2020 Presidential Election -- Biden v Trump: Sleepy Joe vs Dopey Don [Results begin on page 409]

[Bateshorn 9882]

26 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

So Electoral College whining appears to be today's topic. 

The EC is a good thing and accomplishes exactly what it's supposed to accomplish. @bolverk is correct that the real issue is the House being grotesquely undersized. 

You showing up with your 10,000 Representatives and minority rule is good is as reliable as the sun setting and also completely wrong. 

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

9 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

Any chance you could stop using this word?  It seems to be your go-to lingo for the last several weeks.  When I see it, I stop reading.

Usually it’s counterpoint I think. 

[The Dog 43771]

38 minutes ago, Bateshorn said:

Yeah, I loathe the electoral college, it’s an abhorrent structural relic of our racist past, but our current situation is a function of the fact Californians really, really, really hate Trump. 

That's partially true (hating Trump), but it ignores the groundwork President Clinton laid while he was in office. He made more trips to the state than any president in history and made it a point to lock it up for the Democrats for a generation. He deserves a lot of credit for what the Democrats have there today.

[Bateshorn 9882]

1 minute ago, The Dog said:

That's partially true (hating Trump), but it ignores the groundwork President Clinton laid while he was in office. He made more trips to the state than any president in history and made it a point to lock it up for the Democrats for a generation. He deserves a lot of credit for what the Democrats have there today.

Pete Wilson and Prop 187 did more to make the state overwhelmingly democrat than anything.

[JimmyJames 12271]

Just now, Bateshorn said:

Pete Wilson and Prop 187 did more to make the state overwhelmingly democrat than anything.

Yeah that was sort of dumb. 

[David Dennison 18608]

31 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

So Electoral College whining appears to be today's topic. 

The EC is a good thing and accomplishes exactly what it's supposed to accomplish. @bolverk is correct that the real issue is the House being grotesquely undersized. 

The EC needs to be abolished. Full stop. 

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

8 minutes ago, yoladu said:

thanks for your posts, made me think about all this a bit differently.

so instead of Counterfactual and looking back to the Reality... it would imply that Trump is the more radical and polarizing of the two candidates, despite Trump's claims otherwise.

Maybe?  I don’t know if that’s a 100% necessary takeaway, always, from how California is positioned vis a vis the rest of the country, but it sure fits here. 

[Anastasis 23375]

1 minute ago, David Dennison said:

The EC needs to be abolished. Full stop. 

Only if we abolish the federal government at the same time. 

[Continental Op 3934]

18 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Yeah- I think if they get their asses kicked they will absolutely go away. Or will be ignored. 

Didn't you also say that principled conservatives would keep Trump under control?

[David Dennison 18608]

1 minute ago, Anastasis said:

Only if we abolish the federal government at the same time. 

No.

We should get rid of states, instead.

Edited September 2, 2020 by David Dennison

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

9 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

you really think houston (or anywhere in texas) is comparable?

a majority of the people i grew up with in houston currently reside in houston.  i would guess there are some other texas transplants.  hou -> dallas and dallas -> houston and so forth.  but it's nothing like what california is like.

I lived in California until I was 12. I’ve lived in houston for 20 of the past 30 years. They feel pretty similar to me in that nobody is actually from there. That’s not a bad thing to my way of thinking- that’s a real positive for an area. Shows dynamism. 

[totallynotabuttpirate 5341]

1 minute ago, Wulaw Horn said:

That’s not a bad thing to my way of thinking- that’s a real positive for an area. Shows dynamism. 

Your mom shows good dynamism. 

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

1 minute ago, Continental Op said:

Didn't you also say that principled conservatives would keep Trump under control?

Hey, we are all making predictions here. If I knew the future for a fact I’d be sitting on a beach making 20% with Hans Gruber.  

[David Dennison 18608]

Just now, Wulaw Horn said:

I lived in California until I was 12. I’ve lived in houston for 20 of the past 30 years. They feel pretty similar to me in that nobody is actually from there. That’s not a bad thing to my way of thinking- that’s a real positive for an area. Shows dynamism. 

Saying that nobody is actually from Houston will come as a surprise to millions of native Houstonians.

[Nice Guy Eddie 13391]

1 minute ago, David Dennison said:

No.

We should get rid of states, instead.

This is the crux of the issue. Are we one country or 50 states? It's been the question since 1789. I get the opinion that the EC is outdated but it is one of the reasons that the original states agreed to come together.  That and the senate ensured that the smaller population states had a voice while the House is more large population friendly.

[henrygandorf 29174]

3 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

I lived in California until I was 12. I’ve lived in houston for 20 of the past 30 years. They feel pretty similar to me in that nobody is actually from there. That’s not a bad thing to my way of thinking- that’s a real positive for an area. Shows dynamism. 

it's not a matter of positive or negative, it's a matter of true or false.

maybe it's anecdotal, and i'm sure la is an extreme because of the specific industries that are here, but i see nothing similar.  maybe there are numbers out there that could shed some light.

[Storm the Field 5270]

QPac out for first time since their eyebrow-raising +15 Biden in June.

Not much drop considering this represents a switch from RV to LV.

 

 

 

[Storm the Field 5270]

On a side note, RCP is also currently at 7.5, up from 6.0 yesterday. First time I can recall that 538 and RCP have exact same national margin.

[Sawbonz 27375]

 

 

3 hours ago, Pancho said:

 

 That was a really smart move waiting to go until after Trump had a chance to go and make an absolute ass of himself. Now he can go and look presidential

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

9 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

it's not a matter of positive or negative, it's a matter of true or false.

maybe it's anecdotal, and i'm sure la is an extreme because of the specific industries that are here, but i see nothing similar.  maybe there are numbers out there that could shed some light.

https://www.migrationpolicy.org/research/profile-immigrants-houston-nations-most-diverse-metropolitan-area
 

Huge international migration to HTown. Also large internal migration. 

[bolverk 29360]

11 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

it's not a matter of positive or negative, it's a matter of true or false.

maybe it's anecdotal, and i'm sure la is an extreme because of the specific industries that are here, but i see nothing similar.  maybe there are numbers out there that could shed some light.

There are. It's actually pretty fascinating. Nice interactive map of counties showing percentage of the population born in the state of residence.

https://www.governing.com/gov-data/census/native-homegrown-residents-by-county.html

[Sawbonz 27375]

1 hour ago, lemonlime said:

Trump backed out of a debate during the primary in 2016.  Just held a rally instead.  I'd lay odds that what happens here.  He hasn't been able to field a question from a "journalist" who's not completely in the bag for him in months.

He wasn’t the champ back then. The champ can’t duck the only challenger. Might as well retire 

[Snake Diggity 4614]

Just had a thought: people’s votes hinge on whether they believe it’s more likely that Vladimir Putin possesses a video of racist Septuagenarian One urinating on a naked little girl or that socialist Septugenarian Two is controlled by thousands of pedophiles who are addicted to harvesting adrenochrome from the glands of terrified children.

 

 

 

 

 

We’re fucked.

Edited September 2, 2020 by Snake Diggity

[Huckleberry 32685]

48 minutes ago, Hank Kingsley said:

For a major political party to go rogue and eventually embrace Trumpism? 

The President is elected by the States, not by the People. If the popular vote compact goes through, that would be cool. Because it would be the States deciding it. 

[Ghost of LL 15348]

8 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

 

 

 That was a really smart move waiting to go until after Trump had a chance to go and make an absolute ass of himself. Now he can go and look presidential

Yeah.  I like that move.  Let's see how it works out, but this may become a model for Biden's trips going forward.

[MonkeyDoughnut 10134]

19 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

This is the crux of the issue. Are we one country or 50 states? It's been the question since 1789. I get the opinion that the EC is outdated but it is one of the reasons that the original states agreed to come together.  That and the senate ensured that the smaller population states had a voice while the House is more large population friendly.

I'd be for scrapping the 17th amendment and letting states go back to appointing their Senators.  Tired of Senators pandering to the populace when sometimes real issues need to be addressed

[henrygandorf 29174]

7 minutes ago, bolverk said:

There are. It's actually pretty fascinating. Nice interactive map of counties showing percentage of the population born in the state of residence.

https://www.governing.com/gov-data/census/native-homegrown-residents-by-county.html

the spread is not as big in la county vs harris county as i would've thought (only about a 5-6% difference).  but texas as a whole is much more blue and dark blue (using the map, not political colors) than california.

