2024 Presidential Election Thread - Let's keep the party going.

[Bateshorn 9896]

11 hours ago, heso said:

For the overwhelming majority of morons it boils down to nothing more than inflation. Inflation was bad during Biden, not during Trump. Clearly that’s all due to things Biden and Trump did. 

You guys give WAY WAY too much credit to the general population of this country. There are tens of millions of people in this country that are really fucking stupid. 

Go over to the Springfield thread and watch the interviews with the locals and then imagine every single small town in the country being filled with millions of people like that. 

Those are the people that decided Trump was the best the gop could offer.

We are living in idiocracy. 

Take a moment to visualize the average person you know in your neighborhood or work.  That normal-ish guy who sometimes misses the point but is generally in the right spot intellectually.  
 

Half the country is dumber than that person. 

[Js1 85071]

11 minutes ago, Bateshorn said:

Take a moment to visualize the average person you know in your neighborhood or work.  That normal-ish guy who sometimes misses the point but is generally in the right spot intellectually.  
 

Half the country is dumber than that person. 

I pretty much just assume the average person/voter is TexAgs level of intelligent. 

[atomheartbevo 89381]

I'll fight @Brisketexan or anybody else for Nicole Wallace

 

[Snake Diggity 4614]

~10% of American adults didn’t graduate high school.

~52% of American adults did not graduate college.

~70% of Americans fail a basic civic literacy quiz on topics like the three branches of government, the number of Supreme Court justices, and other basic functions of our democracy.

We have woefully unqualified electorate.

[Brisketexan 104501]

49 minutes ago, Js1 said:

I pretty much just assume the average person/voter is TexAgs level of intelligent. 

Let me terrify you even more: most Texags posters are at least college educated.  What you see on that site is folks who probably fall in the top 1/3 of education and intelligence.

You truly cannot conceive of how stupid Americans of average/median intelligence are.....let alone the fucking HALF of Americans who are BELOW median intelligence and education.  "Stupid" doesn't even scratch the surface of how fucked we are.

[Js1 85071]

5 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

~70% of Americans fail a basic civic literacy quiz on topics like the three branches of government, the number of Supreme Court justices, and other basic functions of our democracy.

 

So does Tommy Tuberville.  Aim high, kids! 

[BehoId, The Underminer! 11668]

Basic decency is lacking more than basic intelligence.  People were a lot less educated 100 years ago but figured out how to elect Lincoln 

[Huckleberry 32693]

9 minutes ago, BehoId, The Underminer! said:

Basic decency is lacking more than basic intelligence.  People were a lot less educated 100 years ago but figured out how to elect Lincoln 

Education != intelligence

[hobbes2702 12775]

20 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

~10% of American adults didn’t graduate high school.

~52% of American adults did not graduate college.

~70% of Americans fail a basic civic literacy quiz on topics like the three branches of government, the number of Supreme Court justices, and other basic functions of our democracy.

We have woefully unqualified electorate.

I don’t think you need to have done any of those things to see that Trump is a hateful bigot. It’s not about them not being smart enough, it’s about them not being moral enough 

[DigglerontheHoof 21040]

2 minutes ago, hobbes2702 said:

I don’t think you need to have done any of those things to see that Trump is a hateful bigot. It’s not about them not being smart enough, it’s about them not being moral enough 

Willfully ignorant and morally bankrupt. 

[Horn Dog 9662]

16 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Let me terrify you even more: most Texags posters are at least college educated.  What you see on that site is folks who probably fall in the top 1/3 of education and intelligence.

You truly cannot conceive of how stupid Americans of average/median intelligence are.....let alone the fucking HALF of Americans who are BELOW median intelligence and education.  "Stupid" doesn't even scratch the surface of how fucked we are.

This is absolutely true.  I posted a few weeks ago about a meeting I attended with hospital administration about how our consent was “too complicated “ cause it used big words like “abdomen” and how we needed to dumb it down cause according to their research, our average adult patient had a vocabulary and logical abilities of a 6th grader.  It is truly truly frightening what is out there.

[Js1 85071]

The first of a few PA polls dropping today:

Muhlenberg

POTUS - 48-48 (last Muhlenberg PA poll was Trump +3)
Senate - Casey +4
Generic ballot - 45-45

[Ted Lange 15999]

 

 

[tx ind 6997]

31 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

~10% of American adults didn’t graduate high school.

~52% of American adults did not graduate college.

