I’m encouraged by the fact that in our neighborhood, the number of Harris signs has been steadily increasing. While out walking this evening I saw one house with three different Harris yard signs plus a big ol’ flag hanging off the porch. (Plus all their Halloween decorations.)
Still not a single Trump sign to be seen.
If there’s any enthusiasm for the guy, I’m not seeing it.
My zip code is known to be very purple, maybe even a bit red. But my immediate community there’s about 5 Harris signs and only 2 Trump signs.
On the other hand: there are a lot of American flags flying. I wonder if the flying of an American flag is a way of saying “a MAGA lives here”, which (if true) is infuriating – it’s everyone’s flag.
So we put a Harris sign in our yard, and put up the Stars & Stripes. Suck on it, MAGAs.
Exactly what we did, and for the same reason.
The U.S. Constitution forbids any amendment that would deprive a state of equal Senate representation against its will.
But — here’s the non-panic part — the possibility of Harris winning the electoral college and not the popular vote is real. Look at the Partisan Lean chart here:
In 2008, the great majority of solid one party states were Democratic. This meant there were more states in which the Democrats wasted loads of presidential votes, and fewer in which the Republicans wasted lots of votes. Now that has evened up. Expert opinions differ, but some pundits think that most of the GOP electoral college advantage is gone. We will see what happens in this cycle. But in the long run, the electoral college advantage switches around.
Not so much, but the Gadsden flag Gadsden flag - Wikipedia
is definitely a warning sign.
If it is a MAGA, they arent just gonna fly old Glory, theres gonna be trump flags and signs.
So Mr. Numbers, the guy who’s known for his methodic, reasoned and scientific approach to polling is now writing essays where he announces his gut feelings on the election? WTF?
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4948792-nate-silver-donald-trump-2024-election-essay/
So is he trolling for eyeballs? Trying to kick Harris supporters into high gear? Or what?
His punditry isn’t worth much but his point was that his gut (and Carville’s gut and your gut) isn’t worth much either. Well duh.
Nor my gut, that’s another thing! 
Which bugs me, because I really like that flag and it speaks to my Libertarian leanings
(Just to be clear, I’m not a wacko Libertarian, but I do think we could use with fewer stupid rules; I should be allowed to do something that might hurt me if I wish; I think living somewhere with an HOA would make me a murderer, that kind of Libertarian; If the Democratic and Libertarian parties had a baby, that’s me)
Something we do not see here in Michigan was observed by me this week.
I passed a church, Assembly of God, that had a bunch of Trump signs on its lawn. Not near the road, up by the building.
I’m about to report them if such a thing exists. They should NOT be tax exempt and promoting a candidate.
I always hear this happens elsewhere, but in Michigan, I never see direct political signs on churches property. Like, placed and allowed by the church.
Been expecting way more newsworthy things happening recently, other than just the Kamala town hall, and thus it’s been feeling totally like a lull before the storm lately.
Heh, everyone being afraid to make a move now
I live in the same type of area. It feels like a lot fewer signs than last time but at least 75% of the signs are for Trump. It shouldn’t matter because the state should go for Harris by a wide margin. However the very vocal support for Trump worries me. I don’t panic but my gut is telling me what Nate Silver’s gut is telling him.
Based mainly on just a gut feeling, I think we’ll see see some slightly better polls for Harris released in the next few days. No game-changers – the election’s gonna be a nail-biter that could easily go either way, not matter what – but just a few high-quality polls that will suggest about a 2 percent lead in the three Blue Wall states, plus about a 1 percent lead in one or two of the four other swing states.
In other words, enough to put a few more of 528’s model runs in her favor. Right now, Trump gets about 505 to 510 for every 1000 trials; a few days after it digests the upcoming polls I hypothesized – i.e., around this time next week – it will be at around 510 or 515 for Harris, instead.
I think most are neither, they are just horribly misinformed. If I thought that the economy was circling the drain, crime was out of control, the current administration wants to change my children’s gender without my consent, all the courts have been “weaponized”, and that everything was rosy under Trump, I may well consider voting for him too.
It’s pretty amazing gaslighting, and it’s half the RW media shamlessly lying (now that Trump opened the floodgates for all that) and LW media very rarely pushing back, out of a desire to not be “dismissive” of voters’ concerns.
Which is why I’ve been annoyed with the couple of appearances I’ve seen of Mark Cuban talking tariffs. He seems to just talk about tariffs increasing prices, and even uses a “Chinese car” as an example product going up in price. Anyone who was pro-tariff would not be swayed by that argument.
What he could be saying is that, for many products, it’s necessary to source components from all over the world. An American made car incorporates many imported parts, just as a German or Japanese car does. So it will cost more under the severe tariffs Trump is proposing.
Or how US inflation fits in with the world supply shock following covid and how it is now close to ideal levels.
I know some might consider it idealistic to think you could educate people on all these topics, especially when most people will just see a short clip, but I just don’t see him using his time well on the topic.
While this is true, it’s not terribly persuasive, especially to someone having trouble buying groceries.
“Trump’s tarrifs will raise costs of stuff made in the US, because they import parts from China”, is a better argument. It still works coming off as tone-deaf.
I think that differentiating between “stupid” and “horribly misinformed” is an awfully fine point. I am not sure how one can be intelligent and well intentioned, and end up being so misinformed.
Nate Silver says his gut tells him Trump will win.
I dunno, I have this horrible feeling Trump will win as well.
Ignorance is not the same as stupidity. Not sure though where to place willful ignorance or arrogant ignorance.
Sure. But being so “horribly misinformed” requires several not intelligent choices and actions, no?
I can be ignorant about any number of things that I simply have never heard or read about. But if I choose a clearly unreliable source for my information, and unquestionably accept information which is contrary to common sense and/or daily experience, how is that not stupid?
If I ask my drunk golf buddy (who is NOT a medical professional) how to treat my cancer, and he tells me to eat more Twizzlers - I’m simply ignorant and not stupid?
And this isn’t something obscure that is hard to get reliable info about. If someone chooses to get their info solely from Fox, and believes everything they hear, that is simple ignorance and not stupidity?
This isn’t the first time around these boards that people have taken issue with my use of the word “stupid”, and seem to excuse phenomenal ignorance. I don’t understand that parsing of word choice.
I’m not saying to lead with it as a primary argument.
But it is pretty important context to at least mention, given a time slot long enough to repeat his one argument over and over.
Right, and let’s agree that it’s better than just saying Chinese products themselves will be more expensive.
Again: