A new ABC/Post poll finds that Biden’s lead over Trump in a hypothetical match-up has shrunk to just two points: 49% to 47%. The poll also identifies an enormous enthusiasm gap between Republicans and Democrats, with more than half of Trump supporters reporting that they’re “very” enthusiastic about voting for Trump vs. just under a quarter of Biden supporters saying the same.
Here’s ABC’s summary of other poll results:
As noted, Trump is aided in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates, by his ratings on the economy. Despite deep economic impacts of the coronavirus crisis, 57% of Americans approve of his handling of the economy, a new high in ABC/Post data. And Trump leads Biden in trust to handle the economy, 50-42%. (As reported Friday, 48% also approve of Trump’s handling of the job generally, another career high.)
Trump and Biden are even in trust to handle the coronavirus outbreak, 45-43%. Biden comes back to lead by 13 points in trust to handle health care more generally, 52-39%.
I’m not that worried about this poll. I think Trump is currently benefiting from the most muted “rally ’round the flag” effect approval bump in recent history, and it won’t last long. As for the enthusiasm gap, if the pollsters had asked Democrats if they were enthusiastic about the opportunity to vote against Trump, I think the percentage would have been stratospheric.
The election will be a referendum on Trump, who is failing and flailing daily. Trump will limp into the contest having aggressively mismanaged a pandemic in a way that will directly affect everyone and with the economy he spent three years bragging about reduced to a smoking crater. I hate the circumstances, but I like Democrats’ chances under them.
As for Democrats who are “meh” on Biden, there are plenty of other ways to get involved and stay engaged. The fight on voting rights was always going to be critical, and the pandemic complicates it even more. Republicans who are defending senate seats this year have the Trump millstone draped around their necks, so those contests are suddenly more exciting. And of course all the House seats are up, and Trump’s hideous performance is an opportunity to not only hold but expand the majority there too.
We have hard months ahead of us, and things will change, as they always do. But here’s one thing that won’t change: Trump is radically incompetent. He will not rise to the circumstances because he is incapable of doing so. He has a hardcore cult following, but I don’t see how he expands it beyond the 40% or so of goobers already in his camp unless he becomes a different person, which will not happen.
Even our thoroughly shitty Beltway media can’t Febreeze away the stench of the orange fart cloud. So, without taking anything for granted and with a firm commitment to work like we’re 10 points down in every race, I think the enthusiasm to get rid of Trump will be the story of the 2020 election.
Deep Southerner
First?
PsiFighter37
So much of this also has to do with free airtime. Trump is showing his ugly mug on TV every day pretending to know what he’s doing, while Biden has basically been persona non grata because the campaigns have ground to a halt and there aren’t any primaries for at least a month. I am pretty sure if you rewind to Biden’s last victories, the polling numbers were quite different.
Biden (and other Democrats) should aggressively point out that Trump owns every single U.S. coronavirus death due to the administration’s gross negligence and incompetence in preparing / handling of this. And as for people approving of his handling of the economy…just wait until record-high unemployment for months hits – and if the job losses start bleeding upwards into the white-collar, currently WFH set
Also, it’d help if Bernie would drop out. Instead, that shitstain gets a free pass to stay in the race until June because there are no more votes until then, and he and Jane don’t know how basic math works unless it comes to taking their supporters’ money.
debbie
Too bad that this will just motivate Trump to continue being an asshole to the blue states. How many people will die for his desire to be reelected?
NotMax
With the usual caveats of only one poll, early days, etc., a 2 point gap is a pretty darn good position to be in for someone who has yet to begin campaigning nationally (as opposed to Dolt 45, who has never stopped).
debbie
@debbie:
Though I must also say that Trump’s continued assholery will motivate more voters to vote him out. They may not be enthusiastic for Biden, but their incandescent anger at Trump will do the trick.
bbleh
All true, but it also bears remembering that the Trump people will scapegoat like crazy. They can’t do much to make him less incompetent, or even to disguise his incompetence, so all that’s left is distraction and blame, and they will do that in abundance.
Notice how COVID is already New York’s fault (probably because of all those immigrants, and those cosmopolitan libruls). Any wobbling in the economy will be blamed on Obama/Biden and the Democrats. And just wait until they start rattling the sabers about some foreign threat (probably Muslims, cuz you know how they are.)
The cult are emotionally committed to Trump. Emotional commitment means never saying you’re sorry, much less wrong. They’ll swallow it all, and the MSM will dutifully echo it (“some commentators are saying”) lest they lose a single pair of eyeballs.
It ain’t gonna be pretty …
Matt McIrvin
I’ve seen a lot of people touting this as a sign that the Democrats nominated the wrong person, but though I did NOT vote for Biden, I think this was inevitable regardless of who we ended up with, because the party is divided. The non-Biden candidates all sparked tremendous enthusiasm–from their limited bases. Beyond that, there was often a lot active hostility between the camps.
Trump, meanwhile, has convinced most Republicans to buy into his personality cult, because they’re assholes and he is too.
I think it’s quite likely that we’re going to lose, and we’ll have to live through four years of a plague-wracked and depressed country under Republican control. The big crisis didn’t hit early enough for people to really catch on that the administration’s incompetence/malevolence has anything to do with it, unless they hated Trump already.
But nominating Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren or Kamala Harris probably wouldn’t have made a huge difference here–just a different pattern regarding who’s enthused.
WereBear
I see this poll as evidence of how hard they are trying.
bbleh
@Matt McIrvin: I still love the description of Biden as the “Cheesecake Factory candidate.” Nobody’s particularly enthusiastic about it, but yeah, okay, I guess I can live with it.
Aziz, light!
The percentage of Americans without brains in their heads is remarkably high, so the election will be surprisingly close. Ignore all polls except polling stations.
JPL
@PsiFighter37: According to twitter, Nancy came close. While trump fiddles, people die.
p.a.
In a free and fair election we win. Odds on that (not even considering the unElectoral College) are… x< 100%
Betty Cracker
@Matt McIrvin:
Seven months isn’t long enough?
WereBear
Before this crisis, people bled away into Independent status without making a big fuss about sneaking out of the Republican Party.
Now, they are taking to social media to declare they are no longer Republicans. Way too little, lots and lots too late, but seemingly sincere… at least until the election, which they will either sit out or (gasp!) vote not-Republican.
NotMax
@JPL
Go for where he’ll feel it. Call him Dawdling Donald.
(Can certainly come up with more muscular negative nicknames; trying for some modicum of finesse to woo the wavering. Although still fond of using Downhill Donald.)
PsiFighter37
@Matt McIrvin: If Trump wins, this country is screwed. Biden is right on that count – another 4 years of this shit, and the country will be close to irredeemable. Just imagine how much work is going to be required to get the bureaucratic functioning of this country back to snuff after the complete negligence of the past 4 years. There are so many things broken about the executive branch right now; another 4 years like this, and I think you have broken the government for good. You will never be able to convince people to work for less pay but for the greater good if it appears like the greater good is a completely lost cause.
Ohio Mom
I like to think Biden is laying low because he’s giving Trump all the rope he needs to hang himself with.
And also, anything Biden would do, would get drowned out by CV19 news.
debbie
@NotMax:
Maybe “Dithering” instead? He prides himself on his decisiveness
ETA: Maybe skip the alliteration and really piss him off: “Flaccid Trump.”
JMG
Events are moving so swiftly and for the worse that polls taken last week have already lost their relevance if they’re published today. April is going to be one of the worst months in the country’s history. We cannot avoid that. And that is going to have an impact on public opinion, one way or the other, that will make today’s snapshot (really last week’s) irrelevant. I mean, I suppose voters could rally to Trump in even larger numbers, but it’d be a first when repeated bad news was good for an incumbent. What would’ve happened to GW Bush’s 90 percent approval rating if there had been another 9/11 on 9/18, and 9/25 and so on?
trnc
I think CNN’s coverage has been pretty good, but I just saw Tapper on CNN interviewing Governor Ricketts of Nebraska. Ricketts made the straw man argument about states who “ask the federal government to do everything” and then complain about decisions made by the federal govt (aka DT administration).
Has anyone heard any governor saying the feds should do EVERYTHING? I sure as hell haven’t, and was disappointed that Tapper didn’t ask to whom Ricketts is referring.
But Zakaria followed that with a blistering screed against DT’s management, so that was good.
Exregis
I’ve lived under 14 presidents and in that time only during Roosevelt’s term (I was a toddler) and Trump’s term has this country face two existential crises at the same time. During Roosevelt’s term it was the Great Depression and World War II. During Trump’s term it is CoViD19 and Trump.
Dorothy A. Winsor
These days, I’m surprised when I read about Sanders. He just seems irrelevant.
Baud
Somewhat related.
JPL
@NotMax: How about if we call him Audrey.
Kattails
A friend was just asking (rhetorically) why our Senators Shaheen and Hassan are not trashing Dolt every day for his incompetence. They would probably say it’s to keep things moving, but they seem oblivious to the idea that if he wins, their job is going to get even more onerous than it is right now.
trnc
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I wish he were irrelevant so he wouldn’t be a negative.
Don Beal
As I have said since South Carolina, Trump is going to eat Biden alive. Does anyone really think Trump super pacs will let the sexual harassment charge against Biden go away quietly. Do you really think “corn pop”, “dog face pony soldier”, “playing records fo to help kids” will not be pushed like crazy? My only hope is that the convention can stop this train wreck and install anybody but Cuomo.
JPL
@NotMax: Audrey might be a tad obscure for some, what about Audrey flytrap. Or feed me trump.
rikyrah
Last poll of the 300 swing counties had Biden up by 8 or 9. Saw it last week.
Chyron HR
Mission accomplished, Bernie has damaged the actual primary winner enough that the superdelegates will HAVE to give him his coronation this time!
WereBear
As soon as the COVID-19 pandemic started dominating the news, I knew it would be Biden. Panicked people will rush back to safety. His Obama connection alone, plus the Veep experience, plus all the Unca Joe good feeling: to me it’s a done deal. Stop fussing.
The man is doing far better than Trump, and that IS his job right now. He brings up how he talks to President Obama, and that soothes me; I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have than the Obama/Biden team back, and I’ll take this one.
AND he’s already endorsing the plans Elizabeth Warren put together. So I’m fine with all of that, too.
JPL
@rikyrah: I didn’t even read the analysis, because they didn’t ask whether or not you would walk over coals to oust the asshole.
Baud
I also think enthusiasm is overrated. Helpful, yes, but no ballot measures it.
rikyrah
Biff Baxter
Wasn’t there a Fox poll the day before that had Biden by 9?
rikyrah
JPL
@Biff Baxter: yup… It’s early and for some reason, I’m not concerned yet.
oldgold
After the Bay of Pigs fiasco JFK’s approval rating rose to 84%. After Pearl Harbor, FDR poll numbers experienced a similar spike. After 9-11. W’s ratings sky-rocketed into the 90s. All crises, to some degree, they bore responsibility for.