~70% of Americans fail a basic civic literacy quiz on topics like the three branches of government, the number of Supreme Court justices, and other basic functions of our democracy.

We have woefully unqualified electorate.

I'd bet if you gave the civic quiz to the Haitians in Springfield vs. the non-Haitians the results would be astonishing.

[SubliminalHorn 6661]

3 minutes ago, Js1 said:

The first of a few PA polls dropping today:

Muhlenberg

POTUS - 48-48 (last Muhlenberg PA poll was Trump +3)
Senate - Casey +4
Generic ballot - 45-45

Fucking PA man

[SimonBolivar 10907]

17 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

Education != intelligence

Correct. I don't think I have anything more than average intelligence, but education (both formal and informal) makes a big difference.

[SimonBolivar 10907]

29 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Let me terrify you even more: most Texags posters are at least college educated. 

[Js1 85071]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/09/25/economy-election-harris-trump-polls/

Although voters still favor former president Donald Trump over Harris on handling the economy, his advantage has dropped dramatically in recent weeks. Trump now averages a six-percentage-point edge on the economy, compared with a 12-point lead against President Joe Biden earlier this year, according to an analysis of five polls that measured voters’ opinions before and after Biden dropped out.

A Fox News poll this month, for example, found that 51 percent of registered voters favor Trump on the economy, compared with 46 percent who favor Harris. That’s compared with a 15-point advantage Trump had over Biden in March. Other recent polls — by ABC-Ipsos, NPR-PBS NewsHour-Marist, USA Today-Suffolk University and Quinnipiac University — show similar shifts.

“Voters are beginning to give to give [Harris] the benefit of the doubt — and that’s really significant,” said Frank Luntz, a longtime GOP pollster. “Affordability is a top issue for voters, but Trump has failed to hold Harris to account or to tie her to Biden’s inflation failures.”

Underlying that sea change, analysts say, is the fact that Americans are feeling better about the economy. Prices are stabilizing, interest rates are coming down and wages are rising faster than inflation. At the same time, voters seem to view Harris as a clean slate, unburdened by the rapid run-up in prices that has plagued Biden for much of his presidency.

Plus, political strategists say, she has struck a decidedly different tone on the issue. Unlike Biden, who spent a lot of time trying to convince Americans that the underlying economy was great, Harris has come across as more sympathetic to their everyday struggles. Her economic policies — including a slate of new proposals rolling out this week — have focused on issues important to middle-class voters, including affordable health care, housing and childcare. Harris is scheduled to speak on the economy Wednesday in Pittsburgh.

[Aqua Buddha 14500]

37 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

I'll fight @Brisketexan or anybody else for Nicole Wallace

 

I'd fight both of you and you'd both lose because I fight dirty.  I'd gouge your eyes out with spoon for 30 minutes with her.  

Wheelhouse.

['stache 21744]

9 hours ago, Loch Ness Monster said:

Trump is winning by around 11% on the economy.

Lots of young men believe he's a business genius.

I remember when I was young (Regan era) my dad said he didn't like republicans because they only cared about businesses and not people. I think the perception has been and remains that republicans are good at business and therefore economy. They aren't looking at the graphs or listening to Bill Clinton's correct mention of job creation under republicans vs. democrats. Throw in the trump name whose celebrity was built on being a businessman and they just default to republicans are good at economy. 

Edited September 25 by 'stache

[BrickHorn 18184]

29 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

Education != intelligence

True. But I tend to think education is more important than raw intellectual horsepower when it comes to making rational political decisions. 

Without a basic understanding of history, civics, and economics, even a brilliant voter won’t have the contextual knowledge required to distinguish good policies from bad ones. A lot of political reasoning is of the database search variety. You compare policy proposals to a mental database of things that have been tried in the past and their corresponding outcomes. We don’t resist communism because we run some thought experiment every time we consider it - instead, we conjur up all the examples of communist nations and recoil at what we know are the real world results. The same thing happens with morons who interpret every social welfare program as “socialism.” They instantly associate such policies with historical communist failures. The problem is that they aren’t educated enough to understand the substantive differences between modern European style welfare and Soviet communism. 

That’s why “otherwise intelligent” is such a common trope in any MAGA encounter story you’ll read here. Too many bright Americans have been spoonfed bullshit propaganda instead of a real education in history and economics.

Hell, you see it every day on the Israel thread. Numerous bright and otherwise well-educated left-leaning posters have a huge blind spot when it comes to the history of that conflict, which causes them to spout idiotic shit. 

