(Note: I hope I am not running afoul of Dope rules since I am not accusing any specific poster of lying - nor is “lying” really the term I mean to infer here.)
You know how some sports fans like to “psych themselves down” by using "negative posturing " before or during a game by forecasting doom (oh no, we’re going to blow this lead, we’re going to lose)…so that they can then be extra relieved and joyous when they win, even when their team was heavily favored throughout?
That is the vibe I get when I read posts here by Biden voters claiming that Trump will win reelection or that Trump is the advantaged candidate, etc. even though all the polls point heavily in Biden’s favor (yes, I know, some will claim it’s still early) and there is every reason to believe Biden will win a smashing victory (yes, I know, Hillary 2016, but that was different.)
My point isn’t to discuss whether Biden is likely to win or not, but rather…that I question the sincerity of such posts. Sure, there may be some pessimists who truly see things through a dark lens, but I suspect that some others are using…negative posturing, like the sports fans mentioned above who exclaim “we’re doomed” when their team is still leading by two touchdowns. Deep down, they know Biden is highly likely to win, but they still play an exterior appearance of pretending the race is much more tied than it is.
In a thread a few weeks ago, we had some Dopers claiming that even a 10% lead in the polls on the eve of Election Day wouldn’t make them feel safe, even though that is well nigh insurmountable. Which, again, I think, is posturing.
Feel free to roast me (hopefully in a non-Pit way) if I’m wrong. But that’s my take on it. I am not attacking anyone, I am just saying that many of these posts seem specious. Certainly if Trump were leading Biden by 11%, nobody here would claim Biden stood a good chance of winning, yet some liberals seem convinced that Trump is more competitive in this race than he is despite trailing by 11%.
Some people are doing the opposite: remembering 2016 and how awful it felt to be blindsided by an unexpected Trump win, they’re trying to prevent setting themselves up for that a second time.
And some people are factoring in Russian interference, Republican party misconduct, and Trump-specific misconduct and how any or all of those could muck with what would otherwise be the outcome of the election.
Why should you be roasted? It’s a good question asked in good faith and very pertinent at this stage of the election year. You’re certainly not accusing anyone of lying.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m very sincere when I say that I think Biden is going to lose. For various reasons, including Biden’s own words and actions, the record of running against incumbents since 1968, the history of bad candidates vs. bad candidates, and what I see and hear on this board, I simply don’t think Biden has it in him to beat a guy like Trump.
Of course I could be wrong. Trump has been saying and doing some fuck-awful things in the year of our Lloyd 2020, but that’s just it: Clown fights might be amusing, but they’re not compelling, and I just don’t see the electorate lining up behind Biden. Too much baggage. Too much history. Then again, Trump is a truly abysmal candidate. Then again, he was no worse in 2016, and he still won.
It’s like watching two blind, crippled homeless people fight over a nickel. Neither one is truly going to win that fight. They’re just going to lose less. Future generations will look back on this election as a big reason to hate our generation–quite correctly, too.
I’m not an American voter, just another foreigner looking in, but I absolutely think Trump will win again and there is nothing insincere about that opinion.
Consider it reflective of my opinion on America in general right now.
According to 538, Biden’s ahead about 8% right now. If we lived in usual times that would feel quite reassuring. However, in other news, a white supremacist group (Evropa) posing as an antifa cell pretended to plan to show up all across the most libertarian-fascist part of the US “tearing down the flag” and looting, precipitating a large turnout of massively armed white males to stand around staring pugnaciously for hours, in six or seven states (Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, and some others).
So no, I am not reassured. Not even a little. Of course the majority will vote for Biden, but that is no guarantee of anything good. The majority voted for Hilary Clinton, and Al Gore.
What I find fascinating is that BOTH Democrats and Republicans seem to be really into predicting online that Trump will beat Biden, despite the fact that literally all of the polling data indicates that he probably won’t. I mean, I totally buy that Democrats felt really burned by 2016 (and, in general, have more experience of losing elections by agonizingly close margins), but I would think that if I were a Republican, I’d be pretty wary of sounding overconfident too, especially after 2018. (And I dunno, maybe some of them are – I’m not privy to what Republicans are saying in Republican-only online spaces – but in public, it’s all buoyantly confident predictions that seem to be based on nothing of substance.)
It’s a really interesting difference in political culture and messaging, and I’m not totally sure what to make of it, especially since it seems to contradict a lot of stuff I thought I knew about the parties (aren’t conservatives, in general, supposed to be more pessimistic and quicker to feel threatened?)
The massive surge of protests lately have been somewhat encouraging to me. Before George Floyd, even while Trump’s mishandling of the coronavirus was on full display, I was still pretty much resigned to Trump winning re-election. I’m not so sure now - I’m thinking that the energy of the Floyd protests will carry over to mobilization of voters against Trump. The military brass openly condemning him is another encouraging sign. And the most recent speech by Biden that I watched on Youtube actually seemed halfway decent.