This muted rally around the flag for Trump; particularly, given the rough news that lies ahead, is not goodcnews for him.
germy
ThresherK
@Baud: The one gap Dems won’t close is the number of stories our Media Betters will file on people who are holding their nose and voting for
HillaryBiden.It’s like there’s a template out there for this story already!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@JMG: This and right now the virus is considered a Blue state problem and it’s only just starting in the Red States.
dimmsdale
Left this comment on a Twitter thread earlier, but I’ll post it here because it’s pertinent: When this is all resolved, I wonder if the current crop of Republican trump supporters are reckoning with the pent-up rage that they will encounter when the corpses due to trump’s incompetence (and their own complicity) are added up. Do you think there’ll ever be a moral reckoning for what these monsters have done?
As of this morning, with the news about Trump lickspittle DeSantis scoring 200% MORE life-saving equipment from the Feds than he asked for, I would just add to the above, “TOWERING” pent-up rage. I think this rage (I am generalizing, sure, but I can’t be the only one who feels this) needs to be cultivated and focused so that it effectively scours the Republican Party (and its sycophants) off the face of the earth, forever.
I’m not sure who to look to for this; or if it’s even possible. It would involve a unity of messaging that would link every single GOP parasite directly to Trump’s lethal malevolence that will almost certainly have led to the deaths people every voter knows. The Democratic Party is useless and incompetent for this–unfortunately only Republicans understand communication well enough (and have a fat enough cushion of money) to accomplish this.
I wonder, when the emergency finally lifts and public assembly is once again possible, if enough of us will take to the streets (and to GOTV efforts) to make a difference, to truly hold the GOP morally accountable? I do think our widespread rage may lead us to truly making a difference (in these odd times, one needs SOME hope; it is a deep disappointment to me how many Americans seem to lack any moral compass at all).
NotMax
@oldgold
Indecorous to rally ’round the flag while he’s humping it.
;)
Baud
@ThresherK:
Matt McIrvin
@Betty Cracker: It took several years for most people to figure out Bush wasn’t any good at fighting terrorism or doing wars. Even a lot of liberals.
debbie
@Baud:
I don’t know. What I’m seeing on Twitter is about his stumbling and forgetfulness. It’s as if Jill is his puppetmaster.
mousebumples
Wisconsin is still having our primary in a little over a week. They are strongly encouraging vote by mail (no excuse needed in Wisconsin), and I dropped my ballot off by the post office last week. I thought about volunteering to be a poll worker (*provided I could get the day off of work), but given that I’m still pumping/breastfeeding my little one, I don’t think the schedule will work for me. I’ve been encouraging my friends via text/social media to request a mail ballot, so hopefully most of them have done so. (I know my sister & her family have, at least!)
We have a statewide judicial race going on, and I think that’s why they’re sticking with the current date. I’m hopeful that they’ll relax the vote by mail procedures (right now, the rules are “must be received by the polling place by election day” versus must be postmarked by), but … we’ll see. We still have a hyper-gerrymandered legislature, so the ability to do anything productive there may be limited.
BobS
@PsiFighter37: That actually suggests a pretty good commercial- a solemn voiceover (with graphics depicting the health and economic impact of COVID) stating ‘3 years of Donald Trump left the United States unprepared for and unable to respond quick enough to a global pandemic. Don’t let that happen again.’
Baud
@debbie:
That’s Twitter. It’s an anti-Dem propaganda shop if you follow the right people/bots.
Matt McIrvin
@PsiFighter37: I think we need to mentally prepare for what we’re going to do if Trump wins, both to survive and to work toward some kind of better world in the distant future. Obviously try hard to win, but recognize the situation is constrained and you might not. Because nihilism in that case isn’t really a helpful response, and “there is no plan B” only leads to that if you don’t roll lucky.
lumpkin
Trump gets a free daily platform where he openly displays his malicious buffoonery and his approval ratings go up. People see him demanding empty flattery in exchange for peoples’ lives and a growing percentage of voters trust his handling of the crisis. Our numbers of infected and soon our numbers of dead are on a path to equal the rest of the world combined and people somehow fail to see that this is directly trump’s fault.
There is something deeply wrong with a lot of our fellow Americans.
I’m not optimistic.
Jerry
Anectdata from North Carolina:
My father in law, born and raised in eastern NC, is a huge fan of Reagan and Jesse Helms said that he’s definitely going to vote for Biden in the fall.
My next door neighbor’s father who has been Rush Limbaugh’s biggest fan for 20 years thinks that Trump has fucked up everything and will vote for Biden in the fall.
patrick II
I mentioned in a comment a couple of days ago that I had just talked to my Conservative neighbor. She is a nice lady, plants flowers in front of the condominium, hosts the association meetings, makes popcorn, and generally has common sense things to say about managing the association. So, she seems sane, so, even though I know she often has FOX on her television, I talked a little politics with her. But, however sane she seems about everything else, that stops at the Trump border. Trump is the greatest president ever. Obama was the worse ever — among other things Obama bribed the Iranians with millions in cash. I told her that we had lost a lawsuit and it was the Iranians money. She said, even if true, they didn’t have to give it too them in cash. And I said when I go to the bank and ask for cash I get it.
Anyhow, she did not know about or believe the court case existed and that we did not owe them the money. So, I said I would forward some documentation. So, I sent her this Washington Post story,Was Obama’s $1.7 billion cash deal with Iran prohibited by U.S. law?; a pretty thorough outline of the case and payment.
Her response:
I wasn’t really expecting that. First, the Hague was not where we lost the case. It was only mentioned because we would probably lose there too. And second — our CIA needs cash to create biological weapons? But the worst thing is that the implication that any source outside of FOX, and probably Rush, are untrustworthy. It is not a matter of truth (which she could look up, by the way) it is only a matter of who says it. There is no truth that conflicts with FOX. They have been well-trained.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: I’ve started just unfollowing everyone on Twitter who starts complaining about the Democratic primary candidates in any way. I can’t take any more of that. I already voted, it’s over for me, I don’t like the presumptive nominee but I’ll certainly vote for him, and listening more is just damaging my mental health.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
I agree. I’m not pessimistic, but victory is not guaranteed.
Plus, people thinking Hillary was definitely going to win hurt us in 2016.
JR
@dimmsdale: Where did you see this?
germy
@lumpkin:
I agree that there is something deeply wrong with a lot of our fellow Americans.
But I’m still trying to be optimistic. I’m hoping enough people are disgusted enough to vote this administration and a bunch of republican senators into the history books.
And then the work of rebuilding can begin.
kindness
I question the validity of those polls. The Republicans I work around hate Trump and what they think he’s done to their brand. Some of my distant relatives love him but they are California Okies and dumb as posts. They won’t win Trump this election. And Bernie’s people don’t seem to be trying to Hindenburg Biden like they did Hillary. Trump’s done. We just have to survive him till January.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Right. You wouldn’t follow @PatriotFarmers for their insight into the Democratic Party. Don’t follow @BurnItDownLefties either.
wvng
I am really tried of people saying that Biden should be out every day doing press conferences to say what he would do on addressing covid19. The reality is that he has no role to play because he has no power to do anything. If he tried to do daily briefings the attempt would be ridiculed. He is doing fine on periodic interviews.
Matt McIrvin
@lumpkin:
I would go further: they’re failing to see that this is even going to happen, largely because they’re not spending their time staring at logarithmic charts like you and I likely have been. The attitude of the electorally-weighted average American is still that this is an overblown crisis something like a seasonal flu. They’re not feeling it.
How they respond when it really does happen, to people they know and in their neighborhoods, I don’t think we can really say. Right now, in most parts of the country outside of some metro areas, the disease itself is an abstract, faraway problem–all they see is the restrictions they have to live with, if any.
germy
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/desperate-for-medical-equipment-states-encounter-a-beleaguered-national-stockpile/2020/03/28/1f4f9a0a-6f82-11ea-aa80-c2470c6b2034_story.htm
PEETUS will be moving to Florida when his administration is done, He wants to make sure his new nest is “clean”
Han
@Matt McIrvin: We’re racking up casualties a lot faster this time around though.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: If Biden has to drop out for whatever reason (or dies) and there’s a big damn succession crisis at the party convention, with the Bernie people announcing they’re entitled to Bernie and the party leaders fighting them or whatever… I am OUT. Not going to get involved. I can’t. Give me a nominee and I’ll vote for them.
Dr. Ronnie James, D.O.
Doddering Donald
The Demented Don
Dicked-Around Donald
Pharaoh of Denial
Down to the DMV to Take the Keys from Donald
@NotMax:
Betty Cracker
@Baud:
That’s true, and I think that experience will HELP us this time. Also, 2020 features the the horrid reality of Trump vs. the unlikely prospect of a clown taking control in 2016.
BobS
@patrick II: Which one of these people is your neighbor?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzDhm808oU4
Bill Arnold
@Don Beal:
The Democrats and their allies will be attacking Trump (and his allies and family), and doing so effectively. They will be dominating many, maybe even most news cycles with this. You’re acting like a troll. (Are you?)
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Biden is supposedly vetting Veep candidates. I think whoever he chooses will be asked to step into the role. It’ll cause a schism, but we’ll just have to deal with it.
germy
@Betty Cracker:
I agree. In ’16, too many voters assumed HRC was a shoo-in. So they felt comfortable staying home, or voting for Stein, or dicking around with writing in Gumby or whoever.
I’m going to keep hoping voters realize things are too serious now for game playing.
Baud
@Bill Arnold:
He consistently posts anti-Biden comments “from the left.” Your choice as to how to label that and how to address it.
bemused
@patrick II:
Does she think trump is doing a great job with covid 19 pandemic?
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Hopefully our experience with the propaganda war will also help. FWIW, Reddit’s front page is less of cesspool than it was it 2016.
(Also, too, Biden’s white penis helps.)
ThresherK
@Baud: Is there really a self-labeled BurnItDownLefties twitter or is that just the rose variant?
I can’t tell who is kidding anymore after reading so many people micro-Monday-morning-quarterbacking Nancy (Primary Nancy Pelosi!) Pelosi.
germy
@Don Beal:
Who would you like to see installed?
Does it set a bad precedent to have primaries where a candidate gets the majority of votes, and is then removed at the convention for someone else to be installed?
Biden wasn’t my first or second choice, but he seems to have won more votes than the candidates I supported.
NotMax
@WereBear
Very fine line as if overdone it runs the risk of being seen or interpreted by an important slice of the electorate as an admission by Biden that he’s not up to the job and must rely on Obama as a crutch.
Baud
@ThresherK:
Don’t know. I meant those to be symbolic.
Speaking of potential trolls, shout out to jk for not going on against Biden after he took a commanding lead. It seems like very few people with intense feelings move on from them these days.
Spc
@Don Beal: any D candidate would have some ready made scandal on tap by the r-fuckers.
Frankensteinbeck
For the last three years, Democrats have been smashing every election because everyone who even leans liberal hates Trump with a fucking bloody passion. For the last three years, all we have seen are stories about how that’s not going to happen in each election about to happen. Nothing has changed. Coronavirus sure as Hell ain’t gonna change that. He won by 80,000 votes divided among three states where there have been big swings. He’s toast. We’re fighting for the Senate and we should fight like lions. I don’t mind if the public thinks we have to get out every vote, however.
@Bill Arnold:
Yes. Don Beal has a history. Utter purity pony troll, ignores all reasonable counterarguments to complain about the insults instead.
Spc
@kindness: and Trump’s rally round the flag bump is incredibly weak historically.
