2:00PM Water Cooler 10/8/2024 | bare capitalism

For those who ignore your complete idea of margin of error, Trump gained a couple of inches of floor within the trench warfare (After all, we on the surface may as properly be inspecting the entrails of birds once we attempt to predict what is going to occur to a subset of voters (undecided; irregular) in a subset of states (swing), and the irregulars particularly may as properly be quantum foam, however presumably the marketing campaign professionals have higher knowledge, and have the state of affairs as underneath management as it may be _{MR SUBLIMINAL Fooled ya. Kidding!}.

Legend: Numbers in Blue (Kamala) or Purple (Trump) present the main candidate in 2024. Naturally, orange numbers present Trump’s underestimates in 2020.

Clearly, if the polls in 2024 are off by as a lot, and in the identical route, because the polls in 2020, this election appears to be like very, very completely different (and, the truth is, within the bag for Trump). However are they? Opinions differ (“Infinite are the arguments of mages” –Ursula LeGuin).

Lambert right here: I’m not a polling maven!

“CNN knowledge guru declares Trump will win White Home if he outperforms present polling by one level” [FOX]. “CNN senior knowledge reporter Harry Enten stated that the presidential race between former President Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris is so shut that if Trump outperforms present polling by one level, he’ll win the White Home. ‘We‘re speaking concerning the closest marketing campaign in a technology the place ,’ Enten instructed CNN anchor John Berman on Friday.” • Oh.

“The Asterisk on Kamala Harris’s Ballot Numbers” [The Atlantic]. “The 2016 election lives in standard reminiscence as maybe probably the most notorious polling miss of all time, however 2020 was quietly even worse. The polls 4 years in the past badly underestimated Trump’s help at the same time as they appropriately forecast a Joe Biden win. A complete postmortem by the American Affiliation for Public Opinion Analysis concluded that 2020 polls had been the least correct in a long time, overstating Biden’s benefit by a median of three.9 share factors nationally and 4.3 share factors on the state degree over the ultimate two weeks of the election…. In accordance with The New York Instances, Biden led by 10 factors in Wisconsin however received it by lower than 1 level; he led Michigan by 8 and received by 3; he led in Pennsylvania by 5 and received by about 1. As of this writing, Harris is up in all three states, however by lower than Biden was. .” Extra: “[Don Levy, the director of the Siena College Research Institute] instructed me that, in 2020, the folks working the telephones for Siena incessantly reported incidents of being yelled at by mistrustful Trump supporters. ‘In plain English, it was not unusual for somebody to say, ‘I’m voting for Trump—fuck you,’” after which grasp up earlier than finishing the remainder of the survey, he stated. (A lot for the ‘shy Trump voter’ speculation.) In 2020, these responses weren’t counted. This time round, they’re. Levy instructed me that together with these ‘partials’ in 2020 would have erased almost half of Siena’s error price.” What if Trump voters are so disaffected that they lie about supporting Harris? No person appears to have talked about that chance. And: “‘In 2016, the sensation was that the issue we had was not capturing non-college-educated white voters, notably within the Midwest,’ Chris Jackson, the pinnacle of U.S. public polling at Ipsos, instructed me. ‘However what 2020 instructed us is that’s not truly ample. There may be some form of political-behavior dimension that wasn’t captured in that education-by-race crosstab. So, basically, what the business writ giant has accomplished is, we’ve began actually wanting far more strongly at political variables.’ .” • Maybe the Republican and Democrat voters are essentially completely different not alongside ideological strains however by way of functionality. Republicans, in spite of everything, hated their occasion management and overthrew it. Democrats have accomplished no such factor. Maybe that degree of dedication carries over to turnout (although I grant this chance wouldn’t apply to undecided or irregular voters, except they thought this functionality worthy of emulation). One may speculate that Trump’s “struggle, struggle, struggle!,” and continued presence on the marketing campaign path regardless of not one however two assassination makes an attempt feeds into this propensity.