Indeed, he’s within or close to the margin of error in the swing state polls I’m seeing. I may be ridiculously terrified of it happening but I’m not insincere at all in believing that Biden does not have this wrapped up.
We live in a different world today. Absolutely nothing has driven Trump’s approval rating under 40% (multiple poll average). We wouldn’t have seen anything like that stability in the past. And that support comes from a highly-motivated base whose demographics vote in larger percentages than any other. Biden’s approval rating is only a few points higher. His base tends to vote in lower percentages and he has a huge split in his party with a large minority wanting another candidate. Democratic voters are also facing a gigantic voter suppression campaign in many states.
Moreover, national polls showing Biden with a double-digit lead are virtually meaningless. Presidents aren’t elected by popular vote, as everybody needs to remember at every moment. 35 electoral votes have to switch to have Biden win. Only a few states are expected to be possible swing states. In those few states, the polls remain very close. 270towin.com has Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Florida, and Arizona as tossups. That’s 102 electoral votes. Biden has to win two to four of those states, depending on their size.
I think he can do so, but the certainty level is very low. Right now people can make any scenario plausible.
Right now is also five months away from the election. Nobody saw the pandemic coming. Nobody forecast the protests over George Floyd. Nation-changing events might happen every week from now on.
You can doubt the sincerity of some predictions, but what conceivable counterargument can you make that would clearly refute them? Nothing is certain, nothing is knowable.
I assure you I am completely sincere in my belief that Trump will be re-elected. I’m not as confident as I was in January, but if I had to bet that’s where my money would go–as little as possible.
He’s an incumbent, the electoral college favors Republicans, and the left is torn by infighting between progressives and moderates. A poor economy can sink an incumbent, but since this economy was caused by a virus, Trump can escape blame.
He’s a weird president, and anything can happen, but it’s his election to lose.
I think there is one group of people on the left who want Trump to beat Biden because a Biden presidency blunts the “progressive” movement who without Sanders has no figurehead going forward. I think there is another group of people who have 2016 anxiety despite the fact Biden’s polling average is almost six points better off from where Clinton was at this stage in 2016 and that polls for the 2018 mid-terms were on the ball. And finally I think there is a third group of people who have seen Trump get away with everything that was supposed to bring him down and no matter how outrageous he acts, or how stupidly he talks, or how mentally unhinged he is, his base have remained loyal and the electoral college favors Republicans.
I think Biden has a slight advantage. But it’s a guess. How sincere are the posters who think otherwise? That’s sort of unknowable and I am not sure if it’s problematic tbh.
I don’t consider that my predictions are better than those of the Betfair prediction market. (Anyone who thinks that market’s predictions are way off has an opportunity to make money.)
Sometimes months go by without my checking that market, and if there’s a place to click to see past prices I’ve not found it. But my notes give some record of the trend. In March 2019 the GOP was shown with about 42% to win the White House — perhaps punters were enthusiastic about the “stars” running for the Ds. But a 42% chance isn’t much worse than 50% — the prediction has always been extremely close, almost a toss-up.
The GOP chance rose steadily and was 62% in early February, but has fallen and is 45.7% as I type. (I write “GOP” rather than “Trump” — Pence is better than 1% to be elected President in November according to Betfair, and Haley also has a chance. Death or illness is possible, especially with advanced age.)
But again, numbers like that can be summarized as “toss-up.” And those predictions are not out of line with polls. As Red Wiggler points out, nationwide polling is less important than key tipping states. A recent post showed Biden as up by only 1% or 2% in polls in the important Rust Belt swing states — less than the margin of error. Are those numbers correct? ***If the election were held today, it would be very close. ***
I don’t check polls much, but just for this thread I clicked over to RCP and saw these polls from Minnesota:
Between October and May, Biden lost 7%. Sure, 5% is a big lead, but this was a state Clinton won. This poll was taken before the George Floyd riots; what would it look like today?
So we’re left with two key questions:
(1) How will public sentiment change over the next five months?
(2) How effective will Republican cheating be?
On the latter topic, note that there are some scenarios where Trump retains the Presidency, but Betfair cancels its market, or awards the prizes to Biden bettors:
I think this election will be one of the most chaotic in American history. I think many Americans who are telling pollsters they will vote for Biden will not be able to vote in November. The GOP already has plans to fill precincts with “monitors” dedicated to intimidating voters who look likely to vote for Ds. The GOP already has plans to interfere with mail-in voting. Voter ID will be a big issue — it did swing the 2016 election. The GOP will use unscrupulous tricks we’ve not even thought of. They will litigate close elections. Electors may be bribed or intimidated into unfaithfulness.
It will be hard to fight a Biden landslide, but if the election is very close — decided in just 1 or 2 states — you can bet that the GOP will “pull out all the stops.” This is a significant GOP chance that is, because of their rules, not fully reflected in Betfair’s predictions.
