but he is the perfect guy for this right now.

I'm not sure how this works - voting (in my area) is done in your precinct. This makes is easier for people (me, for example) to inspect the polls and make sure that no one is violating rules. So this could be good for 29 precincts (or maybe immediately adjacent precincts?) across the US where arenas are at.

I think any benefit might be offset by the chaos of people from the 'burbs interested in the novelty of voting in a stadium. Said voters show up (in ignorant good faith) at the stadium and wait in line only to find out that you cannot vote 30 miles from your home (ie you aren't on the registration list at the stadium). If we allow people to vote outside of their home precincts, then how do the workers ensure that I didn't vote twice? Or, how many people will miss their chance to vote because of this (went to the Arena and got sent to home precinct 10min before polls close)?

My experience may be tainted by a largely manual process in my state. Having had to ask poll workers to remove candidate paraphernalia before the opening of my local polls before, I can assure you that humans are capable of bad election judgment.

I think its novel and they likely mean well, but not all help helps.

In SC, you can vote outside your precinct using a provisional paper ballot. It is counted after the voting lists are reconciled and it shows you haven't voted elsewhere.

[Holman]

My wife has spearheaded a grass-roots postcard campaign aimed at informing people step-by-step how to vote by mail/dropbox here in Philadelphia. She and her colleagues have designed, printed, and posted the cards to registered Dems who skipped the primary (since primary voters are typically reliable in the general election) living in neighborhoods known to vote Dem.

The strategy has been to reach likely but not regular Dem voters in places known to be Biden-favorable. They ignored neighborhoods where (for example) voters were more likely to be conservatives voting in the Dem primary but prone to go GOP in the general (as police and fire union members often do for city-council reasons).

So far we've sent out more than 5,000 targeted cards. Trump won the whole state of PA by just 44,000 votes in 2016.

[Kraken]

But can the NBA dictate what the stadium is used for, or do owners have to approve?

In this case, the "NBA" is the owners agreeing to do this. The actual statement says that the owners will work with the local governments to use their stadiums as polling places where possible. If it is too late to make this work, then the stadiums will be used to support voting rights by doing things like holding voter registration drives.

And the owners are all on board. Jordan has been an instrumental liaison between the players and owners (he's the most influential of both). I believe he told owners something like, "Now is the time to listen, not to talk.". And they've been listening.

I've never been an MJ fan (90 Pistons fan here) but he is the perfect guy for this right now.

I'm not sure how this works - voting (in my area) is done in your precinct. This makes is easier for people (me, for example) to inspect the polls and make sure that no one is violating rules. So this could be good for 29 precincts (or maybe immediately adjacent precincts?) across the US where arenas are at.

I think any benefit might be offset by the chaos of people from the 'burbs interested in the novelty of voting in a stadium. Said voters show up (in ignorant good faith) at the stadium and wait in line only to find out that you cannot vote 30 miles from your home (ie you aren't on the registration list at the stadium). If we allow people to vote outside of their home precincts, then how do the workers ensure that I didn't vote twice? Or, how many people will miss their chance to vote because of this (went to the Arena and got sent to home precinct 10min before polls close)?

My experience may be tainted by a largely manual process in my state. Having had to ask poll workers to remove candidate paraphernalia before the opening of my local polls before, I can assure you that humans are capable of bad election judgment.

I think its novel and they likely mean well, but not all help helps.

In SC, you can vote outside your precinct using a provisional paper ballot. It is counted after the voting lists are reconciled and it shows you haven't voted elsewhere.

My town usually has 9 precincts. This year, they rolled them into three. Instead of voting at Town Hall, as I've done for the past 30 years, we go to the high school now. Except we got a post card last week saying that's changed, and our mega-precinct was moved to a middle school that IDK where it is. That won't affect us because I drop our mail-in ballots at a collection box. Point being that these things are all malleable this year. If a city wants everyone voting at its basketball arena, they can do that.

[LawBeefaroni]

If a city wants everyone voting at its basketball arena, they can do that.

There will undoubtedly be challenges that it's not a neutral site.

Not that it's not but there will be challenges.