“Can we belief the polls this 12 months?” [VOX]. Varied: “It has been getting tougher due to Trump’s potential to end up the sorts of voters many polls have hassle capturing.” If these “varieties” of voters are irregular or disaffected, that will imply that Trump is making “our democracy” work higher than Democrats. Extra: “The phrase I heard most in my conversations was a fear about ‘fixing for the final drawback’ or ‘combating the final battle.’ In different phrases, classes have been realized, however will these classes apply this time round? In 2016, for instance, pollsters addressed a few of the causes they overestimated Mitt Romney’s efficiency in 2012 however missed that state-level surveys had been overrepresenting faculty graduates. That miss ended up artificially boosting Hillary Clinton’s help, particularly within the Midwest battleground states that proved decisive.” And an inventory of the troubles: Nonresponse bias, unlikely and late-deciding voters, hard-to-poll subgroups (approached by wanting crosstab outcomes that “can yield conclusions with margins of error a lot bigger than these of a ballot’s topline outcomes”). And suggestions: Take a look at the pattern measurement, methodology, agency, margin of error, and keep skeptical.

“So, you’re positive the presidential race can be shut?” [Roll Call]. “Keep in mind, polls are primarily based on turnout assumptions, and if Harris generates stronger turnout amongst youthful voters, voters of shade, former Republicans, and college-educated whites, she might outperform the polling.” • I’m uncertain. I’m seeing two swing states the place voters meet the “crawl over damaged glass” turnout take a look at. Each units of voters are Trump voters. The primary is PA, the place Trump was nearly assassinated in Butler. The second is NC, the place Trump voters in WNC could really feel they’ve been deserted (and disrespected) by the Biden Administration’s response to Helene. Now, NC cuts each methods, as a result of these Trump voters, motivated although they be, merely could not be capable to attain the polls (the Put up Workplace isn’t getting many absentee ballots proper now, for instance). Nevertheless, if Republicans successfullly body the Biden Administration’s response to Milton as just like the response to Helene, then WNC sentiment could unfold to Georgia, one other swing state hit arduous by Helene, and even go nationwide. And I feel the Democrat counter-messaging on abortion is preaching to the choir. From Georgia, KLG amplifies:

My sources don’t have any cause to lie. Maybe some exaggeration however it all appears too prone to me.

FEMA is a charlie foxtrot, no matter its apologists and directors say. Virtually each one that applies for the $750 is denied. For instance, in case you have insurance coverage, no $750 as a result of your benevolent insurance coverage firm pays. Yeah, however for a lot of, solely after being dragged kicking and screaming to chop the test. An assistant rents her home in rural Georgia. Her losses are actual however as a result of she is a renter, no $200 to interchange the farm produce and meat misplaced in her freezer because of every week with out electrical energy. That’s all she requested for. $200B or no matter for Ukraine however no $200 for her. Some areas nonetheless have no idea when energy can be restored. In comparison with the mountains of North Carolina, these are the lucky. That is the message the individuals are getting…It’s prone to worsen when Milton slams into Tampa-St. Pete Wednesday evening. Sustained winds again as much as 150 mph with 24 hours to go. This could be a killer.

If that assistant is just not troubled with TDS, there’s one other potential “damaged glass” voter in a swing state (and thirty days is time to marinate a number of grievance).

“Polling isn’t damaged, however pollsters nonetheless face Trump-era challenges” [ABC]. Report from the annual convention of the American Affiliation for Public Opinion Analysis in Could: “[Cameron McPhee, chief methodologist for SSRS} told me the industry has moved toward agreement that multi-mode approaches are the best way to get a more representative sample. She stressed that it’s not that one mode is better, but rather a combination is ‘better than the sum of its parts.’ For instance, one SSRS survey experiment saw improved response rates for state-level surveys that recruited respondents by various means, including postcard or SMS text message, and gave respondents six potential access points to respond: URL, QR code (directing them to the survey), text, email, a phone number for respondents to call (inbound dialing) and SSRS reaching out to them by phone (outbound dialing).” • I wonder if the different recruitment mode affects the response. I might not be “the same person” answering a call as I am when making a considered response to email.