[bolverk 29360]

1 minute ago, henrygandorf said:

the spread is not as big in la county vs harris county as i would've thought (only about a 5-6% difference).  but texas as a whole is much more blue and dark blue (using the map, not political colors) than california.

No doubt. I think part of it might also be a function of the small geographic size of our counties as well where many of them don't have a town that's larger than 10,000. Even your rural ag counties in the Central Valley have a moderate sized city in them. But, yeah, overall it makes sense that California has fewer native-born (in-state) adults - it's long been a gateway state for both international immigrants, as well as a destination for domestic talent.

Texas has a similar status but just not as extreme. Although though the latter is increasing, especially in the Big 4 major metros - hence, all the bitching about too many Californians moving here and changing "our ways."

[bolverk 29360]

Not to belabor the point and further the thread derail but thought this series of state maps showing the migration inflow of residents is pretty cool.

[G650 13990]

18 minutes ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

I'd be for scrapping the 17th amendment and letting states go back to appointing their Senators.  Tired of Senators pandering to the populace when sometimes real issues need to be addressed

I have been 100% behind this for eons.

[gmr548 16463]

you really think houston (or anywhere in texas) is comparable?
a majority of the people i grew up with in houston currently reside in houston.  i would guess there are some other texas transplants.  hou -> dallas and dallas -> houston and so forth.  but it's nothing like what california is like.

The majority of people who grew up in a given place stay in that given place. That's still true even in today's world. The majority of Californians were born in California. By far the leading out of state birthplace is Mexico, then China. Foreign born residents significantly outnumber residents born in US states.

So in that sense Wulaw was obviously painting with a broad brush but saying there are a lot of transplants in Houston isn't a stretch. Still, a majority of Houstonians were likeky born in the Houston area or at least Texas.

Now if I had to guess is think it's fair to say the majority of older gen x/boomer suburban types in Katy, Cypress, Tomball, the Woodlands, wherever aren't from Houston. Or at least close to a majority That's probably true of most Texas suburbs where out of staters have relocated. But that's a small piece of the overall pie.

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

41 minutes ago, Storm the Field said:

QPac out for first time since their eyebrow-raising +15 Biden in June.

Not much drop considering this represents a switch from RV to LV.

 

 

 

The only two numbers I actually think might even be off are men looks a little light for Trump- I'd guess he carries men, and Black looks a little light for Biden- I don't see Trump pulling double digits there.  My gut feeling has always been Q leans a couple points to the left- I know Silver tracks that shit- what is his house affect for Q- any idea?  

Yeah, this isn't looking particularly close. 

[Biff Tannen 45477]

40 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

 

 

 That was a really smart move waiting to go until after Trump had a chance to go and make an absolute ass of himself. Now he can go and look presidential

Yep.  "This is how you do it, numb nuts."

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

37 minutes ago, bolverk said:

There are. It's actually pretty fascinating. Nice interactive map of counties showing percentage of the population born in the state of residence.

https://www.governing.com/gov-data/census/native-homegrown-residents-by-county.html

Thanks man, that's pretty cool.  So Gandorf- 34% of Los Angelinos are native compared to 39% of houstonians.  Yeah, man, that's not a big difference I'm going to say they are pretty close to the same there. Also, you didn't, obviously state "Los Angelinos you stated Californians.  If you take it comparing Houston to California than Houston has a higher percentage of transports than California.  

[Bateshorn 9882]

32 minutes ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

I'd be for scrapping the 17th amendment and letting states go back to appointing their Senators.  Tired of Senators pandering to the populace when sometimes real issues need to be addressed

That's what we need:  Even less democracy. 

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

7 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

The only two numbers I actually think might even be off are men looks a little light for Trump- I'd guess he carries men, and Black looks a little light for Biden- I don't see Trump pulling double digits there.  My gut feeling has always been Q leans a couple points to the left- I know Silver tracks that shit- what is his house affect for Q- any idea?  

