the thing about electoral politics is the sample size is really small and as a result patterns generally don’t mean shit
I think Biden’s position is quite bad but “nobody has done this before” when “nobody” has a sample size of, like, two is not meaningful
that's more or less right. "things are bad. and we have no precise evidence-based well-documented idea whether option A or option B will make them worse." is basically all that's left at this point.
yeah but it needs to be an extremely desperate, alarmed shrug emoji, because "shit is bad and it's unclear whether any of our options will improve or worsen the situations, but if we don't improve things there'll be a terrible reckoning" is....more the actual vibe
I tend to trust A) actual poli sci professors who specialize in elections and public opinion as well as B) Long-experienced pols & operatives at the state level and higher who've won lots of elections and seen lots of political hijinks. those two groups are less clueless than the rest of us.
I am a little skeptical about porting over other countries' elections as a direct proxy for our own *but* France and India are both good examples of recent elections where media hype around far right dominance was disconnected from reality and there's no reason it can't happen here too.
Yes but I also will say they have had a collective history since 2002 of the “Republican front” being an actual thing with results. The U.S. is *starting* to have it happen (ie never trumpers actually voting Dem in 2020) but it’s not part of our culture yet.
They often are aligned, but the challenger is also usually new to the national political arena and someone the electorate can project their hopes onto. That's not the case with Trump! Not at all!
Anyone, I think, who is going to vote against Trump will do so regardless of who that vote for is actually for.
Biden isn’t popular but Trump is loathed.
There’s also still a shit ton of undecided votes. At this point last cycle there was over 90% combined two-way vote in polling averages, right now it’s 82.
every damn poll is so overstuffed with inference it looks like a ratfuck or simply can't be made to be anything but close so its 'lol we called it close' or 'lol nobody saw a blowout coming' after the fact and hot takes got no time for your lessons learned.
