US Politics: Swindler's List

[Fez]

16 minutes ago, Ormond said:

I'm sure there are big problems with pollsters finding it harder to get representative samples, but I'm not sure the above paragraph is indicative of this because the very same NYT poll did find Lake (as well as Republican US Senate challengers in other states) losing, running considerably behind Trump in their states. I think there are a lot of young people out there who are really mad at Biden because of inflation, housing, and/or Gaza, but who are not about to vote for a Republican for the Senate because of other issues. Hopefully they will realize by November that Trump would be much worse than Biden on the issues they are angry about.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/13/us/politics/democrats-senate-battleground-poll.html

 

It is entirely unrealistic to think that level of ticket splitting could still happen in 2024. Especially a Trump/Senate Democrats split (which the NYT found) instead of a Third Party or Blank/Senate Democrat split.

And if we're talking about the NYT poll specifically, their "likely voter model" has 20% of their voters either not voted in the last two midterms, not voted in the last general election, or never voted before. Which, by any reasonable definition, would not make them "likely" voters. Meanwhile, 34% (!) of their registered voters didn't vote in 2020; which also seems very unrealistic. To me, these numbers reinforce that NYT simply isn't getting representative samples without getting dangerously funky in their methodologies.

[Zorral]

Since he's got gag orders, and the crowds that support him wherever else are not here to support him here, he has summoned his longest tongued spokesmouths to say what he cannot say or else go to jail: Bergum, Johnson, Vance, etc.  They harangue the press in the small city park across from the state court building.

~~~~~~~~~~~

We have all heard of, perhaps been accused of  "virtue signaling," right?  Well the fascists have their own version, "cruelty signaling", this passing out of fake money to the homeless, shooting puppies, etc.  Proving they are ugly enough to be the VP pick for the stinkin' wallowing heap.

Always keep in mind, cruelty is the point.

MICHELLE GOLDBERG
Killing Dogs. Taunting the Homeless. Praising Al Capone. This Is Trump’s Party.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/13/opinion/kristi-noem-vice-signaling-maga.html

Quote

 

.... With his boyish face and slicked-back hair, McEntee, a former director of the White House Office of Presidential Personnel and a man likely to be central to staffing a future Trump administration, comes off a lot like Patrick Bateman, the homicidal investment banker played by Christian Bale in the 2000 film “American Psycho.” The clip’s smug villainy, I think, offers a clue to why South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, thirsty for a bigger role in MAGA world, might have thought she could ingratiate herself by bragging about killing a puppy.

Right wingers often rain contempt on what they call virtue signaling, a performative kind of sanctimony epitomized by the “In This House” yard signs that once dotted progressive neighborhoods. Partly in response, they’ve developed what’s sometimes called vice signaling, the defiant embrace of cruelty and disdain for social norms. Think of “rolling coal,” the practice of modifying diesel engines to make them belch dark exhaust in an effort to trigger environmentalists, or the way George Santos’s promiscuous falsehoods endeared him to hard-core MAGA acolytes.

A cult of Bateman has developed on the very online right, which is why images from “American Psycho” appeared multiple times in a bizarre ad for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis during his abortive presidential campaign. And no one, of course, does vice signaling like Trump, who keeps comparing himself to the gangster Al Capone. ...

 

 

[Zorral]

3 hours ago, Gorn said:

This is the part the worries me. If Biden has a surprise win after Trump's lead in the polls, there is a high risk of post-election trouble.

If Biden loses there is no doubt there will be post-election trouble, as They come breaking down our doors and shooting off all Their gunz.  This is what They are waiting for.

We will all have a better chance of survival if They lose.

[IheartIheartTesla]

I just took a (quick) look at Morning Consult, and their most recent poll claims to have 10000 RV responders. So their need to adjust for demographics is less than other pollsters.

Regarding vote-splitting, a poll is a snapshot in time for now, and a barometer of how people are feeling, so it is entirely possible folks are hypothetically vote splitting right now, but wont come election day. In which case we'll see movement in the polls too.

[DMC]

1 hour ago, Fez said:

And if we're talking about the NYT poll specifically, their "likely voter model" has 20% of their voters either not voted in the last two midterms, not voted in the last general election, or never voted before. Which, by any reasonable definition, would not make them "likely" voters.

I’m not sure why you find this surprising.  According to the cross tabs, nine percent of their likely voter model didn’t vote in the midterm.  Considering the difference in the electorates, that seems fine.  Six percent are new registrants.  That seems a bit high, but not outlandish.  And five percent didn’t vote in the midterm or the last general.  Again, that seems a bit high, but “likely voters” are measured by self-reported responses to an item - and always have been.

1 hour ago, Fez said:

Meanwhile, 34% (!) of their registered voters didn't vote in 2020; which also seems very unrealistic.

Not sure where you’re getting this from.  Annoying the crosstab page doesn’t number their items, but the one I’m looking at reports 18% of registered voters said they didn’t vote, two percent they voted third party (someone else), and three percent responded don’t know/refused.  Those numbers seem just about right to me.

Anyway, the main problem with these “swing state polls” is that while the overall sample looks great, it’s then split between six states.  In this case, while the overall sample is a bit over four thousand, in five of the six states (except PA) are in the low 600s - and then there’s further roll off depending on the item.  That’s inherently going to lead to large sampling error (i.e. margin of error).

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

22 minutes ago, DMC said:

I’m not sure why you find this surprising.  According to the cross tabs, nine percent of their likely voter model didn’t vote in the midterm.  Considering the difference in the electorates, that seems fine.  Six percent are new registrants.  That seems a bit high, but not outlandish.  And five percent didn’t vote in the midterm or the last general.  Again, that seems a bit high, but “likely voters” are measured by self-reported responses to an item - and always have been.

Not sure where you’re getting this from.  Annoying the crosstab page doesn’t number their items, but the one I’m looking at reports 18% of registered voters said they didn’t vote, two percent they voted third party (someone else), and three percent responded don’t know/refused.  Those numbers seem just about right to me.

Anyway, the main problem with these “swing state polls” is that while the overall sample looks great, it’s then split between six states.  In this case, while the overall sample is a bit over four thousand, in five of the six states (except PA) are in the low 600s - and then there’s further roll off depending on the item.  That’s inherently going to lead to large sampling error (i.e. margin of error).

They aren’t polling the individual States?  They’re taking an aggregate from all six swing states?

[DMC]

They are polling from the individual states, but the samples of those individual states are relatively low  - again, in the low 600s in five of the six states.  Just click on the linked cross tabs page and you can check out the specifics.

[Ormond]

1 hour ago, Fez said:

It is entirely unrealistic to think that level of ticket splitting could still happen in 2024. Especially a Trump/Senate Democrats split (which the NYT found) instead of a Third Party or Blank/Senate Democrat split.

 

I don't know if there is enough data in the details published in this particular poll to figure out how much of the ticket splitting was found among younger and first time voters. But I really don't think one can assume that voters under 30 are going to be as predictable in following any past trend among voters, whether it's ticket splitting or anything else. It would not surprise me if Gaza and the pandemic have combined to make voters under age 30 more into ticket splitting than other voters. 

[Fez]

58 minutes ago, DMC said:

I’m not sure why you find this surprising.  According to the cross tabs, nine percent of their likely voter model didn’t vote in the midterm.  Considering the difference in the electorates, that seems fine.  Six percent are new registrants.  That seems a bit high, but not outlandish.  And five percent didn’t vote in the midterm or the last general.  Again, that seems a bit high, but “likely voters” are measured by self-reported responses to an item - and always have been.

Not sure where you’re getting this from.  Annoying the crosstab page doesn’t number their items, but the one I’m looking at reports 18% of registered voters said they didn’t vote, two percent they voted third party (someone else), and three percent responded don’t know/refused.  Those numbers seem just about right to me.

Anyway, the main problem with these “swing state polls” is that while the overall sample looks great, it’s then split between six states.  In this case, while the overall sample is a bit over four thousand, in five of the six states (except PA) are in the low 600s - and then there’s further roll off depending on the item.  That’s inherently going to lead to large sampling error (i.e. margin of error).

I know LV screens (the good ones historically anyway) are self-reported. But there's simply not that much turnover from election-to-election, so if you're finding so much turnover there's a problem somewhere. Likely in that the sample isn't actually representative.

And what I saw (admittedly posted elsewhere, so maybe they were lying) was that respondents' recalled 2020 vote was:

Biden: 42%

Trump: 32%

Did not vote: 34%

[DMC]

18 minutes ago, Fez said:

But there's simply not that much turnover from election-to-election, so if you're finding so much turnover there's a problem somewhere. Likely in that the sample isn't actually representative.

Again, 11 percent “new” voters (new registrants + those that did not vote in the previous midterm AND general) is not particularly unusual for a presidential cycle.  Obviously 2020 was an outlier, but it was the only one I could quickly find data on.  A full 19 percent didn’t vote in 2018 nor 2016.

23 minutes ago, Fez said:

And what I saw (admittedly posted elsewhere, so maybe they were lying) was that respondents' recalled 2020 vote was:

The numbers I saw in the aforementioned item was Biden 40, Trump 37.  The numbers you cited add up to 108.

[DMC]

9 hours ago, Ormond said:

I think there are a lot of young people out there who are really mad at Biden because of inflation, housing, and/or Gaza, but who are not about to vote for a Republican for the Senate because of other issues. Hopefully they will realize by November that Trump would be much worse than Biden on the issues they are angry about.

Just to build off this, looking at the crosstabs linked above, it is plainly young people that are driving Biden losing.  To be clear, this is just under registered voters, but Biden is actually losing 18 to 29 year olds to Trump, when he won that age group 60 to 36 four years ago.  His net approval there is lowest among all age groups.  And if you’re wondering where that ticket-splitting is coming from, 18-29 prefer the Democratic Senate candidate 50 to 29, but Trump 46 to 43.  (Georgia and Michigan were not included in the Senate sample since there is no race this cycle.)

Do I think this is because NYT/Siena is wrong?  No.  Is it a sampling or weighting issue?  No.*  Do I think this will be the case come November?  Absolutely not.  Young people are pissed right now, and rightfully so.

But unless you are in that age group, I’d wager I spend more time with 18 to 29 year olds than anyone reading this.  And when I do, I am literally discussing American politics with them, or monitoring discussions amongst themselves.  I teach about 200 students per semester, albeit that’s nearly cut in half during the summer which started yesterday.  The vast majority of them are 18 to 29 years old.  That may be “anecdotal,” but I am very confident those crosstabs will look drastically different come November among that age group.

*If you scroll down to the end of the crosstabs link they actually show you the weighting.  Plainly the biggest “correction” they made was with uneducated voters - still clearly trying to account for the Trump underestimating.

ETA/Correction:  There is, of course, an open Senate seat in Michigan this cycle to replace the retiring Debbie Stabenow.  I imagine NYT/Siena omitted the that because the primaries aren’t until August 6.

[ThinkerX]

I saw an article earlier today that detailed how the Democratic Senate incumbents in swing states were polling far better than expected. If another article is to be believed (maybe?) Cruz is in serious trouble - enough so to where he might lose. Alas, both articles seem to have vanished...

[DMC]

Angela Alsobrooks won the Maryland Democratic primary tonight to replace Ben Cardin in the Senate.  Her opponent, David Trone, spent $61 million of his own money on the campaign.  Proving once again the diminishing returns of ludicrous funding.

[Darzin]

14 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

I wouldn't be so sure about this. The crazy has only swirled further down the drain. It's probably unwise to assume we've seen anything close to the worst of what these times may bring. 

Biden being in office gives him far more leverage then as a challenger. And even if Trump wins he's term limited. There's not a path forward for overthrowing democracy. The time to do it was 2020 but that ship has, thankfully, sailed. 

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

2 hours ago, Darzin said:

And even if Trump wins he's term limited. There's not a path forward for overthrowing democracy. The time to do it was 2020 but that ship has, thankfully, sailed. 

Trump-packed Supreme Court says hello. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

7 hours ago, Darzin said:

Biden being in office gives him far more leverage then as a challenger. And even if Trump wins he's term limited. There's not a path forward for overthrowing democracy. The time to do it was 2020 but that ship has, thankfully, sailed. 

You are assuming, incorrectly, that Trump and Trumpanistas give a flying fuck about the limitations of the 22nd Amendment.  I’ve seen them claim, speciously, that a failed effort to remove a President from office means they get another term.  I ask for they basis for such an assertion and get told to “do my own research”…

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

4 hours ago, Matrim Fox Cauthon said:

Trump-packed Supreme Court says hello. 

That would be an incredible stretch for the SCOTUS to ignore.  The term limits for Presidents is established by the 22nd Amendment.  That his fanatical cult like followers might want to ignore the Constitution wouldn’t surprise me.  The SCOTUS doing the same (well not Alito and Thomas) would.

[DMC]

5 hours ago, Matrim Fox Cauthon said:

Trump-packed Supreme Court says hello. 

SCOTUS is effectively the same as it was in 2020, when they provided no aid to Trump’s myriad challenges.  Will that be different this time?  Perhaps.  But the Trump camp is plainly going to have to come up with better justifications to convince five of them.

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

41 minutes ago, DMC said:

SCOTUS is effectively the same as it was in 2020, when they provided no aid to Trump’s myriad challenges.  Will that be different this time?  Perhaps.  But the Trump camp is plainly going to have to come up with better justifications to convince five of them.

But if Trump wins and he packs more into loyalists SCOTUS... That's my worry. 

[DMC]

12 minutes ago, Matrim Fox Cauthon said:

But if Trump wins and he packs more into loyalists SCOTUS... That's my worry. 

Ah. K.  That’s different than the discussion, and presents its own obstacles.