Citizen Alan
@kindness:
Are you serious?!? Their pushing a fabricated rape accusation against Joe! Granted, it’s utter bullshit, but then so were Benghazi and Hillary’s emails.
Baud
@Frankensteinbeck:
Add to that Biden’s amazing feat in SC and on Super Tuesday.
beef
I’m finding myself quite enthusiastic about Biden. He’s the right guy for the job, and he’s got a coalition that helps a lot with the Senate.
Did you know that Biden published an editorial in USA Today on January Frickin 27th, calling out the Trump administration for dropping the ball on pandemic preparation.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/01/27/coronavirus-donald-trump-made-us-less-prepared-joe-biden-column/4581710002/
He was way ahead of the country and the other candidates on this stuff. There are some benefits to experience.
Also: His Twitter feed is pretty good. It’d be nice to see it echoed here and elsewhere in the liberal blogosphere more often.
Baud
@Citizen Alan:
I’m looking forward to seeing the mental gymnastics they will go through when Bernie nominally endorses Biden.
germy
Important:
Kattails
Joe Biden ad:
NotMax
Of the 20-odd candidates Biden was probably my 30th choice, but here we are. The election does not hinge on my choice; shall accept what is, neither pine nor whine over what might have been and do whatever is legal and necessary to remove the incumbent monster in our midst.
Baud
@NotMax:
Same here, brother.
pamelabrown53
@Frankensteinbeck:
Thank you for some much needed perspective in this thread. Totally agree.
Also, even though we need to recognize a slight uptick due to the “rally around the flag” phenomenon, I just wonder who bothers to be polled in the middle of a pandemic!?
Frankensteinbeck
@Citizen Alan:
Yeah, the Sanders supporters are pushing every smear they can come up with. More importantly, Sanders himself is pushing the exact same ‘The Democratic Party cheated you’ line, and I can think of nothing more guaranteed to make his followers not vote. He’s lost a LOT of influence since last time, however.
Barbara
In the early winter of 1991 I went to Europe for the first time, on the eve of the first Iraqi invasion (which I opposed, but whatever). I was sitting in the British Airways waiting area at Dulles International Airport when someone told me the president would be making a speech at 9:00 pm, when I would be in the air. I had an entire row of seats to myself because only an idiot would be flying at that particular time, right? Well, my SO was in London on a business trip and when he saw how cheap it was he practically ordered me to go, and his partner had scored tickets to ask the Prime Minister for me and his own wife. So I was in a seat viewing Parliament one day after the U.S. had started hostilities. Still one of the most amazing experiences of my life.
What does this have to do with anything? Bush’s popularity soared to 90% and I was absolutely sure he would be reelected. He wasn’t. My patience with prognosticating has gotten lower and lower over time, to the point that I avoid all news articles with the words “might” and “could” in them. Eyes on the prize. Volunteer for a campaign, any campaign and do what is possible.
Baud
@Barbara:
Preach it. Definitely this. I’d ask you to come sit by me, but …. you know.
BobS
@Frankensteinbeck: His influence is just as deep within his cult- it’s just not nearly as broad. I think a lot of his supporters from 2016 got slapped in the face with the reality that approaching elections as a ‘self-affirmation exercise’ is fucking ignorant in the binary system we have.
Barbara
Also, totally OT: For those of you in the DC Metro Area in despair at the lack of hand sanitizer. You can score some sanitizer and support a local business by buying some coffee or coffee drinks at Compass Coffee, which has teamed up with Union Kitchen to product hand sanitizer according to the WHO recipe.
patrick II
@bemused:
Yes, she does think Trump’s doing good with covid-19. That’s how the conversation started. I pointed out how he did nothing the first month and said coronavirus was a hoax, said it would go away like magic, and now it is clear he was wrong and that we were both self-isolating (I saw her in the front yard and kept my eight foot distance).
She said well… and then changed the subject to how democrats had ruined her business, and then on to Obama, and you know the rest of the story, aside from then saying Trump is the greatest president ever.
Honestly, she seems smart and sane about most things. The depth of her irrationality surprised me.
BobS
@Barbara: Bush the Lesser had a spike in his approval after Katrina.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Barbara: @Baud: also, the ABC poll is getting hyped to hell and back again, but isn’t it an outlier? A Fox poll of less that 48 hours ago showed Biden up almost ten, and I think there was at least one other poll last week with similar numbers.
Baud
@BobS:
My current postulate is that a lot of the non-liberal Dem electorate who like progressives as advocates don’t support progressives as leaders.
If we ever get a calm moment, we might have an interesting conversation about whether I’m right and why that is.
JPL
UHOH They moved the 5:30 briefing to noon. I expect some nasty women comments coming soon.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I try not to follow polls too closely. Poll averages are the only thing important, and even that has its limits.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Nancy Pelosi going all “dracaris” on CNN this morning
Kattails
@Citizen Alan: In checking out Biden’s website to get the video link I just posted, I see a lot of trolling about the rape accusation. Very nasty stuff. Of course, no mention of Trump’s lengthy history of sexual shit. Far left and right in feedback loops?
I don’t know. I don’t know how the Democrats get a message and stay on it, pull all Trump’s meanness and incompetence together into one easy soundbite that can be hammered day in and day out. I don’t understand how we get around having to take responsibility for everything while the entire Republican party skates on everything. I’m depressed that the governors cannot stand together and call him out on his extortion
Nevertheless, I will persist. But now gonna go get some work done.
WereBear
@NotMax: No, it’s implied mostly. I’m talking about Voter Brains as much as I am the message being sent to them.
justsomeguy
I have thought for quite a while that if in October Trump is within 10 percentage points in national polls, he will win.
Due to voter suppression, electoral college, micro targeting, & media need for a horse race (& bias against any Democrat).
Biden’s “leadership” during this time certainly ain’t helping. Imagine the leadership & competence that Warren would be showing, or that Obama radiated during the fall of 2008.
oldgold
Is this true? If so, why is it not getting more attention?
The story I am seeing on Twitter is that in early February we sent China 17.5 tons of PPE.
jonas
Dems may not be super excited about Biden as the Trump’s dead-eyed cultists are about him, but I’d like to see a poll about how enthusiastic Dems are about voting *against* Trump. I’d say “very enthusiastic” would get about 98%.
JMG
@patrick II: Voters like this person cannot abandon Trump without admitting they were fooled by him and have been living a fantasy. That’s not something people readily do, which is what con artists depend on to give them time to skip town.
debbie
@JPL:
Pelosi’s interview with Jake Tapper, I’d bet. Or a tee time.
BobS
@JPL: Trying to upstage Cuomo. His daily briefings are required watching by my wife and I (she worked a midnight shift yesterday- RN- and is trying to sleep, so I have the DVR set for 1130).
Maybe Cuomo needs to have 2 daily briefings- his regular AM, and a shorter PM to correct the stupid shit emanating from the White House.
Baud
@Kattails:
My 2¢. You stay on message by staying on message. Don’t let the latest Twitter trends or media news cycle distract you. And don’t chase a magically object that will instantly turn the tide and save the day. That only happens in the movies.
jeffreyw
I mentioned here earlier, when there were still a dozen candidates, that I would happily vote for Joe. I was told that Joe was a terrible choice. I will eagerly, happily, vote for Joe in the general. The perfect is the enemy of the excellent.
Trump delenda est
Croaker
Hate to be the bearer of bad news but this poll is crap. Remember you have to have a narrative for a horse race. So let’s push that on you.
Anyone look at the data? I will try to dig into later but here is quick breakdown:
https://www.langerresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/1212a32020Election.pdft
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@beef:
This is a point that the internet left, at least, can’t seem to process. There’s a reason Cal Cunningham and Mark Kelly and Jaime Harrison endorsed Biden, or as good as.
and if anyone’s ever heard a legislative strategy from Bernieland more sophisticated than “Look out the window, Mitch”, I haven’t heard it.
dimmsdale
@JR: Here you go. Posted this before I saw that Germy at 63 posted the same link. Caution: Math was never my strong point; feel free to correct my percentages, but the claim stands, I think: scroll down to the paragraph that begins “Florida has been an exception in its dealings with the stockpile…”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/desperate-for-medical-equipment-states-encounter-a-beleaguered-national-stockpile/2020/03/28/1f4f9a0a-6f82-11ea-aa80-c2470c6b2034_story.html
Subsole
@Don Beal: Boy, that sounds bad. If only the progressive heroes of the trust-fund soviet had managed to convince its footsoldiers to vote instead of sitting around sobbing and carping and sniping like a bunch of limp little bitches…
Barbara
@JMG: I think this is the main point. It’s very difficult to admit that you have been conned. I don’t even bother with people like this. I have cousins who have been pooh poohing the severity of COVID-19 daily, and my view is that reality will overtake their denial soon enough. The fact that they and their mother are in a high risk group seems not to have sunk in.
JPL
@debbie: It’s raining. There was a planned 5:30 briefing and I just think he watched the morning shows.
We are watching a mashup of the Hunger Games and Little Shop of Horrors.
scav
I wouldn’t be surprised by some sort of sunk cost bounce — they’ve invested too much energy to thinking all of this is a hoax and said so loudly to back off visibly. This is follow through from “It’s all a ploy by the Demons and media to make Our God-Given leader (and by extension themselves) look bad,”. And the rising piles of dead bodies look bad and will continue to look bad. They will fight hard for their personal self-esteem as the most holy and perfected of all.
PST
@Jerry:
I am starting to observe a bit of this among my Trumpista relatives. I find it impossible to talk anyone out of Trump loyalty. (Actually, it is very hard to talk anyone out of anything.) The only reliable conversions are those who change their minds on their own. The percentage will be small, but that is good enough, because Trump will never bring new swing voters over to his side. This is probably a good time for Biden and the Democrats to play rope-a-dope and let Trump overexpose himself before the pain hits in full. As many have pointed out, Trump’s rally-round-the-president bump in a crisis is one of the weakest in history. But some potential swing voters will still get angry at a full-throated attack at this point. I hate those people, but that isn’t relevant. When the worst has passed, and everyone is surveying the damage of lives lost and unemployment at 15 percent, then is the time for a reckoning. That’s when the endless replaying of Trump’s early words will do the most good.
Emma from FL
Again with the polls? Jesus, Mary and Joseph.
The defeatism wafting off this thread makes me think we should just give up right now and just sit out the election. I( mean what’s the point? If Trump and his unbeatable crew doesn’t get us, the press will. Or people will not love Biden. Or something.
joel hanes
@JMG:
But a big, fine looking man jumps up on a bench and shouts:
“Hold on! Just a word, gentlemen.” They stopped to listen. “We are sold – mighty badly sold. But we don’t want to be the laughing stock of this whole town, I reckon, and never hear the last of this thing as long as we live. No. What we want is to go out of here quiet, and talk this show up, and sell the rest of the town! Then we’ll all be in the same boat. Ain’t that sensible?”
— Huckleberry Finn, the audience after the first night’s performance of The Royal Nonesuch
Chyron HR
@germy:
You don’t UNDERSTAND, bro! The voters RIGGED the election!
gene108
How big is Trump’s base? They have unwavering support for Trump, but do they really have the numbers versus Democrats, and Independents wanting to vote Trump out?