Kamala (D): “Kamala’s Comedown How the Harris campaign became a grim slog” [New York Magazine]. “Her once-ascendant polling numbers have stalled and her marketing campaign has develop into cautious, granting TV interviews principally to a handful of native information channels in swing states. If the primary month of her candidacy was an exhalation after the suffocating defeatism underneath Biden, the final weeks earlier than Election Day have felt like a collective holding of breath.” Maybe to a Democrat. Extra: After the Vance-Walz debate, “[i]t was obvious that the Harris marketing campaign had backed away from its main value-add: the promise that it will break with the politics of the previous… In response to Republican smears casting her as America’s ‘border czar’ answerable for a dysfunctional immigration system, Harris has pivoted rightward on the problem, promising a extra restricted path for asylum seekers throughout a September journey to the U.S.-Mexico border… Harris’s deference to the established order has been much more pronounced on international coverage, which has been dominated by Israel’s grinding warfare in Gaza…. [S]elling nostalgia for a pre-Trump world raises the query of how Harris is any completely different from Biden. It additionally sends the message that Democrats have didn’t persuade voters that Trump and his acolytes are past the pale. So what’s to be accomplished a couple of political actuality through which voters need the opposing forces of liberalism and authoritarianism to be reconciled? The reply, for Harris, more and more resembles a paradox: stave off Trumpian calamity via politics as ordinary.” • “Acolytes” being roughly half the inhabitants, deplorable although they might be?

Kamala (D): “Doug Emhoff was a foul-mouthed ‘a**gap’ and ‘misogynist’ who employed a ‘trophy secretary’ as a result of she was ‘fairly’ and ‘retaliated towards ladies who didn’t flirt again’ at LA legislation agency, ex-staff declare” [Daily Mail]. IOW, he was an leisure lawyer? “Attorneys who labored with Doug Emhoff at his former agency Venable say he yelled expletives, held a men-only cocktail hour within the workplace, revoked work perks from ladies who didn’t flirt with him, and took solely younger, enticing associates in a limousine to a ball. A 2019 lawsuit additionally claimed intercourse discrimination by different companions within the LA workplace Emhoff ran, and that whereas engaged to Harris, he employed an ‘unqualified’ part-time mannequin as a authorized secretary ‘as a result of she was younger, enticing and pleasant with the highly effective males within the workplace’. The claims are the most recent in a string of allegations revealed by DailyMail.com that threaten to shatter Emhoff’s picture, closely promoted by the Harris presidential marketing campaign, of a feminist ally and ‘spouse man’. In August DailyMail.com revealed the Los Angeles lawyer cheated on his first spouse and received his daughter’s grade faculty teacher-cum-nanny pregnant. And final week we uncovered claims that he struck his ex-girlfriend in 2012…. Now his former colleagues from the Venable Los Angeles workplace, which he ran from 2006 to 2017, are coming ahead with allegations about his ‘inappropriate’ and ‘a**gap’ habits within the office. All of them spoke upon settlement they’d not be named, fearing retaliation. One senior former staffer claimed Emhoff ‘bragged’ about yelling ‘get the f*** out of my workplace’ to a feminine accomplice on the agency, later telling his prime male colleagues that he had ‘put her in her place’.” • Put the burden of proof right here towards that introduced in the course of the Kavanaugh nomination, and evaluate the degrees of hysteria.

Lambert right here: Kamala’s stated an entire raft of idiotic clarifying issues up to now few days, however I’ve no time to mixture the clips and evaluate transcripts. Maybe tomorrow.

Kamala (D): Sorry to cite World Web Every day, however right here we’re:

“What Occurs if a Hurricane Smashes Tampa?” [Matt Stoller, BIG]. “Regardless, we’re getting into a world beset by local weather change, which would require a unique political order. Final July, I wrote a chunk on how we’re forgetting the teachings from Covid. We’re nonetheless extremely depending on China, and the fragility of our provide chains hasn’t improved. And that’s as a result of, whereas there are some good policymakers in positions of authority like Lina Khan and Rohit Chopra, the majority of our management class remains to be in thrall to a finance-friendly mannequin of business fragility. And this dynamic is as a lot an ideological drawback as anything.” • Absent the type of “change” that so many people hope for, I feel that our response to the Covid pandemic offers a transparent precedent for our already-in-place “completely different political order”: The ruthless utility of Rule #2. Stoller is extra optimistic, and I hope he’s proper.