 

 

[Js1 85071]

I’ve mentioned this before - the GOP’s EC edge is not as high as it was the last 2 cycles 

According to The New York Times’s polling average, it does not seem that Kamala Harris will necessarily need to win the popular vote by much to prevail.

 

The simplest way to measure the advantage in the Electoral College is to take the difference between the national popular vote and the vote in the “tipping-point” state (the state that puts one candidate over the top in the Electoral College). Right now, Vice President Harris leads the polling in the national vote by 2.6 percentage points, and leads Wisconsin — the current tipping-point state — by 1.8 points, which makes Mr. Trump’s advantage less than a point.

By this measure, Mr. Trump’s advantage is only around one-fifth as large as it was four years ago, when President Biden fared 3.8 points better nationally than in Wisconsin (the tipping-point state in 2020).

How is it possible?

On the one hand, Ms. Harris is holding her own in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. It’s worth noting this is tenuous: Together, these states help Ms. Harris win the Electoral College, with little room for error. Should the polls meaningfully underestimate Mr. Trump in any one of Michigan, Pennsylvania or Wisconsin, as they did in the last two presidential elections, much of his Electoral College advantage could return.

The second half of the explanation, oddly, is that Mr. Trump is gaining in noncompetitive states like New York, improving his position in the national popular vote without helping him in the most important states. In particular, he appears to be faring best in the states where Republicans excelled in the midterm election two years ago.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/25/upshot/trump-electoral-college-harris.html

There is the whole article but the overall point Cohn makes - this could be 2022 redux where the GOP and Trump make smalls gains in blue states, like NY and CA, but not enough to win them, while Dems win in the purple states and win them and thus win the EC. 

[Gatorubet 30081]

33 minutes ago, hobbes2702 said:

I don’t think you need to have done any of those things to see that Trump is a hateful bigot. It’s not about them not being smart enough, it’s about them not being moral enough 

 

30 minutes ago, DigglerontheHoof said:

Willfully ignorant and morally bankrupt. 

I do not think they are willfully ignorant. I think they are all on board with hateful bigotry

[locodos 5330]

33 minutes ago, BehoId, The Underminer! said:

Basic decency is lacking more than basic intelligence.  People were a lot less educated 100 years ago but figured out how to elect Lincoln 

I don't think this is true.  Very few people (I'd bet <1%) think to themselves...  "I'm a horrible shitbag and I'm OK with that"

The concept of decency is subjective.  

Compassion is the quality I find most lacking.  That said, I think that the vast majority of Americans would "Do the right thing" but only if they found themselves directly exposed to the problem (starving child, person in distress)  but maybe I'm an optimist?

[RomaVicta 29767]

22 hours ago, C-Man said:

Signs are starting to appear in our Bluffview (the poor side) neighborhood. Harris/Walz signs outnumber Trump's by a slight number. Our across-the-street neighbor put up Harris/Walz and Colin Allred signs yesterday. He's a big executive at AT&T. I think he waited until after they hosted a huge TCU-SMU watch party (their daughter graduated from TCU) because they've probably got a large number of MAGA friends that might not have liked the signs!

Their immediate next-door neighbor put up a Trump sign last week. She's a high-volume residential real estate agent/broker with Compass or Allie Beth or Briggs -- can't remember which -- who ran for public office this spring and lost in runoff. Their sign was right near the street and I think it was "disturbed" so they moved it closer to the house.

My next door neighbors are mid/late 30's child-less couple who make a ton of money at AT&T. They're awesome and hard-core Dems. In a matter of a week, my wife has gone from "no way we're putting a political yard sign out front" to actually entertaining our next door neighbors and us both putting them out so our street will lean heavy Harris in public support. We'll see how that goes -- probably going to order signs for next door neighbors and us so we have them on hand in case Mrs C-Man orders the "code blue."

Out here in Johnson City where we've been for almost 2 years, there have been four or five large Trump signs up. Some have been up since we moved here. The ever hilarious, "Let's go, Brandon!" was on a few. 

Yesterday, for the first time, I saw a big Harris Waltz sign out on RR 1323 where we live. It's weird that that seems like a brave act. 

My beloved has become acquainted with some of the local women who have an uspoken rule about not talking politics. I've been on the fence about a sign in the yard. Shamefully, I think it traces back to wanting not to be disliked. My stance has been, I don't want to know who of my friends and acquaintances are Trumpist, so I won't have to decide whether to drop them or not. 