Fleeting Ex-istence
I do so wish that Biden would name his Veep running mate soonest. We need the clarity right away and there needs to be a full ticket long before the convention.
Matt McIrvin
@Barbara: That reminds me of my only time in London (not counting a recent brief layover at Heathrow), which was in the late summer of 1986. It was a youth science convention that I’d won admission to in a science fair. Challenger and Chernobyl had exploded, Gorbachev was in but it was before Reykjavik, Iran-contra hadn’t quite broken yet, the US mostly loved Reagan and the UK was deeply divided over Thatcher. There was a lot of mistrust in science and engineering going around. Interesting times.
Anyway, the most interesting thing was that there was a mixed-race South African delegation at the conference, and the policy of Western democracies toward apartheid was this huge burning issue. There was a panel at the convention that was not about science at all but about divestment/apartheid policy, with pro- and anti-divestment MPs speaking, and the overwhelming feeling was that nothing was ever going to change. I think about that a lot.
At one point I was on a Tube train with a bunch of other kids and they started asking one of the black South Africans about the situation there and what he felt about it. Asking him, among other things, why he didn’t just leave.
Now, I knew that that was kind of a dumb question because of the huge practical obstacles involved and the question of where you might go, but that wasn’t what he said; after carefully looking left and right to see who might be listening, he shrugged and said, more or less: “It’s home. You don’t just abandon your home if you can possibly stay and try to make things better.”
And I think about that a lot too.
TS (the original)
@BobS:
Trump being like the states that have to have the earliest primaries. Cuomo should give his at 8am & see what trump does //
Emma from FL
@gene108: Trump won with a few thousand voters over 4 states. Most of those states were heavily hacked by the Russians and/or republican ratfuckers. Amazing unbeatability, isn’t it?
germy
@Fleeting Ex-istence: Maybe it takes a long time because of the vetting process? They need to examine every nook and cranny of a candidate’s background. Because we know the GOP operatives (from the top all the way down to the fringe characters) are doing the same thing.
Lapassionara
The saying “all politics is local” sums up my view. We need to focus on our local races and on electing Democrats instead of Republicans to the House and the Senate. If I were in Maine, I would darn sure be enthusiastic about voting for a Democrat to replace Susan Collins. I am very enthusiastic about seeing my dim witted Republican Representative replaced by a Democrat. I would vote for a pitcher of warm spit over Trump any day, and I am enthusiastic about that vote too.
A Ghost to Most
@Fleeting Ex-istence: I disagree. Do not give the fascists time to concentrate on the Veep choice.
WaterGirl
@Emma from FL:
Boy, I haven’t heard that in 35 years. That was my mom’s go-to for swearing.
TS (the original)
I watch Cuomo most days. (From down under and its rather late in my world). Other than the drug testing (is this to appease trump?) it is the best information I hear from the US. Our news mainly reports what trump is saying (not always with belief in same).
I like that the Washington Post puts the feed up each day with link on the front screen.
debbie
@beef:
If nothing else, he will appoint far better and more qualified people to work in his administration. I am not excited and likely that won’t change, but better governing is more than enough for me.
jc
If Trump is re-elected, it will be because his base has learned nothing. It will be proof that they are ignorant and shallow beyond redemption. It will be the ultimate demonstration that they understand nothing of our system, how anything works, what anything means.
debbie
@JPL:
I have officially run out of words.
germy
@WaterGirl: I remember the swearing in the old W.C. Fields films:
“Godfrey Daniel!”
“Mother of Pearl!”
“Drat!”
germy
Pelosi slams Trump’s handling of pandemic; Fauci doubts Easter timeline
germy
Gvg
@germy: I thought Hillary was a shoo in, but I voted because I cared. I guess there were a few who didn’t bother but I wouldn’t count on it being a huge number. I think there are always a number who don’t bother to vote, but I don’t know that it was an especially large group. I really hope a small percent who where indifferent will become voters permanently.
Croaker
@jeffreyw: don’t worry you still can the misleading ABC/Post poll still has them all in it. So let’s all vote for our local favorites. Then compare the results against one.
BobS
@germy: For nearly 50 years, anytime I read (or hear) someone use the phrase ‘Mother of Pearl’, this plays in my head off and on for the rest of day:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwT_SbBtX8U
NotMax
@Fleeting Ex-istence
Too early. When he’s amassed 1991 delegates on his own, that’s the moment.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Five words that get me excited for Biden: Ruth Bader Ginsberg Steven Breyer
Five more: Neomi Rao Amy Coney Barrett
Five more: Supreme Court Justice Ted Cruz (trump would do it to make Cruz grovel publicly on the rumor and to piss us off)
A Ghost to Most
I read a book, “The Long, Loud Silence”, by Wilson Tucker, long ago in my yoot.
It wasn’t a masterpiece, but it’s spare writing and desparate story have clung to me all my life. It’s ringing like a bell to me now, given the circumstances of plague and societal collapse.
Off to see if Kindle has it.
Kattails
@Baud: I agree. To recap, a friend earlier today was complaining that our reliably Dem. Senators are nonetheless reluctant to say anything at all negative about Trump, at least that we’ve seen. They’re playing nice girls. I saw and linked to a new Biden campaign ad that does, literally, say that Trump’s ego will cost lives. Good! I also noted that there was a lot of garbage about a rape Joe Biden supposedly perpetrated and that Biden should withdraw. Hadn’t seen this stuff before. I don’t give that stuff traction & I’m not on Facebook or Twitter, but should be aware that it’s out there.
Is it a fantasy to think that every Democratic congressperson and Senator and Governor could get together and put out an ad nationally saying “President Trump, we are aware that we represent our entire states in our response to this, including the Republican constituents who voted against us? We intent to distribute help to everyone. That money belongs to the people of the US, not you. How dare you withhold it from ANYONE?” Argggh. I really need to get to my drafting table.
Subsole
@Barbara:
Was having a similar talk w/a coworker abt racism (for context he’s black, I’m white). He pointed out that it is possible to break free and self-civilize. The trouble is, to stop being a clown you have to admit you used to be a clown. Most of these folks would rather spend their whole lives being clowns, because they are clown-ass motherfuckers who are scared to face being wrong.
You also see it on the Bernslime left, whenever ’16 comes up.
AnonPhenom
Let’s not forget the forest for the trees.
2020 will be a census year. State legislators and governors will redraw congressional districts.
Republicans/Tea Party handed the Democrats their asses in 2010 and as a result the last 10 years has been one uphill battle after another.
Let’s not have a repeat.
JPL
@debbie: I think that was an error cuz MSNBC said Cuomo and CNN is showing State of the Union.
feebog
May I point out that one poll can be an outlier? Or that a Fox News poll taken from March 21 t March 24 shows Biden up by 9%? Or that the same poll shows him up in the battleground states by the same margin? Or that in the last 10 polls going back to mid-February, Biden leads by and average of 7.1%. Please, being shut in for the last two weeks is depressing enough. Stop with the doom and gloom, we already have plenty to go around with the Covid-19 pandemic.
Suzy
@Matt McIrvin: Cuomo is given almost as much media time as Trump. NY is a big story no question. And it helps that the networks have headquarters in NY and that many media stars are New Yorkers.
But I wonder if Corporate America, aided by Corporate media, will be tempted to push… Hypothetical polls in 3… 2…1….
BobS
@Kattails: I like that idea- you have Democratic senators in quite a few Trump 2016 states. Off hand, I count Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Ohio, Montana, and West Virginia, and there may be others.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Subsole: One of my former colleagues now teaches in Florida. He went to the grocery store yesterday wearing gloves and a mask, and a lady pushed up to him as he was getting out of the car. She said he looked like an idiot and this was hoax. To me, her need to confront him rather than just roll her eyes shows that somewhere underneath she knows she’s wrong and resents being confronted by something that suggests that’s so.
Patricia Kayden
gsp
@PsiFighter37:
Yes, it’s Bernie’s fault. When he gets curbstomped by Trump for voting for Iraq war, mass incarceration, supporting cuts to social security (“when I argued that we should freeze federal spending, I meant Social Security as well…I not only tried it once, I tried it twice, I tried it a third time, and I tried it a fourth time”, etc it will undoubtedly be Bernie’s fault. Take some responsibility. he’s simply a terrible candidate for this era. Maybe the 90s but certainly not now.
I sure hope you are right Betty, but I’m not convinced. I think he loses. He’s the wrong candidate for 2020 and I know you’ve argued otherwise but his decline is going to become more pronounced as the campaign goes on. The only thing right now that I think is going to sink Trump is his incompetent COVID-19 response and the tragic death and chaos it may inflict. This might be what opens people’s eyes but no, there will not be much enthusiasm for Biden regardless (hope I’m wrong).
Betty Cracker
LOL!
[“Sure, Jan” GIF]
Elizabelle
@feebog: Yes!
Can we get an EeyoreCake? To throw at the doom and gloomers and the ridiculous pundits and pollsters?
Betty Cracker
@feebog: May I point out the content of the bloody post?
Emma from FL
@WaterGirl: Standard Cuban usage from the old days.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@gsp: Biden is a flawed candidate, no doubt. But he was the only top-line candidate in the primary who didn’t badly misread the results of the 2016 primary– i.e., Bernie’s support was more anti-Hillary than pro-Bernie, see just about every Dem primary this year– and 2018– i.e., for all they’re charismatic and telegenic, “The Squad” doesn’t really represent the voters and candidates who actually flipped the House.
I don’t really get the argument that candidates who couldn’t generate enough “enthusiasm” to win partisan primaries would do so in a general election in states (remember the Electoral College?) like Florida, North Carolina and Arizona.
ETA: I wish whatever adults there are in Bernieworld could recognize that the “enthusiasm” of his supporters is and would be a drag on his candidacy.
JPL
@Betty Cracker: It doesn’t deny the fact that appeared to have a few to many.
Baud
@Betty Cracker: She should go to Technical Difficulties Anonymous.
randy khan
@Betty Cracker:
Yeah, it actually seems about perfect to me. Not that I ever would have wished something like this on the country, but if it’s going to happen, best that it happen in the actual year of the election with enough lead time to see the consequences of the failure of leadership.
AnotherBruce
@feebog: No shit on the utter dispair about the election that is 7 months away. The polls are worthless right now.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Betty Cracker: says a lot that they felt they had to respond publicly
randy khan
I kind of feel like there should have been a choice along the lines of “grimly determined” in that poll. Probably 90% of the somewhat enthusiastics feel that way.
Omnes Omnibus
All of you who needed to mourn that Warren wasn’t going to be the nominee have had your time. This election is bigger than your feelings and Biden is the presumptive Democratic nominee. Find a way to be enthused about him. Right now, your choices are Biden or Trump. It is that simple.
scav
@randy khan: Taking out the garbage generally does suffer from an enthusiasm gap.
Betty Cracker
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Seems like there was enthusiasm for several of the primary candidates. The problem is, it was fragmented.
AnonPhenom
Census response rate by state.
also:
Go online and respond today.
WaterGirl
@germy: I never watched those, I’m sure it was funny. My mom using “jesus, Mary and Joseph!” was quite scandalous, as we were Catholic, and two of my dad’s sisters were nuns.