[Grifman]

Good news - early evidence is that Trump didn't get much, if any, bounce from his convention:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/30/politics ... index.html

[Little Raven]

My wife, who is very far from a political expert but called the 2016 election correctly when I was 100% convinced it was in the bag for Hillary....is putting less stock than ever in polls. According to her, in our current environment, there are people that will never admit to supporting Trump in any way for fear of bringing the wrath of Twitter down upon them, but who will absolutely pull the lever for him in the privacy of the voting booth.

I really, really hope she's wrong.

[Holman]

My wife, who is very far from a political expert but called the 2016 election correctly when I was 100% convinced it was in the bag for Hillary....is putting less stock than ever in polls. According to her, in our current environment, there are people that will never admit to supporting Trump in any way for fear of bringing the wrath of Twitter down upon them, but who will absolutely pull the lever for him in the privacy of the voting booth.

I really, really hope she's wrong.

The thing is, the 2016 polls *were* accurate. The final ones taken even caught the effect of the Comey letter.

Hillary's error was running up the score in Blue states while under-addressing (during the campaign) issues in the tipping point states. And even there she only lost by a Jill Stein.

I'm allowing myself a little confidence because I believe that Biden has none of Hillary's negatives and the nation has a huge case of Trump fatigue. I also think there's very little "shy voter" effect in such a polarized environment. Sure, Twitter isn't a right-wing Safe Space, but polling doesn't check Twitter.

[Little Raven]

https://twitter.com/mviser/status/1300154855546392577

Biden's statement on last night's incident in Portland. I think it works.

[RunningMn9]

My wife, who is very far from a political expert but called the 2016 election correctly when I was 100% convinced it was in the bag for Hillary....is putting less stock than ever in polls. According to her, in our current environment, there are people that will never admit to supporting Trump in any way for fear of bringing the wrath of Twitter down upon them, but who will absolutely pull the lever for him in the privacy of the voting booth.

I really, really hope she's wrong.

Your wife might feel that way, but it’s based on fear and confirmation bias. Answering a pollster honestly doesn’t bring any twitter wrath. It literally has no consequences at all.

I did read an interesting article recently that even in polls where Biden has a substantial lead, the very same respondents believe that Trump will win anyway. Which is the exact opposite of 2016, where the polls were much closer and everyone thought Clinton would win.

Answering a poll about how you will vote is easy, it just involves knowing what you plan to do. Answering a poll about what you think other people will do doesn’t mean shit.

It didn’t in 2016 when people thought Clinton would win. It didn’t in 2018, when people responded that they thought the GOP would hold the House.

The answer to that question is all about fear. I feel it too. No matter the numbers, I have convinced myself that this shit bird is going to win some how, some way.

[Kraken]

My wife, who is very far from a political expert but called the 2016 election correctly when I was 100% convinced it was in the bag for Hillary....is putting less stock than ever in polls. According to her, in our current environment, there are people that will never admit to supporting Trump in any way for fear of bringing the wrath of Twitter down upon them, but who will absolutely pull the lever for him in the privacy of the voting booth.

I really, really hope she's wrong.

Just a few minutes ago I was pulled away from reading a story in which Granholm estimated that about 4% of trump voters in MI won't admit their support to pollsters or anyone outside of their close friends and family. I figure she probably knows MI voters as well as anyone and better than most. It bugs me that so many people have the good sense to be embarrassed but not enough sense of responsibility to change their vote or stay home.

[Defiant]

I think part of the reason people think that Trump will win is because Trump supporters are a lot louder (at least on social media). *Silent* majority they are not.

(Also, a lot of people took the lessons of 2016 too far)

[Max Peck]

Technically, they're neither silent nor a majority.

[RunningMn9]

Granholm estimated that about 4% of trump voters in MI won't admit their support to pollsters or anyone outside of their close friends and family. I figure she probably knows MI voters as well as anyone and better than most.

I don’t buy it. There’s no consequences to telling a pollster, no shame. Every Trump voter I know shares two important features: they are *proud* of it; and they won’t shut up about it.

[malchior]

https://twitter.com/jjmacnab/status/1300228934550851584