Your post and the yard sign I've seen here have matured my thinking a little more. I'll declare and anybody who doesn't like it can drop me. Please drop me. If the beloved agrees, I think I need to back the person who already has a sign up.

[royiv 9143]

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

Let me terrify you even more: most Texags posters are at least college educated.  What you see on that site is folks who probably fall in the top 1/3 of education and intelligence.

You truly cannot conceive of how stupid Americans of average/median intelligence are.....let alone the fucking HALF of Americans who are BELOW median intelligence and education.  "Stupid" doesn't even scratch the surface of how fucked we are.

And these are the people who think it’s a grand idea to abolish the Department of Education.

[Jive Turkey 12565]

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

Let me terrify you even more: most Texags posters are at least college educated.  What you see on that site is folks who probably fall in the top 1/3 of education and intelligence.

You truly cannot conceive of how stupid Americans of average/median intelligence are.....let alone the fucking HALF of Americans who are BELOW median intelligence and education.  "Stupid" doesn't even scratch the surface of how fucked we are.

Yep. And that’s the GQP’s base. Which explains why there is a full frontal attack on education and schools of higher learning by the right. They want Americans to be dumb. Hell, they need them to be dumb for that party to survive. They vilify teachers, talk about the  “parade of horrors” that happen at public schools (gender surgeries, kids peeing in litter boxes, etc.), want to defund public education, and want to make it easier for kids be home schooled or given vouchers to attend Patriotic Americans for Guns private school. Trump said yesterday he wants to get rid of the Department of Education. We really are heading down the road to Idiocracy.

 

[locodos 5330]

In my hood, it's quiet, maybe too quiet.  I'm guessing the Trumpkins are going to pull the lever same as they always have, but just don't see the need to crow about it.   Also there is a particular house on an intersection that has put up huge Trump displays in the past... I'm talking mini billboards.   So far nothing.  So either he's in jail for J6 or he's keeping his powder dry (figuratively and metaphorically)

[Dutchrudder 11104]

Pete sits down for a long and deep conversation with Ezra Klein covering all sorts of topics related to politics. Very interesting discussion between them, and it's amazing to see how Pete is well prepared and thoughtful in every reply. I really hope that one day he's in a race for a higher profile office, he's such an authentic and empathetic person, truly a rare breed in politics these days. 

 

 

[honolulu horn 6156]

3 hours ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Trump's "speech" on Tuesday about tariffs on cars coming from Mexico, etc had a familiar twist.  The only thing missing was tears:

https://jalopnik.com/donald-trump-doubles-down-on-200-percent-imported-car-t-1851656477

I think there's at least one modern auto plant in the USA. He should ask his BFF about it. 

[BehoId, The Underminer! 11668]

3 minutes ago, locodos said:

In my hood, it's quiet, maybe too quiet.  I'm guessing the Trumpkins are going to pull the lever same as they always have, but just don't see the need to crow about it.   Also there is a particular house on an intersection that has put up huge Trump displays in the past... I'm talking mini billboards.   So far nothing.  So either he's in jail for J6 or he's keeping his powder dry (figuratively and metaphorically)

reduced enthusiasm is always good.  the flip side is i've always thought the white trash branding that Rs do these days has to be a net negative.  maybe they're wising up to that too.

[royiv 9143]

2 minutes ago, honolulu horn said:

I think there's at least one modern auto plant in the USA. He should ask his BFF about it. 

And that one has been laying off significant numbers of employees because his friend is driving the company into the ground.

[Js1 85071]

I missed this from last week -

The Uncommitted Movement is not going to endorse Harris over her Israel stance, said do not vote for Trump because he will make it worse and do not vote third-party because you'll be helping Trump.

So they're just going to not show up at all or vote for Harris in secret I guess.

[Aqua Buddha 14500]

2 minutes ago, Js1 said:

I missed this from last week -

The Uncommitted Movement is not going to endorse Harris over her Israel stance, said do not vote for Trump because he will make it worse and do not vote third-party because you'll be helping Trump.

So they're just going to not show up at all or vote for Harris in secret I guess.

So, make it possible for the candidate who will deport them all to Palestine and give Bibi the green light to level the place the week after?

That's a great idea.

['stache 21744]

The ones who actually care will vote Harris even if secretly. The ones virtue signaling their progressive bona fides are going to stay home, and probably were anyway, because they are essentially "both side"-ers.