Don Beal
@germy: I recognize the problem of “selecting” a candidate instead of Biden would be undemocratic/unfair/terrible precedent. It would be far better if he just stepped aside. To keep peace in the house I would prefer Warren but would accept and work for Harris. I realize Sanders would cause a major blowup. I’m sure the DNC can work it’s will on Biden just like they did to the rest of the moderates when they decided Biden was the “chosen one”.
Betty Cracker
@Omnes Omnibus: I don’t know of a single Warren supporter who doesn’t intend to vote for Biden. They may exist, but I’ve never seen a single comment here or even on the mad house that is Twitter that suggests Warren supporter defections are an issue.
Chyron HR
@Omnes Omnibus:
What the FUCK? “Warrenbros” aren’t a thing–we’re all in on Biden. Take your sanctimonious lectures over to the “Gamer Girls for Bernie” Twitch stream.
debbie
@JPL:
It would have taken a superhuman effort to come up with as much bullshit Trump will need for his press conference. I am really hoping someone asks Trump about the UN’s donation of 250,000 masks to NYC. Hopefully, the response will be something other than being called “Cutey-pie.”
randy khan
@justsomeguy:
I find this bizarre. It’s like you haven’t been paying any attention to what Biden has been doing.
Also, of course, he’s not President, so it’s not like he can call out the National Guard or use the Defense Production Act to order companies to make ventilators or masks. I’m not sure what you expect him to do beyond what he’s done.
WaterGirl
@Emma from FL: Interesting! Did not know that.
Elizabelle
@Betty Cracker: Right.
Love that these Obamabashers use the excuse that Pirro was short a teleprompter. Uh huh.
debbie
@Betty Cracker:
I don’t think the teleprompter had half the impact on Pirro’s performance as her box o’ wine! (clips included)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@randy khan: much of the very on-line left has convinced itself that The People are just waiting to follow Somebody Who Shouts, so if The People aren’t responding the way we think they should, it must be that we’re not shouting loudly enough.
Also, volume will somehow override things like who controls the Senate and who is actually in the White House.
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker: @Chyron HR: I know that Warren supporters will support Biden. But I also recall being told we had to let them mourn. Well, in my opinion, the mourning period should be over and the statements of lukewarm, reluctant support should cease. It’s not going to be Harris, it’s not going to be Warren, and it’s not going to be Sanders. Biden is light years better than Trump; that is all that matters.
And @ChyronHR: Go fuck yourself.
Matt McIrvin
@Betty Cracker: Imani Gandy, a Warren supporter, once said she wouldn’t vote for Biden or Pete Buttigieg in the general. But the fact that she even mentioned Pete Buttigieg will indicate approximately when she said that–it was a different world. (And she emphasized that she lives in California, where this is unlikely to affect anything.)
Frankensteinbeck
@gsp:
Why, he’s such a terrible candidate that he’s been beating the shit out of Sanders in the primaries from the moment it became a two person race.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Matt McIrvin: wow, as a fan of hers, that is shocking and disappointing
shades of 2000…..
Chyron HR
@Omnes Omnibus:
Actually, you’d fit in pretty well as a Bernie supporter.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chyron HR: Riiiggghhhttt.
Duane
Typhoid Trump said today, ” When America is tested, Americans rise to the occasion.” Tested. Talk about a poor choice of words. Where were those tests, you bloody fucking idiot. He’s a walking talking poor choice. The Donald of Death.
randy khan
@Don Beal:
I really don’t get people who think the DNC has some magic power over candidates. National parties have almost no power these days, as demonstrated quite vividly by Trump winning the nomination in 2016, when every single Republican operative not named Manafort* thought he was doomed in the general election.
Occam’s Razor tells us that the more likely explanation is the usual reason that people drop out – the polling showed they didn’t have a viable path to win and their donors stopped donating. (It’s also possible that some or all of them thought Sanders would be a terrible candidate, but you’ll never hear one of them say that.)
*Manafort may have thought that, too, but he had, uh, other motivations.
Ruckus
@Betty Cracker:
With his incessant bullshit and how a lot of people are feeling, it may not. With his every day display of his idiocy, incompetence and blame shifting, the true believers will rally around the stupid. They’ve dumped their entire lives to support a racist, ignorant, lying, dumbass as the second coming, they can convince themselves that he’s everything they ever needed to overthrow the liberal train wreck that they think everyone besides their racist, ignorant, lying, dumbass selves is. They found their savior. They truly believe that there are rich people for a rational reason and their job is to support that or the entire planet will collapse. That he’s stone racist is just the icing. And everything the republican party has done or said for the last 50 years supports that so it must be true. I mean we couldn’t find a leader who didn’t lie about his military service, or isn’t trying to shut down their destruction of nature, or is – for god’s sake a BLACK MAN, or wants to create a communist county or what the hell ever it is the entire republican party has lied about this week. They are hooked, they’ve swallowed the hook, sinker, line, rod, reel, boat, dock, boat house, out house and truck full of bullshit.
artem1s
As I suspected. 37% independents? Or Rs in glibertarian clothing? It’s not even likely voters, just a random sample of landlines and mobile. Random sample of who? high schoolers? These polls are shit. So what that 53% of Dump supporters are very enthusiastic. We already know that a high proportion of what is left of a shrinking demographic is in full metal cult mode. Do a poll that reflects the actual voting demographics and I’ll take a look at that. For now this is just the MSM trying to create a horse race for ratings sake and will only serve to encourage the “leftier than thou” to keep up their online onslaught against Biden.
randy khan
@Omnes Omnibus:
I finished mourning about two days after she dropped out. And besides, we still have her in the Senate.
But more to the point, Biden is absolutely fine. All but a small number of the Dems were absolutely fine. I can’t bring myself to think that relatively tiny difference in position should make me whine about not getting my candidate and having to vote for someone else.
TriassicSands
@Matt McIrvin:
I’m afraid time isn’t the critical issue. What matters most is the All-American combination of voter stupidity and ignorance. (Yes, apathy and laziness deserve a nod, too.)
After 3-1/2 years of gross incompetence, Trump is still a good bet to get re-elected, though not a guaranteed winner. His failure in dealing with the pandemic has been spectacular, and is repeated every day, but that isn’t reflected in his numbers.
Whether it was seven days, seven months, or seven years until the election, the American electorate is unlikely to respond intelligently or rationally.
That doesn’t mean Biden, a terrible candidate, can’t win, but it is going to take the greatest effort in the Democratic Party’s history to make that happen.
Don’t give up!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@randy khan: Bernie cannot fail, he can only be failed.
Of course, dismissing huge swaths of Democratic voters, including especially African-American voters, as the corrupt and/or ignorant tools a mysterious and malevolent Establishment (!) is probably the best way to build a winning coalition for the future.
JMG
@artem1s: Please let’s not get into deconstructing polls. That way madness lies. Accept them for what they are, imperfect but useful snapshots of a moment. In the Post poll case, the moments of March 22-25. It’s already the 29th.
zhena gogolia
BIDEN, A SUCCESSFUL FORMER VICE PRESIDENT WHO HELPED WIN TWO NATIONAL ELECTIONS WITH BARACK OBAMA AND HAS A LONG AND DISTINGUISHED CAREER, IS NOT A TERRIBLE CANDIDATE.
ANY MORE THAN HILLARY CLINTON WAS.
bemused
@patrick II:
They always, always change the subject when they can’t remember a fox manufactured lie. Deflection.
Elizabelle
@artem1s: It’s possible they’re setting Trump up for a historic fall with a few later polls. The narrative demands it.
Although I don’t believe the results of this one.
Chyron HR
@TriassicSands:
So terrible he can only beat Bernie, right?
The Thin Black Duke
@Omnes Omnibus: Amen.
Chyron HR
@Omnes Omnibus:
Look, I get that this site has a small clique of Biden supporters who hated Warren (and her supporters) ten million times more than Bernie (and his Bros) for some unknown reason*, but you need to accept that she’s done campaigning and that the person pushing the “Biden is secretly dead and also a rapist” smears is the guy currently running against him in the primary.
* Vagina
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
Agree. Whether a candidate is my preference or not, or whether I can imagine a hypothetical better candidate, does not make a candidate terrible.
Omnes Omnibus
@randy khan: Then I wasn’t talking about you. I started out supporting Harris, and, when she dropped out, I waited a while before deciding who to support. I ended up in the Biden camp; if, however, Warren had won I could easily have moved my enthusiastic support to her. Or to Buttigieg or Klobuchar. All I wanted was a decent Democrat that we could coalesce around. We got that.
patrick II
@bemused:
I forgot, first she said the states should have been prepared themselves with more ventilators, and then deflected.
Ruckus
@debbie:
Flaccid trump is dithering.
There, got them both in.
I don’t think we can be shy. I think that even his hardcore supporters know that he’s just a loose pile of bullshit. It’s just that they have been sold that everything liberal is the complete antithesis of what they are supposed to support and what will allow them their meager existence. They have been told that if a liberal government takes over life as they know it and desire it will die. Racism will end, sexual equality will actually be, and their $3/year advantage (which they are really not getting) will end, that everywhere will look like the hell holes of NYC, LA, Boston, with people of color being equal and that scares them, right down to their socks.
artem1s
@Croaker:
Respondents 30% dems 24% nazi supporters 37% wolves in sheep’s clothing Republicans
thanks, Croaker said it better. This poll is shit.
TriassicSands
@randy khan:
Actually, he’s not fine. He’s a terrible presidential candidate given to self destruction. It is tragic that after beginning with the most diverse field in history we ended up with either Biden or Sanders.
Of course Biden is better than Trump, but there is reason to believe that contrary to what Betty implied, enthusiasm “against” is not as effective as enthusiasm “for,” especially in a party dependent on people who routinely don’t show up.
Don’t give up, work hard, and don’t give up. But don’t be surprised if Biden self-destructs.
gsp
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: seeing him in a couple interviews the last week or so has not been encouraging of his chances. just don’t see him having a better chance of the two but man, he needs to win the election.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
huh, I added something to a comment and the original comment got et. Oh well, it was probably TLDR anyway– basically, this: @zhena gogolia:
Omnes Omnibus
@Chyron HR: Wow. You are fucking deranged.
Ruckus
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Actually BS has always been irrelevant. He’s just made enough noise and has enough paid support that people think he must have something going on. But other than his angry bullshit, he’s got nothing. Nothing concrete to back up his fancy words. But a lot of people like soaring rhetoric and never look for the rational behind it. And he has been consistent in his soaring.
UncleEbeneezer
Turnout in just about every primary has been up.
Biden won most of them by substantial %’s.
I don’t give a F about “enthusiasm” as registered by polls. Bernie had the “enthusiasm” for all that’s worth. Getting people to actually vote is the key, and Biden has been doing that. Meanwhile Dem voters in Swing states are going to be getting a LOT of letters and postcards, reminding them of the importance of voting.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus:
Same here. I went Harris, then nobody in particular (anyone but BS), then Biden, and I would have been happy to support Warren if she had won the primaries.
Brachiator
I guess this part about the economy doesn’t surprise me, and it may spur Trump to step up his efforts to “get the economy going again.”
I think the Democrats could counter this with demands that most, if not all, of the tariffs be dropped, pointing out that now they are hurting Americans more than they are helping. The Democrats could also continue to attack Trump’s pro-corporation tax policy, pointing out the ways it is bad for America.