Yeah, this isn't looking particularly close. 

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pollster-ratings/

Has Q as a D +0.1.

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

37 minutes ago, Ghost of LL said:

Yeah.  I like that move.  Let's see how it works out, but this may become a model for Biden's trips going forward.

I get the appeal. I think it has to be very limited in scope- or you look like you are ankle biting and reacting to someone else's schedule.  Kenosha? Sure. Likely sets up the opportunity for a great contrast on a topical event.  If he starts following Trump to Tulsa or New Hampshire or something that's probably a bad look. 

[Biff Tannen 45477]

3 minutes ago, Bateshorn said:

That's what we need:  Even less democracy. 

That was my reaction.  Why would Senators not being accountable to the people be a good thing?  I'm willing to learn.

[Pancho 44358]

Well furk

 

 

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

8 minutes ago, Longhornmaniac8 said:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/pollster-ratings/

Has Q as a D +0.1.

Thanks. I'm not smart enough to know what mean reverted bias means. Maybe Huck will take pity on me and explain it.  I saw B+ on the pollster but I thought I saw D +0.2. I don't think that means subtract two tenths of a point from that poll from dems and you will get the right answer last time around, but I don't know.  That does jive with my slight house effect for Dem gut instinct though.   if its' 10 points it's not close, though, and that's the main point.  

[bolverk 29360]

3 minutes ago, Pancho said:

Well furk

 

 

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that would be an untenable situation for holding this country together.

[jimmyjazz 45513]

47 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

The President is elected by the States, not by the People. If the popular vote compact goes through, that would be cool. Because it would be the States deciding it. 

How close is that compact?  They need to get to 270 electors, right?

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

1 minute ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Thanks. I'm not smart enough to know what mean reverted bias means. Maybe Huck will take pity on me and explain it.  I saw B+ on the pollster but I thought I saw D +0.2. I don't think that means subtract two tenths of a point from that poll from dems and you will get the right answer last time around, but I don't know.  That does jive with my slight house effect for Dem gut instinct though.   if its' 10 points it's not close, though, and that's the main point.  

Yep, 0.2, typo. I'll edit. 

Here's what the Definitions tab says about Mean Reverted Bias.

Quote

Mean-reverted bias

A pollster's historical average statistical bias toward Democratic or Republican candidates, reverted to a mean of zero based on the number of polls in the database. A score of “R +1.5,” for example, indicates that the pollster’s polls have historically overrated the performance of Republican candidates.

 

[Ghost of LL 15348]

9 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

I get the appeal. I think it has to be very limited in scope- or you look like you are ankle biting and reacting to someone else's schedule.  Kenosha? Sure. Likely sets up the opportunity for a great contrast on a topical event.  If he starts following Trump to Tulsa or New Hampshire or something that's probably a bad look. 

That's right.  I didn't mean to say that if Trump holds a random rally in Paducah that Biden should show up there two days later.  I do mean, however, if there's a disaster or event of national significance that Trump shows up to--and inevitably fucks up--then Biden should be hot on his heels to display compassion and show what an actual president looks like.

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

5 minutes ago, Pancho said:

Well furk

 

 

That's a non-sequiter though right?  He's talking about the electoral college and then he says we need to enlarge the house.  Don't get me wrong- I agree with him. The House should be enlarged. And it's undoubtedly true that this will help democrats (they "waste" more votes through extremely blue urban areas than they do gerrymandering- having more reps would help this for sure) or at least urban areas (which I think have always probably meant democrats) but it's imminently fair and reasonable, and 750K or whatever is just too big a house district to be what the framers envisioned.  

I don't see how changing the size of the house affects Electoral college politics, but if I'm missing something obvious please share. 

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

3 minutes ago, Longhornmaniac8 said:

Yep, 0.2, typo. I'll edit. 

Here's what the Definitions tab says about Mean Reverted Bias.

 

I got the direction- but it didn't explain how far that direction encompassed.  Unless it really is 0.2 and I'm overthinking it. Thanks for sharing. 