[Js1 85071]

Monmouth - PA

Harris 47, Trump 45 (Harris +2) with registered voters
Harris 48, Trump 45 (Harris +3) with definite+probably support

Extremely motivated: Harris 50, Trump 46
Extremely + very motivated: Harris 49, Trump 46

Same poll had Fetterman +4 in 2022, so a point off from the final margin (Fetterman +5)

Edited September 25 by Js1

[Red Five 40613]

3 minutes ago, Js1 said:

Extremely motivated: Harris 50, Trump 46
Extremely + very motivated: Harris 49, Trump 46

What now?

[DixonHur 11127]

1 minute ago, Red Five said:

What now?

What about the Extremely++ crowd?

[Old Freak Nasty 818]

1 hour ago, BehoId, The Underminer! said:

Basic decency is lacking more than basic intelligence.  People were a lot less educated 100 years ago but figured out how to elect Lincoln 

There was also no Fox News 100 years ago.  What's happening now is a systemic two pronged assault on a functional democracy.  Destroying educational attainment and critical thinking skills coupled with focus group tested non-stop propaganda.  The combination of the two has broken morality for 45% of the electorate.

[SydneyCarton 47811]

3 minutes ago, Red Five said:

What now?

Fully Engorged, imo.

[TexArcher 37481]

I really need Pete to be president for 8 years before I die.

[Longhorn_Fan68 33830]

10 hours ago, Loch Ness Monster said:

Trump is winning by around 11% on the economy.

Lots of young men believe he's a business genius.

young people are stupid in economics - but so are a lot of older people.

1 hour ago, Snake Diggity said:

~10% of American adults didn’t graduate high school.

~52% of American adults did not graduate college.

~70% of Americans fail a basic civic literacy quiz on topics like the three branches of government, the number of Supreme Court justices, and other basic functions of our democracy.

We have woefully unqualified electorate.

case in point

[Js1 85071]

5 minutes ago, Red Five said:

What now?

Monmouth is a super weird pollster

[Horn Under a Bad Sign 20342]

This is somewhat depressing but shows why we have got to continue to work to turn Texas blue:

 

[quigley 1526]

1 hour ago, tx ind said:

I'd bet if you gave the civic quiz to the Haitians in Springfield vs. the non-Haitians the results would be astonishing.

Before we sanctify all oppressed, we have to remember that just because you're put down doesn't mean that you will necessarily rise above.

To wit, I was talking to a legal Haitian immigrant with a good job (nurse) who seemed quite intelligent. She proudly declared that she was pro-Trump because of him "outlawing" abortion.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Chopper 17144]

I thought I'd have my exit strategy in place by now, if needed, but it's been delayed by unforeseen circumstances. As if we don't have enough to worry about now, the projected map for 2032 looks quite challenging without a major shift.

[Red Five 40613]

4 minutes ago, Old Freak Nasty said:

There was also no Fox News 100 years ago.  What's happening now is a systemic two pronged assault on a functional democracy.  Destroying educational attainment and critical thinking skills coupled with focus group tested non-stop propaganda.  The combination of the two has broken morality for 45% of the electorate.

Millions of people have listened to Rush/watched Fox for decades now, and their brains have been turned upside down. 

If Jesus Christ returned to Earth and was the democratic nominee, and Satan rose from hell and was the republican nominee, tens of millions of "Christians" would say "Well I'm no fan of the dark lord, that's for sure, but I'm not voting for a democrat, even if it is Jesus. I guess I'll just hold my nose and vote for Satan. I'm voting for the policies, not the person, after all." 

"But Satan is promising to end every life on Earth, in very painful ways."

"Still better than a democrat." 

[quigley 1526]

57 minutes ago, &#x27;stache said:

I remember when I was young (Regan era) my dad said he didn't like republicans because they only cared about businesses and not people. I think the perception has been and remains that republicans are good at business and therefore economy. They aren't looking at the graphs or listening to Bill Clinton's correct mention of job creation under republicans vs. democrats. Throw in the trump name whose celebrity was built on being a businessman and they just default to republicans are good at economy. 

Your parents and mine were probably among the 26 people in Oklahoma who voted for Carter in 1980.

[DixonHur 11127]

There is no way a reasonable electorate could objectively look at these two candidates and choose Trump 

So, the fact that the polling is this close tells me that: 

A. The polling is WAY out of line with reality,

B  American democracy is a failing/failed experiment,

C. Both A & B

I'll be in my bunker.

[quigley 1526]

1 hour ago, Huckleberry said:

Education != intelligence

There's a correlation, but it's not as strong as those with education think it is.