This is somewhat sobering. Trump is not handling the pandemic crisis well at all, and I am somewhat surprised that more people are not seeing and noting Trump’s failures. His “success” is more due to grudgingly doing what state governors want. But Biden cannot do much to counter this. The eyes are on Trump. This is still up to him to screw up and leave it to others to pick up the pieces.
That Biden leads in trust about health care is a very interesting advantage that the Democrats can exploit well. This issue will persist long after we have dealt with the current pandemic.
Also, anyone dealing with the health care system is going to have to come up with a good plan to help hospitals related touchpoints in the health care system.
This would be a provocative and interesting question!
Juice Box
@Chyron HR: What? Where? Who? BJ is pretty much Elizabeth-stan as far as I can tell. She’s great! She would have been an excellent president. HRC would have been great too. There were a bunch of candidates this year who would also have been excellent choices. Unfortunately, there were two old, old men with lots of name recognition who decided to run and got all of the attention. It is what it is and I’m just happy that I don’t have to vote for Tulsi Gabbard or Wilmer (I’m indifferent to their genitalia).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
as JM says in his next tweet, “arrive” should be “service”. I can’t get the video to play, but it looks like they’re in Tampa. Probably full of New York snowbirds//
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@gsp: well, considering you’re spouting Bernista talking points, maybe you’re not the most objective of observers, or a good representative of the voters who will actually decide this election
Marcopolo
@Omnes Omnibus: WTF? Let me repeat myself, WTF? This is certainly one of the more detached from reality comments I’ve read here in a while.
Pretty much everyone’s supporters (except for that Vermont guy) have said, without caveat, that they are supporting Biden.
I’m a Warren person. I will happily vote for Biden. I will give him money. Am I enthusiastic about him. Nah. If that is some kind of litmus test for you then eff off.
Chyron HR
@Juice Box:
Schrodinger’s Cat, Cacti, and apparently Omnes. Absolutely spitting nails for months that Warren was running. Just Warren–not Pete or any of the others. Fucking bizarre.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Juice Box:
one of whom never hugged the anchor that is BernieCare– known to normies as “eliminating your existing health insurance”– and other pet slogans of left twitter
debbie
@Marcopolo:
It’s not enough that obviously superior people insist on directing peons who to vote for; they must also dictate how those peons are to feel and think. //
Fuck this shit. It’s too nice a day to spend it here.
Brachiator
@Chyron HR:
I got up late today and am catching up with various threads here, but you have posted the dumbest comment I have seen in a long time. Factually incorrect, and not worth the time it even takes to read it.
BTW, this is not mere disagreement. What you wrote is about on par with a typical Fox News broadcast. But it is so lame that it cannot stir any controversy.
It is the rhetorical equivalent of a wet fart.
James E Powell
@Kattails:
With just a few notable exceptions, the Democratic senators of my lifetime have never been loud, energetic opponents of Republican presidents in the way that Republican senators are when a Democrat is in the White House.
zhena gogolia
@Marcopolo:
We all better fucking be enthusiastic.
Ruckus
@zhena gogolia:
If one were looking to argue there are valid points to do so with.
But.
We are in an existential crisis. We shouldn’t be but we as a country have proven that we can barely tie our shoes, let alone make a reasonable choice for leader. OK wait a damn minute we did make that choice last time and actually more of us chose better. So never mind.
Biden is fine.
He is heads, tails, miles and miles better than trump. He has, at last reckoning, a penis, and that in many minds makes him better than smarter women and so, there we are. He understands that we are all, men and women, boys and girls, in this together. We advance together or we die fighting the most ignorant fights, wealth above all else and racism for racism’s sake. Not that we can ignore those fights but there are other issues as well. And Biden knows that also. Most importantly I believe that Biden also knows his limitations. And knowing that is a key to leadership, one that is massively missing from our current placeholder/wrecker.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@zhena gogolia: Pretty much the same path I followed.
Steeplejack (phone)
This just in from the nutball in chief:
Omnes Omnibus
@Chyron HR: Find anything I said against Warren.
ETA: You won’t find anything negative. I have no problem with her. I am tired of people prefacing comments about Biden in terms of regretting that he is the presumptive nominee. As far I am concerned, that ship has sailed.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Matt McIrvin:
Hundreds of thousands of people will die or tens of thousands. That’s baked in and isn’t going to change. This will not be some abstraction forever.
Yes we can say. Not all will directly blame Trump, but many will. You can’t fucking spin deaths of loved ones and friends.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack (phone):
I pray he gets it.
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: Me three. After Harris dropped out I was ABBS.
Chris Johnson
@Omnes Omnibus: Wait and see who fucking dies, k?
I know I’m voting Whichever Blue Didn’t Fucking Die, 2020. They’re all too god-damned old, so wait and see who we get.
Thankfully, we are not electing Superman. It’s a government. I don’t care that much who gets to wear the shiny hat, he or she does not do it all. One of the BEST things about Biden is that the guy can listen to others. I’m done with Fearless Leaders. The times call for an actual government, one with teeth, ‘cos it’s gonna have to go around biting a lot of sociopaths who’re fixing to get us all killed. I’m extra done with that.
trollhattan
Everybody run out of coffee? Lotta gawddamn cranky people this morning.
Job 1: beat Trump
Job 2: there is no Job 2
Elizabelle
What I find hilarious is seeing some Bernie supporters whingeing about voter suppression in … Michigan.
And now we see Michigan’s Democratic Governor Whitmer on the teevee all the time. Yeah, she sure looks like a vote suppressor.
BC in Illinois
@Omnes Omnibus:
On mourning and transitions to campaigning:
Elizabeth Warren dropped out the Wednesday before the Missouri Primary, so I had six days to mourn and make the transition.
That Saturday, I went to a Biden rally down town, bought a couple of Biden buttons (and a “Dogs Against Trump” button for my daughter), went home, took the “Missouri for Warren” sign out of my front yard and put up a “Missouri for Biden” sign that I had picked up at the rally.
On March 10, Biden beat Sanders 60% to 34%.
There were 6,000 more votes in the MO Primary than in 2016, and Sanders’s total vote count was down by 81,000 votes (311k in 2016; 230k in 2020).
Three days to mourn, 3 days to transition to Biden.
We’ll get this done in 220 days. Think of six months of the Obamas, the Clintons, Warren, Harris, Klobuchar, Beto, Pelosi, and all the rest making the case for a Democratic Senate, House, and a Biden administration.
Put all that energy into protecting the vote, also, too.
We’ll get this done.
Elizabelle
@Steeplejack (phone): This is so sad, because ANY publicly traded company and that lunatic would have been canned, months or years ago.
But the standards turn out to be many levels lower for “president.” It’s tragic.
schrodingers_cat
Latest on Cray Cray Rose Twitter. Evil DNC is going to anoint Andrew Cuomo as the nominee and force Biden to drop out
*cue ominous music
Ruckus
@Betty Cracker:
The technical difficulty was that the teleprompter got knocked over getting to, and to, and to and to the liquor cabinet.
Baud
You get certain allowances when you are the last defense of white privilege.
WaterGirl
In the wise words of the Thin Black Duke:
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
That CT is an awfully strange one.
James E Powell
@NotMax:
Some time ago I asked if we could set a date after which we would no longer begin every comment about Joe Biden with qualifications and lamentations. I’m asking again, can we set that date? It’s overdue.
This too much like 2016 where far too many people had to start every comment with something like “Look, I hate Hillary as much as anyone else . . . ” or “Even though she’s a corporate sellout . . .” It’s some kind of claim of virtue. Useless or worse, caustic.
No disrespect, but can we set that date? Please?
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: That would be reading the poll literally, no?
catclub
@debbie: yes, how does shitting on Michigan get him their votes?
He needs Michigan.
Baud
@James E Powell:
Yesterday.
Omnes Omnibus
@James E Powell: This is the point I was trying to make.
Ruckus
@trollhattan:
Yes.
Eye on the prize.
Everything else is not within sight of second place.
Baud
@WaterGirl: I hope I’m invited to your arguments, WG.
Ruckus
@James E Powell:
March 15, 2020
DONE. END OF DISCUSSION.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: Kinky.
Baud
@Ruckus: Ides of March, or did something else happen on that date?
catclub
as long as you vote, nobody can tell if you voted enthusiastically.
Ruckus
@Baud:
I fixed it.
And I don’t know, it was 2 weeks ago.
Whatever is wrong, probably latency, the web is slower than trump today.
Brachiator
@PsiFighter37:
I previously said that I thought that Warren should formally endorse Biden. I thought that Sanders should officially drop out of the race and support Biden as well. Just for the sake of party unity.
But Biden’s lead and current events make both Warren and Sanders little more than historical footnotes in the presidential campaign.
Their value now is as working senators, and opponents to the stupidity of Trump and the GOP.
JPL
@TriassicSands: 2018 victories were due to concern over health. Even in this poll Biden is up by ten.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Frankensteinbeck:
Yes, this!
The defeatism and fatalism of some around here pisses me off to no end; it’s like an LGM thread
James E Powell
@Omnes Omnibus:
Sorry. I hadn’t scrolled down that far.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’d be curious to see polls in key states, say two months from now, FL, AZ, NC, WI
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Baud:
No, it’s not, don’t you see?
We’re all doomed DOOMED DOOMED because reasons
Geminid
@JMG: You are right about polls. So much in polling is conditioned by model and methodology. The most valuable info I get from them is when I can follow the same poll week over week, and month over month. I think trend is real info.
Mike in NC
This “Enthusiasm Gap” horseshit was something Dan Balz at WaPo invented out of whole cloth about 20 years ago and he trots it out for every election, and it always favors the GOP. Wonder why that is?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Omnes Omnibus:
How have you been Omnes? Staying healthy and safe?
Omnes Omnibus
@James E Powell: No, don’t be sorry. My way of expressing it sparked a lot of push back. Yours shouldn’t, and it expresses the sentiment I was trying to get across.
Omnes Omnibus
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I am fine.
dr. luba
I’m a democrat.
My opinion of Biden? M’eh. Not my first (or second or third) choice.
But voting? I would crawl over broken glass to cast a ballot against Trump. And so would most democrats I know.
In 2018, I didn’t care much for Gretchen Whitmer. But she wasn’t Snyder (or his successor, Schuete), and she was a dem. She won by 9 points.
BobS
@Matt McIrvin: She has a blind spot that a semi could occupy.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Always! ??
edit: bunny added because it’s officially spring.
dr. luba
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
You didn’t include Michigan, but i’s’ pretty safe to say Trump has lost here big time already.
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: As long as it’s arguments, and not abuse!
(Monty Python reference for anyone living in a hole in the ground for the past 30 years.)
schrodingers_cat
Went for a grocery run this morning. Got mostly everything I wanted. Toilet paper aisle is still empty, also gone was all the flour and tomato cans. Replenished the strategic alcohol reserve with white wine, red wine, gin and beer. That should last me until fall. Also made some hard cider. It has been raining cats and dogs so the roads were eerily empty like in a Steven King novel.
Brachiator
@Steeplejack (phone):
My sister is very even-tempered, but got thoroughly disgusted with Trump during one of his briefings and emailed me about how she had to switch the channel to something else.