[formermav43 4599]

1 minute ago, Wulaw Horn said:

That's a non-sequiter though right?  He's talking about the electoral college and then he says we need to enlarge the house.  Don't get me wrong- I agree with him. The House should be enlarged. And it's undoubtedly true that this will help democrats (they "waste" more votes through extremely blue urban areas than they do gerrymandering- having more reps would help this for sure) or at least urban areas (which I think have always probably meant democrats) but it's imminently fair and reasonable, and 750K or whatever is just too big a house district to be what the framers envisioned.  

I don't see how changing the size of the house affects Electoral college politics, but if I'm missing something obvious please share. 

More house members means the power of smaller states in the electoral college will be further diminished relative to more populous states. A state like Wyoming will still only have 3 electoral votes, but more populous states will pick up some.

[Nice Guy Eddie 13391]

10 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

That's a non-sequiter though right?  He's talking about the electoral college and then he says we need to enlarge the house.  Don't get me wrong- I agree with him. The House should be enlarged. And it's undoubtedly true that this will help democrats (they "waste" more votes through extremely blue urban areas than they do gerrymandering- having more reps would help this for sure) or at least urban areas (which I think have always probably meant democrats) but it's imminently fair and reasonable, and 750K or whatever is just too big a house district to be what the framers envisioned.  

I don't see how changing the size of the house affects Electoral college politics, but if I'm missing something obvious please share. 

they effectively go hand in hand. A state's EC vote are their # of reps + # of senators. DC gets to pretend their a state to get their 3 EC votes.

If the House was increased, then small population states would more correctly have a smaller proportion of the House. Right now Wyoming gets 1 rep for their 200K residents. CA or TX has a rep for every 700K residents. Say you double the House. WY still gets 1 but Texas and CA would basically double their # of reps and almost double their EC votes. This sounds incredibly unfair for WY but its already unfair for then. This is balancing that unfairness to where it should be.

A downside of increasing the House is cost. You need more room, more staff, more money. You would also have more crazy people in Congress as it will take less votes and money to win.

Edited September 2, 2020 by Nice Guy Eddie

[Ghost of LL 15348]

6 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

That's a non-sequiter though right?  He's talking about the electoral college and then he says we need to enlarge the house.  Don't get me wrong- I agree with him. The House should be enlarged. And it's undoubtedly true that this will help democrats (they "waste" more votes through extremely blue urban areas than they do gerrymandering- having more reps would help this for sure) or at least urban areas (which I think have always probably meant democrats) but it's imminently fair and reasonable, and 750K or whatever is just too big a house district to be what the framers envisioned.  

I don't see how changing the size of the house affects Electoral college politics, but if I'm missing something obvious please share. 

The number of electors that each state gets in the Electoral College is the state's number of House seats plus the two senators.  So if there are more House seats, then that obviously dilutes the impact of the automatic two senate seats.

By way of example, if you added 200 House seats, there would suddenly be 738 electoral votes.  So those Senate seats would go from accounting for 100/538 (i.e.,  18.6%) down to 100/738 (i.e.,  13.6%).  

The real-world effect is seen on Wyoming.  Wyoming has three electoral college votes (i.e., 0.6%).  Even if you expanded by 200 House seats, Wyoming would probably still only have one Member of the House.  So its percentage of the electoral college goes down to 0.4%.

Or conversely, compare it with Texas.  Texas has 8.74% of the American population, but with only 38 electoral votes, it has only 7.1% of the vote.  Assuming that you added 200 new House seats, Texas would presumably get somewhere in the neighborhood of 17 new congressmen, which means its electoral vote would go up to 55.  That's now 7.5%.  Maybe not a huge increase, but it's getting us in the right direction.

Edited September 2, 2020 by Ghost of LL

[Wulaw Horn 18963]

13 minutes ago, Pancho said:

Well furk

 

 

Also, I just dropped the numbers and this tweet is really really needlessly alarming.  Right now, over 50% of Americans live in the top 9 most populous states.  The top 8 most populous states have an estimated population of 157,203,000 people. If America is a country of 330,000,000 that means the top 8 states currently house 48% of the population.  So- in twenty years the drift will be 2%.  Slight difference, but not anything we need to get too worked up about or something that changes the face of the nation.