U.S. Elections 2016 - Polls in mirror appear closer than they are

[Guy Kilmore]

2 hours ago, Pony Queen Jace said:

 

At this point my reaction to them is no different than if I see a spider. I want to squash it or have it as far away from me as possible, though I really want to have someone else take care of it for me. Someone big and loud, a strongman of sorts, who won't be afraid to tell me I'm right to dislike the spider.

Even better is when he is orange and has bad hair.  I bet how he handles that spider will be the best way to handle that spider and that nobody could've handled that spider better.

On a serious note, I guess, for the sake of human dignity the best way to combat someone who is being inhuman is by being at our most "humane".

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Just now, Shryke said:

Clinton pulled a majority of voters in the Democratic Primary. Trump couldn't even come close to that.

Clinton appealed to alot of people. And appealed to even more before she decided to run for the Presidency.

Yes, but how much did she pull from outside the DNC voter pool? That is the more interesting question. In other words, how appealing was she for people outside the DNC. The argument was, that Trump was drawing from non-traditional GOP voters as his base. And the traditional GOP voters can very well hold their nose and vote him based on the Supreme Court nominations.

If she did best in the DNC primary with the voters with the strongest ties to the party, and was relatively unpopular with the part of the DNC electorate, which was more loosely tied to the DNC, then it can become a real problem in the election. If she can't appeal to more than the rank and file Democrats, that is.

 

[Shryke]

2 hours ago, SerPaladin said:

I'm not going to debate these particular cases, but I can cite recent science denying on the right with Global Warming, and on the left with GMOs. Both sides have cases where they willfully deny evidence in front of their noses. The left tends to have rose-colored glasses about many of their government proposals, economically, while the right tends to go with storm-cloud-gray.

You don't get it because you probably agree with one of the sides, and that is "reality" to you. For you, Awful Unreality is the other guy. I'm a skeptic. Both sides are deluded to degrees, victims of their own marketing.

Bullshit. This is nothing but myopic false equivalency because embracing "Both sides are the same man" is easier then actually thinking.

We could go on about who supports what in what numbers but thankfully, we don't have to anymore. This argument is the easiest thing in the world to counter these days. One side just nominated Donald Trump.

The whole "both sides are deluded" is nothing but intellectually lazy masturbation. It's a way to make yourself feel better about how much smarter you are then all those people with, like, opinions and shit. Please.

[Seli]

1 hour ago, Patrek_Mallister said:

 

...

On the other hand, you could turn it around – for people living in certain areas of the world, both Democratic and Republican results are disastrous in a way that say Peace and Freedom or even Libertarian results are not. 

The US system doesn't work that way, currently. Any vote for Peace and Freedom or Libertarian (and not voting at all) is in effect a vote for one of the two big parties. Can't be helped until the whole system is reformed.

[TrackerNeil]

29 minutes ago, Shryke said:

Clinton pulled a majority of voters in the Democratic Primary. Trump couldn't even come close to that.

Clinton appealed to alot of people. And appealed to even more before she decided to run for the Presidency.

But then, Sanders spent a good deal of rhetorical time implying that closed primaries, at which Clinton did quite well, are somehow "rigged", which had the effect of leading his followers to believe that a secret majority of Democrats were really Berniecrats.

[Patrek_Mallister]

29 minutes ago, Seli said:

The US system doesn't work that way, currently. Any vote for Peace and Freedom or Libertarian (and not voting at all) is in effect a vote for one of the two big parties. Can't be helped until the whole system is reformed.

I think that a vote for Peace/Freedom or Libertarian is a vote for Peace/Freedom or Libertarian. Mine seems to be the more defensible position. Of course the effect of the vote is proportional to support, but that just means most people support the very people they're complaining about. That seems like a crazy thing to do, but it's being vehemently defended from most in the thread. 

And the idea that not voting is in effect a vote for some party is just mathematically confused, I mean demonstrably wrong. I see the point, but rhetoric shouldn't be so overblown that it literally makes no sense. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

27 minutes ago, Seli said:

The US system doesn't work that way, currently. Any vote for Peace and Freedom or Libertarian (and not voting at all) is in effect a vote for one of the two big parties. Can't be helped until the whole system is reformed.

And if we keep electing the two parties that benefit from the existing system they have zero incentive to reform that system.