Trump can’t help himself, but this kind of crap stands out even more when there is an emergency we need to deal with. It is so freaking unnecessary, as well as offensive.
And the only thing it achieves? I am in California. I pay attention to what the governor and local officials say. But I depend on reliable news sites and programs to filter what Trump says for any nugget of tangible information, and bypass the rest of his continuing clown act.
JMG
In 2012, polls showed that Romney voters had more “enthusiasm” than Obama voters. Now, Obama had a very enthusiastic mass following. We oughta know. Most of us here were part of it. It’s a bullshit metric. IMO, any poll question that gets more open-ended than Yes or No, X or Y is itself questionable.
laura
Got to mourning early with Harris and then spent time learning about the other candidates in a crowded field. Metric shit-tons of talent and each had unique strengths and weaknesses because “human.” I’m totally ride-or-die Team No Malarkey Jitney Back to the Future 2020 because as Trollhattan laid it out simply and concisely job 1 is beat trump and job 2 is see job 1. The most reliable voters have and continue to make clear, they trust Joe Biden because he’s been a steady presence in the body politic and they’ve seen him in his capacity as Vice President and colleague to President Obama, and they didnt see him fuck up or seek to enrich himself as the current administration has done since jump street.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@dr. luba:
I would hope so. I saw a tweet that said MI Republicans are pissed, but I didn’t follow to the story. As I recall, MI has a history of not-crazy Republicans, but I can’t think of any off the top of my head. George Romney has gone to his reward, there to watch his granddaughter renounce his name and grovel for an adulterous, avaricious, grotesque, racist trust-fund baby.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Brachiator:
You’re stronger than I am. I never watch his bullshit. I rely on others to filter it for me because I don’t want to be misinformed. I still remember him talking about the Navy hospital ships like they were already on their way to NYC and LA as he spoke two weeks ago or when he “invoked” the DPA and didn’t
BobS
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: “not crazy” Republicans will soon need a Smithsonian exhibit to prove they ever existed.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Omnes Omnibus:
That’s good! Since Wisconsin has a Dem governor, I’m assuming they’ve already locked down?
Just Chuck
If Trump’s numbers keep going the way they are, then we’re talking about 53% of 27%.
Lies, Damn Lies, Statistics, and Trump.
ciotogist
@wvng: Also, he is! He’s been speaking from his house and doing interviews with people like Anderson Cooper and the hosts of The View.
JPL
By now, everyone realizes that if they had the flu, because of possible damage to lung function it’s a preexisting condition. They won on that in 2018 and they’ll win again on that.
Uncle Cosmo
@Fleeting Ex-istence: Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. Name a running mate now & it just gives the Thugs longer to spread lies & half-truths about her & generally abuse her.**
This campaign is not being run to salve the tender fee-fees of a few handsful of “progressives” who are for the most part a classic illustration that the Dunning-Kruger Effect is not restricted to one side of the aisle. Too many posters here preen as if they were doG’s gift to national politics on the basis of a few afternoons knocking on doors or making phonecalls or writing postcards, when in fact they couldn’t tell shit from shoeleather, and the Democratic Party at every level quite properly ignores such overcredentialed imbeciles in favor of those who’ve been there & done that.
** Some weeks back I stated an opinion that Biden’s running mate would not be announced till the eve of the convention & that it would be a white male. I still stand by the first prediction. The second was apparently wrong (pending the actual announcement there’s still time for Joe to change his mind) and I can only hope that his announcement was made for solid political reasons & not just to shut all you WATBs up.
japa21
@zhena gogolia: 6 thumbs up.
gsp
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: yes that’s what I’m doing. But let me defer to you as objective representative of the voters. Will check back in November.
joel hanes
@scav:
Taking out the garbage generally does suffer from an enthusiasm gap.
Depends on how badly the garbage stinks.
Feathers
This problem of “I like Joe, but he wasn’t my first pick,” was fucking baked into the Democratic primary this year. I’m pretty sure I posted about the problem late last year. By having a lot of candidates, you are going to have a problem with lots of people having their favorites lose. So getting mad about something happening that was inevitable is just foolishness.
Personally, I think Joe letting Trump hang himself is a good idea. Everything he does is enraging to the rose crowd. Also, the accusation will be old news once the coronapocalypse has moved from spring to summer.
The most dangerous thought anyone has ever had is that things can’t get worse. The rose crowd doesn’t realize how dangerous a time this is.
joel hanes
@Duane:
The Donald of Death
English Bob saw what you did there.
randy khan
@Omnes Omnibus:
I didn’t mean to suggest you were. It was a roundabout way of saying you were right – there’s no reason to mourn her candidacy now.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@gsp:
Actually, you are. Implying Biden has dementia or is “slowing” is absolutely toxic Rose Twitter talking points.
I don’t think Jim said that or implied it
Brachiator
@artem1s:
RE: Partisan divisions are 30-24-37 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents.
I have long said that people make too much of polls, but they are not as bad as you think. And some of the problems with polls are more varied.
Independents are not just Republicans or libertarians in hiding. This fallacy has been demolished a number of times, but the myth persists. This group may be important in the swing states.
One of the reasons that some polls missed getting the 2016 election right is because some of them over-represented “likely voters,” people who voted in previous elections, and de-emphasized people who had not previously voted or who were down on both the main political parties, but who had become enthusiastic Trump supporters.
This time around, the models may be missing enthusiastic Trump haters.
And the rise of smartphones makes it more difficult to construct reliable samples of voters.
Ksmiami
@Don Beal: You know what, your post is actually really offensive esp to all the people who voted for Biden and see the need for a competent administration so piss off
Ruckus
OK for something a little different.
schrodingers_cat
Also a word of caution, many of the enthusiastic BS supporters are not even American and can’t vote in November. I don’t speak of the Russkie bots and trolls. Magic Socialist Grandpa has an international following among young people who think he is the second coming of Marx and Lenin and will make all their dreams come true. I see this phenomenon on the Indian (from India, not Indian Americans) lefty Twitter.
trollhattan
@WaterGirl:
It’s being hit on the head lessons in here.
janesays
@Betty Cracker: Yeah, I can’t possibly imagine the economic hit that millions of Americans are about to face not having a huge impact on the election. The $1,200 checks and increased unemployment benefits are nice, but they aren’t going to do enough for the out-of-work hospitality and travel industry workers who are going to be in a huge world of hurt six months from now.
joel hanes
It wouldn’t be Balloon Juice without the backbiting, I guess, but right now I’m too tired and sad and afraid for this.
See you later.
zzyzx
When the OMG SHOCK POLL!!! still shows Biden leading by 2, that says to me that Joe has a solid lead right now. I will worry more when there are a few real polls showing Trump with leads.
randy khan
@TriassicSands:
So what has he done wrong so far? Seriously, that is what most people – including me – expected would happen (and note that he never made it past the very early primaries before), but it hasn’t happened yet (and, truth be told, he did fine in two general elections in 2008 and 2012). So maybe he’s learned something.
janesays
Not “close to” irredeemable… irredeemable. Put aside the malevolent mishandling of the biggest crisis of his presidency. If Trump gets re-elected, he’ll get to appoint one or two more Supreme Court justices, making John Roberts’ completely undependable and extremely rare swing vote totally irrelevant. They’ll be able to overturn Roe v. Wade with Roberts siding with the minority. Goodbye Obamacare.
If Trump gets re-elected, America is over, and I’m leaving.
James E Powell
@JMG:
Maybe a component of the enthusiasm – if that’s even the right word for what the polls are asking and measuring – is that right wing voters are really driven by their hatred and fear of us, of our kind of people, of the ideas we generally talk about.
Brachiator
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
No, we’re pretty much on the same page. I pay attention to California Governor Newsom, local officials and the Los Angeles County briefings.
If I ever watch a presidential briefing, it is only to see what the actual medical experts have to say, and since they get little microphone time, I am more inclined to skip the entire thing and look for a summary of any important information later.
ETA: I mentioned in another thread that I hoped that you had got your work situation resolved, to minimize the legitimate concerns you had. I saw a post of yours that implied that things were better. Hope so.
johnnybuck
It seems to me that there a lot of Sanders supporters that are undemocratic in principle. There has been much discussion, grieving and remorse about preferred candidates here, but the overwhelming attitude from the beginning, has been to support the nominee regardless of who that might be. I find it very frustrating to deal with people who expect, or command a coronation for a candidate that has failed to gain more than 30% of the vote. Either you support democratic institutions or you don’t. What is certainly clear is that if you don’t, then you are not, and will never be an ally.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Brachiator:
Yup.
Ruckus
@BobS:
Most humans do. Often with decent reasons that it exists.
Many even know and understand that they have a blind spot and what it is. But almost no one has full unrestricted vision. It’s one of the things that make us human. The number of people who came here to jump on and beat up on ABL was way more than justified for any blind spot she may have had. She’s smart, can be funny and has as valid a position as any other human being. That she got run off is far more a reflection on her detractors than on her.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Brachiator:
That makes sense, yeah. Thankfully, I live in sane state like you so I rely on my state’s health department for info
I did, thank you. Regional corporate gave me a call after a co-worker mentioned my name and my complaints and offered me a personal leave
Be BernieAPOSTROPHEs Valentine
This thread is awfully moist.
Miss Bianca
Personally, I’m incredibly enthusiastic about voting for Joe Biden right now. IN fact, I’d be incredibly enthusiastic about the prospect of getting to vote for him *right now*.
I will vote blue for whoever Colorado decides to anoint as Democratic candidates for other offices.
What I’m not enthusiastic about is *making* any further choices. Case in point: due to the stupid hybrid system we have in place here now, we’ve already had a Presidential primary (where Bernie Sanders came out ahead – Joe was second, then a long drop-off to Bloomberg, as I recall, and my candidate of choice, Warren? Fourth).
Meanwhile, we still have caucuses for the Senate candidate. I caucused for Hickenlooper, as did the rest of the five or six of us who showed up. A similarly anemic showing across the state, however, put Andrew Romanoff ahead in the caucuses. You’d think that would be enough, but wait! Is that another primary I see on the horizon? For Senate candidates, completely separated from the other primary, on June 30? Why, yes, yes it is – and Hickenlooper has got enough signatures to bypass the caucus system altogether, so he will be on that ballot. At which point, presumably, we will finally have a Democratic candidate for Senate.
Meanwhile, since I was one of the only people who showed up for caucus, I automatically became a delegate to our county assembly. Since I didn’t care to be a delegate for any of the other Senate candidates, couldn’t caucus for them. Was able to express a preference for US House rep for CO-3. And I know the woman who is running for Democratic state rep in my district, and she’s useless as tits on a bull (campaigning on fucking Medicare for All and the Green New Deal for fuck’s sake, in a state race in a tilting-red District – did I also mention she’s a die-hard Berner? Le sigh.). Sure, I’ll vote for her in the general election but…
tldr: I don’t, this year, find myself giving even half a damn *who* the other Democrats want to pick. I’ve made my choices, I’ll vote blue no matter who, am I *enthusiastic* about my choices? Maybe not, but I’m sure as shit fired up for voting Trump, Cory Gardner, and any other useless fuckstick Republicans out of office.
Enough, doomsayers, enough mewling about Joe Biden. Just STFU.