Finally: How will sentiment develop over the next five months? I don’t know, but most swing voters are confused by politics and not very smart. I think there’s a good chance that the GOP will be seen as the party that has common-sense response to the pandemic, that wants Americans to go back to work, and that the GOP is the party of law and order. Lies and propaganda will drown out the voices of reason.
So — who do I think will win? I think it’s very very close. Biden’s lead in the polls is roughly canceled by the fact that that we know GOP will cheat. If bookies were offering “10-11 and you pick” I would take GOP. (I don’t like to bet against the future of my children and the world — one reason I’m not trying to place bets on this.)
I’ll admit to natural pessimism, and a desire to emphasize how fragile Democracy’s chances are. However I do think Trump victory is likely.
Electoral-vote.com is one site which tries to gauge that (there are others; the guy who runs that site doesn’t disguise his preference for the Democratic Party, but I do believe he is honest about what the data shows). The site tracks and aggregates state-level polls. Note that pollsters don’t even bother to ask in some states; if you hover over them you’ll see that some of your more blatantly deep red or deep blue states are actually based on “Final 2016 Results”. I suppose just because they’re so big and important and media-rich, there actually ARE results from California and New York from as recently as last month (both “Strong Dem”, natch) but nobody is likely to shell out to poll South Dakota or the District of Columbia.
For a stable link, Electoral-vote.com’s website for June 5 shows 213 “Strongly Dem” electoral votes, and another 60 “Likely Dem” EVs–which would be enough to put Biden over the top with 273 electoral votes. There are another 95 EVs in “Barely Dem” states on that date, including Michigan, Florida, Ohio, Arizona, North Carolina–well, Obama did win that one in 2008–and Georgia (!). Note, again, that if Biden loses ALL of those states he still wins a narrow victory in the Electoral College.
The site also lets you look at “this date in a previous election cycle”; in June 2016, the site was still reporting on the primary elections. The first date in 2016 that the site started reporting projections for the general election looks to be July 25, 2016, and it showed Clinton with 190 “Strongly Dem”, "45 “Likely Dem”, 77 “Barely Dem”–for a total of 312–another 29 EVs in states that were “Exactly Tied”, and Trump only getting 197 EVs in all “GOP” categories from “Strongly” to “Barely”. That certainly makes the current numbers a lot less comforting; you could point out that Clinton only had 235 EVs in the “Strongly” and “Likely Dem” categories, whereas Biden does have just enough to win in those two categories–but it really is just too damned early to tell. (You can also look at graphs for 2016 and for 2020 to date, including graphs that either include or exclude the “Barely” states, which are really ties statistically speaking.)
That “medically-induced coma” option is, once again, looking pretty good these days.
Here’s a Daily Beast piece that says that the Trump campaign is actually pretty pleased with how his approval ratings still haven’t dropped below 40%. They’re amazed at how successful their boy is at placating his base.
With the inherent advantages of the EC, that keeps Donald close in the upcoming election. I believe Rachel Bitecofer (Niskanan) also has it right – this election comes down to turnout. Trump will be driving Biden turnout. Red-governed swing states will be trying to prevent it.
I am entirely sincere in not taking for granted that Biden will win.
I think that, given free and fair elections this fall, that Biden will comfortably win, both in the popular and the EC.
But, I’m not sure that we will have free and fair elections, and even if we do, that people turn out to vote for him, as they complain about not having their choice.
I was fairly confident that Clinton would win in '16. I didn’t think it was a shoe in, and I was very worried about the senate, but I did expect her to win.
I have no such expectations this time around. I have my wish, my desired outcome, and I see that rational factor point towards it being likely.
But I certainly not calling it, and certainly not taking for granted that he will, and no one else should either.
When you have an incumbent president with only one term left to go, it’s always a referendum on the state of the country. The president doesn’t necessarily need things to be great, just not totally screwed. First-term presidents lose only when the country is totally pessimistic about the state of the country, and particularly with the state of the economy.
It took 3 years, but it looks like we’re getting to that point. I refuse to write Trump off just yet because with the grand reopening, it’s possible that Trump might luck out and might benefit from the perception that we’re back on the upswing. However, Trump that is far from a given - I think there will be a resurgence of COVID and I think the economic impact is far worse than people realize, propped up stock market and doctored BLS jobs reports notwithstanding.
Also, Trump now has another problem, which is the perception that the country is “out of control.” And it’s that perception - the idea that it’s midnight in America and the president is totally powerless to stop it - that signals the beginning of the end of democratic support of the president.
That’s what forced LBJ to quit after one term. That’s no doubt what helped turn public opinion against Nixon, and what doomed Ford in 1976. It’s what doomed Carter in 1980 and Bush in 1992, though I think Bush was partly a victim of Reagan fatigue.
But people are beginning to view Trump as an out of control president responding to an out of control country. Whether that lasts depends on how people view their own country a few months from now but the signs aren’t good. Fortunately for him, people have short memories.
Sure, 5% is a big lead, but this was a state Clinton won. This poll was taken before the George Floyd riots; what would it look like today?