[lokisnow]

4 hours ago, Notone said:

I must admit, I did not follow the post mortem of the Brexit as carefully as I should have. And I simply sticked with the the initial analysis based on which areas voted more in favour of leaving. 

Anyhow, my point with Trump and the primaries was this, I think he managed to draw a lot of voters into the primaries, who were not typically voting in primaries (if voting at all for quite some time). So I think you misunderstood/misinterpreted what I wanted to say. 

I think those disengaged voters could infact turn out in big numbers on election day. So that we might see a higher overall turn out in this General Election cycle. And given that the Presidential elections in the last 40 years or so, had a turn out below 60%, I think there's a lot of room to grow. Of course, there's also quite a bit of room for the Democrats, particularly with the Latino vote this cycle. 

If you view Trump as a protest vote (anti-establishment or whatever you want to call it), then they really don't need to be enthusiatic about him. Anger at the status quo will do. The partisan GOP voters, could vote for him, based on the Supreme Court. That's the justification those "establishment Republican" use, to defend a conservative majority there. I think that alone might be enough to hold their nose and cast their vote for him. No love/enthusiasm needed.

So I would really not place any bet on those disengaged voters not casting a protest vote for Trump against Washington, and simply staying at home.

One, trumps primary voters are mostly comprised of white men and women earning more than $70,000 per year, these sorts of demographics are extremely likely to be registered to vote and are extremely likely to be the sort of person who always votes in primaries.

two, voting is very difficult process in the United States and if you are not a normal voter, you probably need to be guided through the process. If trump is relying on white non voters to turn out and vote for him without doing the work of getting them Registered to vote, he's in for a surprise, the simplest reason these people are non voters is that they aren't registered to vote in the first place.  Contrary to trump belief, white skin color is not a valid form of voter ID nor a valid form of voter registration. I refer you back to one, the white non voters did not vote for trump in the primary, the white registered voters who always vote in primaries voted for him, the non voters are not registered and therefor did not vote for him, this same thing is likely to happen In the general election.

three. Please look up how many people comprise a ONE percent increase in voter turnout. It is easy to say that turnout will vary by x percent, because that x number always sounds small, but put it in actual numbers 1 percent increase in turnout means an additional 1,290,854 voters voting, a ten percent increase In Turnout would be 12,290,854 additional voters voting. That is a massive number of people, and you are basically saying that twelve million apathetic non voters are all going to be mobilized and motivated equally to the polls when we know it takes hundreds of millions of dollars in turnout operations to get fewer than that many people to turnout and vote and those people targeted by such turnout operations are the people who are typically "likely" voters rather than typically non voters.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, Shryke said:

The problem with Clinton is the media hates her.

Like, let's look at one simple thing here from a week or so back:

I mean, Trump appears to have been running a scam charity and bribed a State Attorney General.

But Clinton got sick, so ....

 

This is where the election will be won or lost. Clinton will lose if all the scrutiny is on her while Trump gets to skate by some major scandals. 

2 hours ago, Shryke said:

Clinton has "trust issues" because the media has spent 20+ years pushing that narrative.

It takes two to tango, and a lot of it has been self inflicted. Hell, without the email scandal (and it is a legitimate scandal) I bet Clinton would be over 50% in the polls right now while Trump would be at 40% max. 

[Boris the Blade]

Now the NYT will call out Trump lol. Better late than never I guess? 

[The guy from the Vale]

48 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

And if we keep electing the two parties that benefit from the existing system they have zero incentive to reform that system.

If there's enough Gore/Bush situations breaking in one direction, or too much gerrymandering, things might change, just as they did in NZ.

[lokisnow]

2 hours ago, DanteGabriel said:

Look, I have a toddler who got his shots today. I don't have enough words to condemn dingbats who put our herd immunity at risk because they are special snowflakes who got gulled by a dishonest doctor and a passel of idiotic celebrities. 

But there is no way that a fringe anti-vaccine movement which, yes, may have some overprivileged liberals in it, makes the Democratic Party at all comparable to the Republican war on science and refusal to even consider climate change.

This "pox on both their houses" is weak shit. You can be disgusted and disappointed with the Democrats and still acknowledge that the current Republican Party and its nominee are beyond the fucking pale.

The anti vaxxer movement is driven by neither celebs nor doctors, it is entirely driven by Internet message boards, like this one, themed around parenting rather than westeros. Within that demographic, it is driven by people who "researched" their health issue X on the Internet and now are convinced they are better educated on issue x and know more In general than their doctor.  These people then Create a Fox News like echo chamber on their message boards and the self reinforcing ever expanding bubble of misinformation takes hold. Not unlike the westeros politics thread!

false equivalency even has its share of blame for anti vaxxers because people say, "well everything in moderation!" Or "he said she said" and think they are being reasonable and clever by opting for a "moderate " position like a delayed schedule. Then these false equivalent folks get to say they aren't crazy anti vaxxers but are simply skeptical reasonable questioning people. They then get congratulated or congratulate themselves for figuring out the correct moderate position.

and it is definitely happening to a lot of liberals, because it's a human failing not a political thing.

[Jaxom 1974]

4 hours ago, DanteGabriel said:

Look, I have a toddler who got his shots today. I don't have enough words to condemn dingbats who put our herd immunity at risk because they are special snowflakes who got gulled by a dishonest doctor and a passel of idiotic celebrities. 

But there is no way that a fringe anti-vaccine movement which, yes, may have some overprivileged liberals in it, makes the Democratic Party at all comparable to the Republican war on science and refusal to even consider climate change.

This "pox on both their houses" is weak shit. You can be disgusted and disappointed with the Democrats and still acknowledge that the current Republican Party and its nominee are beyond the fucking pale.

I can't like this post enough.  Anti-Vaxxers are possibly the only group I dislike more than alt right Trump supporters...

[DraculaAD1972]

14 hours ago, butterbumps! said:

Is anyone else struggling with seeing all Trump voters as unworthy of sympathy and any Trump vote as wholly indefensible?   I say "struggle" because feeling this way toward huge swaths of the populace isn't really morally right, but nothing I've read or seen or witnessed of the various people making up Trump support is remotely sympathetic or reasonable to me.

is it unfair to understand his support as a combination of the following:

-racists, xenos, misogynists

-the woefully gullible (I'm including "normal" republicans voting for the home team tribalistically, because party over country, how bad could he really be, right?)

even those who "just want change" have no ground to stand on; even if it is desirable to shake up the whole system from scratch, Trump is absolutely not the person who should be at the helm of that mission, and one has to be incredibly naive to think otherwise.  Or totally unable to understand that not all change is good change-- change isn't exactly a self-evident positive.

I get that my east coast super liberal urban disdain for them/ their voting choice exacerbates the issue, but I'm still really struggling to be tolerant or sympathetic toward this.   Is anyone else going through this?

 

I'm struggling with seeing all Hillary supporters as unworthy of sympathy and any Clinton vote as wholly indefensible.  I believe a vote for Hillary is an endorsement for corruption. I understand people are scared of Trump and not without reason, but Hillary is in a league of her own when it comes to lack of virtue. It's a shame Bernie didn't make it past wicked Hillary but the democratic party made its choice: a corrupt, deceitful, venal harpy. Not all change is good change, no, but Trump could be a mixed bag. 

 

[The Anti-Targ]

1 hour ago, King Of The Slums said:

I'm struggling with seeing all Hillary supporters as unworthy of sympathy and any Clinton vote as wholly indefensible.  I believe a vote for Hillary is an endorsement for corruption. I understand people are scared of Trump and not without reason, but Hillary is in a league of her own when it comes to lack of virtue. It's a shame Bernie didn't make it past wicked Hillary but the democratic party made its choice: a corrupt, deceitful, venal harpy. Not all change is good change, no, but Trump could be a mixed bag. 

 

I don't know how you can claim Trump is less corrupt than Hillary. Trump openly admitted he has bought politicians in the past. So if he bought Hillary some time in the past, doesn't hat make him equally corrupt? People claiming the buyer of influence is less corrupt than the seller are simply fooling themselves.

I fail to see how anyone can claim a moral or ethics basis for voting for Trump over Hillary. He's at least as bad if not worse than Hillary, so if it comes down to a binary decision between Trump and Clinton on moral and ethical grounds you can't objectively come down on the side of Trump.

[Mudguard]

The latest Trump Foundation story about Trump using his "charity", which is funded by other people's money, to pay off his own or his business' financial obligation might have some legs.  It sounds really shady to me, but apparently it's not something he's likely to be jailed for.  

Even today Trump was bragging about how much he liked using other people's money as part of his regular business practices, and it's one of the things he claims he's going to do as president - make Mexico pay for the wall, make other countries pay their share for NATO, etc.  This scandal provides Clinton with a pretty good comeback.

I'm assuming Trump will claim that it was just a clerical error and pay a fine and/or reimburse his charity.  The smart thing to do would be to do all this before next week's debate in order to put this scandal behind him as quick as possible, otherwise it potentially could be a huge open issue at the debate.  We'll see how this plays out.  

[Starkess]

To claim that Democrats and Republicans are equally anti-science (setting aside all other issues) is pure nonsense.

Pop quiz: who said "I am being proven right about massive vaccinations—the doctors lied. Save our children & their future."

Oh, right, that's Donald Trump, the current Republican nominee for President.

As far as GMOs, concern about them is largely bipartisan. 15% of liberals don't care whether their food is GMO vs 17% of conservatives. (Note that this means 80+% of all American have at least some concern about GMOs, which is worrying in and of itself but not a partisan issue.) Issues like anti-GMO and anti-vax are more correlated with conspiracy-thinking than political identification.

Quote

Free-market worldviews are an important predictor of the rejection of scientific findings that have potential regulatory implications, such as climate science, but not necessarily of other scientific issues. Conspiracist ideation, by contrast, is associated with the rejection of all scientific propositions tested. We highlight the manifold cognitive reasons why conspiracist ideation would stand in opposition to the scientific method. The involvement of conspiracist ideation in the rejection of science has implications for science communicators.

By contrast, look at climate change. 66% of all voters think it's happening (51% agree that humans have caused it), and that breaks down to 88% of Democrats but only 28% of conservative Republicans. More moderate Republicans were higher at 61%, but that is still a marked partisan difference. And the official Republican platform endorses the more conservative opinion, dismissing the concern of climate change and rejecting any information from IPCC. (Which is a something of a reversal, showing how the Republican Party has moved to the right and rejected their previously more moderate positions from their 2008 platform.)

What about evolution? 60% of American agree that humans have evolved over time, and 33% think humans have existed in our present form since the beginning of time. That breaks down to 67% of Democrats and 43% of Republicans, a clear partisan divide and one that is actually worsening. The 67/43 is from 2013, and that gap was 64/54 in 2009.

So no, there really is no equivalence between Democrats and Republicans about anti-science. To claim otherwise is to be willfully dismissive of actual data.

[all swedes are racist]

What data? Says who?

[Larry of the Lawn]

9 minutes ago, R'hllors Red Lobster said:

What data? Says who?

Anti-poxxers

[James Arryn]

The thing with Trump voters for me is, that at some level, however 'ordinary' they are when not angry, however anti-elite their motivations, however fed up with the status quo their concerns, the bottom line is that they are at least okay with significant bigotry coming from the very top. They may feel Trump is less likely to be empowered, they may feel the media will be more vigilant, all that, but still...they are willing to sign off on significant and overt bigotry in the White House. Whether it's because they are themselves bigots or because bigotry is just not very important to them, that's still the bottom line.

And to me anyone who is either that kind of active or passive bigot is probably not a very good person. Even if they have other virtues, even if they are generally kind to those around them, even if they're good to animals, environmentally concerned, donate to charities, etc. If they are willing to support others being negatively defined by their race, religion, gender or sexuality, they are supporting 'evil' for lack of a better word. And in Trump they must know what they're supporting or they don't care about it enough to look. That's morally indefensible to me. It's the kind of thing that's lead me to end friendships, and lead to familial estrangements. 

If people can genuinely argue that Hillary possesses similarly profound 'evil', then I'd get the argument of picking your poisons, but excepting her willingness to kill foreigners for American  material gain...wherein she is not distinct from either Trump or the US political norm...her negatives (though real) just don't cut it. Her competence is IMO increasingly questionable, her likability has always been an issue, her corporate compliance and her apparent mistrust of others and willingness to be deceptive to achieve her aims are all arguably real, but again, pretty standard fare for politicians, largely true of Trump, and don't approach the kind of hard-core fucked-up-ness of something like putting people of a certain religion on a watchlist or calling people of a certain race natural rapists.

He's a fucking horror, and people who support him are at some level horrible for doing so. It's just true.