Brachiator
OT. I slept in late and it’s a beautiful day outside.
But there is nowhere to go.
This shelter in place thing is a drag today.
I will go out for a brief walk a little later.
BobS
@Ruckus: I was referring specifically to her “blind spot” regarding the nature of elections (especially after what happened in 2016). And while I can appreciate a California (or New York or Alabama or North Dakota) voter’s ‘preciousness’, as a minor internet personality, she should probably understand there are potential voters in Florida or North Carolina paying attention to her inanities.
Young and/or naive people, I can forgive. Her, she’s neither- she can take her ego and go fuck herself.
Miss Bianca
@Be BernieAPOSTROPHEs Valentine:
Well, thank God that Flaky has shown up then, huh?
dr. luba
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: We had many good centrist Republican governors in the past, Romney and Milliken among them.
But not recently. Engler did his best to make us as crappy a state as Mississippi or Alabama (cut taxes and destroy education). People though Snyder would be in the centrist mold, but he turned out to be pretty much a rubber stamp for our gerrymandered legislature and then and he went poisoned Flint.
Democratic women swept the 2018 election (governor, SOS and AG). And Stabenow was reelected. Anti-gerrymandering and absentee voting initiatives were passed overwhelmingly by the electorate.
And COVID-19 is hitting us hard….with Trump refusing to help in a snit.
NotMax
@James E Powell
If all the belly button lint has been dealt with and you’re really, really, really, really stuck for something to do, you could go back through every single election related comment I’ve made here for the past year and discover the one today is the first time I’ve said anything about who my own choices are/were or are/were not.
I don’t have to like Biden to now accept (and support) him but also don’t have to pretend for appearance’s sake any dislike has magically vanished.
Frankensteinbeck
@schrodingers_cat:
Holy shit, is this true. It’s odd to me to see friends in Canada and absolutely bizarre to see friends in Finland retweet the most asinine Sandersite garbage.
Uncle Cosmo
Or curl into a fetal position in a “respite” thread. Or emigrate to Canada. Or drop dead – mir ist’s egal. The rest of us will save liberal democracy without you WATBs.
Uh, no, sorry – the problem was that the enthusiasm of the dilettante center-left (amply represented on this blog) was animated by ethnicity and/or gender and/or policy minutiae that simply did not resonate at all with the great majority of primary voters. Including Harris’s self-defeating efforts to kneecap Biden among AA women, and Warren’s fetish for grandiose plans that the typical Democratic voter simply does not trust.
This is not rocket science. But when people sound off as if they were total experts on practical politics, and election results don’t conform to their alleged knowledge, many bushes are beaten in the hunt for alibis, when it would be simpler & more honest to accept the fact that they didn’t know shit about the electorate.
Another Scott
@Miss Bianca: +1
In the greater scheme of things, right now, the individual candidates don’t matter. What matters is – we have a 2 party system, and the majority party picks the leadership.
The leadership decides who serves on what committee. Decides what bills are brought up for consideration and on what terms. Decides how to handle judicial nominations. Decides just about everything important about the ability of our national (state, and local) government to function. Party matters a lot!!
Uncle Joe showed that he’s a compelling candidate (who else could (or, more importantly, did) win blowout victories in the first states that were representative of the country when he was broke?)
We have a chance to help set the course of this country for two generations or more – a course toward progress, respect for science, and a brighter future.
Vote blue, no matter who.
Cheers,
Scott.
TheWesson
@Kattails: The simple message is to brand the virus for Trump: “Trump Virus.”
Turn the TV star thing against him:
“Trump cares about his ratings, not about you. Trump betrayed America and left it open to the virus.”
These are easily backed up with video clips.
BobS
@TheWesson: I’ve liked this idea since I first read something like it (I think here at Balloon Juice)- the Trump virus, the Trump flu, etc. Maybe even the Trump Pandemic.
NotMax
@TheWesson
On today’s episode of The Deathprentice…
Brachiator
@NotMax:
This is true. However, should you re-evaluate your dislike in light of the fact that Biden has been the clear preference of the majority of primary voters?
Biden was not my first choice, but I was always curious to see how voters in various states would decide. And I want to know what they are looking for in a candidate, not just why I wanted someone else to be the nominee.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@gsp: well, since the on-line hate-mill that is the Bernie “movement” started hammering on carefully curated, thirty year-old things Biden has said about Social Security— you know, like you did above– Biden has been pasting Sanders 2-1 among Democrats in states like Michigan and Florida, so… maybe you, and Bernie Dumbledore, don’t have quite the feel for the electorate you think you do.
As I’ve said, I’m not complacent about Biden’s flaws, but I can’t imagine what country you think you live in if you think Bernie Sanders is a stronger GE candidate than Biden. To put it kindly, as is my wont.
See you in November.
glory b
@Miss Bianca: I’ve said this many times before, but WHY DOES EVERY VOTE HAVE TO INVOLVE ENTHUSIASM???
For goodness sake can’t we just vote for the person we want? I love Obama, but one of the worst things to come from his candidacy was the “enthusiasm” trope.
Jesus Mary and Joseph.
NoraLenderbee
GMAFB. It’s not us Warren fans who are going on and on about how weak and shitty Biden is, or how disappointed we’ll be to vote for him in Nov.
Betty Cracker
@Uncle Cosmo:
I wish you could hear yourself sometimes.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@glory b: and the people demanding “inspiration” are by and large people who hate Obama more than Republicans
smintheus
The Republicans’ votes against impeaching Trump already look terrible, and they will look far worse by Election Day … if he survives in office that long. It will not be the campaign issue that the GOP hoped and prayed and imagined it would be.
ETA: it’s remarkable that mine seems to be the first comment to mention the fact Republicans have to deal with the cloud of impeachment.
NotMax
@Brachiator
The thing is that at this point in the cycle there’s no longer any reason to trumpet it it, unlike some of the minions of a certain Vermonter.
Tortured analogy is that it’s like a ghost pepper in a dish of spaghetti. I can happily eat around it and declare the meal a success, or (alternatively) slice and dice it instead of swallowing it whole and do the same.
Brachiator
@gsp:
Were you locked in a crate during the primary season?
Biden has beat the shit out of Sanders in primary elections. As has been noted, Bernie lost every county in Michigan. Every single one.
Sanders has no chance of becoming the party’s nominee.
Not in this reality or in any alternate universe.
Miss Bianca
@glory b: Well, you know the old saying: “Republicans want to fall in line, Democrats want to fall in love.” However odious I may find the sentiments, I can’t help but think it’s true, to a certain extent. Keep hoping that with events being now so dire that we are finally evolving beyond that bs, but evidently not. smdh.
cain
Imani – (who used to be a front pager on BJ btw) has said many times she would vote for anyone running a D in the general election. I dont ever remember her saying anything otherwise. Imani is awesome!
cain
Someone call the police and tell them a bunch of new yorkers are holding church. That should be fantastic.. watching those assholes be mistaken for New Yorkers is going to be awesome.
NotMax
@cain
“Line up and say ‘water.'”
;)
Brachiator
@NotMax:
Ha! Definitely a tortured analogy, but I get your point.
However, I think it useful to try to understand the larger context of voter preference, not just my own biases. If spaghetti with ghost pepper were the signature dish of a restaurant and a clear favorite with diners, I would want to know why, if I were a restaurant reviewer.
Okay, enough with the tortured analogies. Now I want to have some Italian food, but my favorite place is closed due to the pandemic. They could not profitably remain open with only take out service.
James E Powell
@NotMax:
I don’t need to go back through your comments; I accept your word on such things.
And while it’s true that you don’t have to pretend that your dislike of Biden has magically disappeared, it would be nice if you did.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I was slow to get on the Obama train in ’08, now I’m an Obot’s Obot. I suspect more than a few people will learn to love Uncle Joe
NotMax
@James E Powell
Even the Rock of Gibraltar has its faults.
;)
cain
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Love at first sight for me. :) I remember when John was skeptic as well. The magical unity pony – MUP – good times :D
Darkrose
Um, no?
Biden being the preference of the majority of primary voters doesn’t change any of the reasons I don’t like him. It doesn’t erase his treatment of Anita Hill, or the bankruptcy bill, or his nostalgia for the good old days when the segregationists were still very much a part of the Democratic party (he gave Strom Thurmond’s eulogy, FFS!).
But him being the preference of the majority of primary voters means I’ll crawl over broken glass (which I don’t actually have to do, but if I did, I would) to vote for him. I’m on Team Biden now because he’s the nominee, and I want him to win–and I think he can beat Trump. And I will be telling everyone I know about the thing I do like about Biden: that he is able to learn from his mistakes. He voted for DOMA, and then he pushed Obama to support same-sex marriage. He pushed back against Rahm Emmanuel, who wanted Obama to give up on the ACA. And he knows how to build coalitions and make alliances, and may be the only hope for restoring the trust in America that Trump has utterly squandered. I’m absolutely capable of acknowledging his mixed record and still supporting him.
Another Scott
@smintheus:
History is
bunkerased if it is more than 3 months old. Too expensive to keep all those exabytes these days.HTH!!
Cheers,
Scott.
Miss Bianca
@Darkrose:
Come, sit by me – some six virtual feet apart. : )
Betty Cracker
@Darkrose: Great comment. When I talk to the people in my life who are upset about how the primary shook out, I don’t pretend I’m thrilled about the outcome either because that would be dishonest.
One point I mention that seems to be somewhat convincing to skeptics is that Biden isn’t particularly ideological and never has been. He moves to where the party consensus is. If a M4A bill landed on his desk, he’d sign it.
So, people who aren’t thrilled about Biden can focus their energies on electing Democrats in down ticket races to drive the consensus they want to see. And vote for Biden because he’s not Trump, obviously.
J R in WV
@NotMax:
How ’bout DimWit Donald? Fits every datum we know so far…
J R in WV
@Don Beal:
Just when I wondered why I pied you way back when, and toggle a remark, you show me again why you need to be in the pie safe!
How are things in St Petersburg, tovarisch?
NotMax
@Darkrose
WellExcellentlySuperbly put.J R in WV
@dimmsdale:
I think we will all be lucky if 200% of FLA’s governor’s first ask is sufficient. I suspect Florida is gong to become a charnal house in short order, no quarantine, no testing, just cruise on, bro…
I think the whole state will be fucked, and hope so hard none of our FLA jackals suffer from this remarkable nonchalant incompetence.
ETA: in general want to express that I admire your comment totally. I just want to share my depressing forecast for these red states over the next 6 weeks, while their infection rate skyrockets and they still do nothing because their leadership is bound to not listen to scientists.
Captain C
@J R in WV: I also like Deadbeat Donnie: it points out that he’s a shit businessman who runs away from his obligations, and it has the added benefit that he, IIRC, hates to be called “Donnie”
Brachiator
@Darkrose:
Fair enough. I’ll take this. Well said.
J R in WV
@justsomeguy:
Can I stop for one moment here, and mention that WE ARE NOT IN FALL OF 2020 YET !!!! We’re months away from fall. Biden is not the nominee yet, because we haven’t had the Democratic Convention yet…
Nothing you say makes any sense.
How is the weather in St Petersburg, comrade???
Because you are either a Russian troll, or stupid beyond belief to write such a paragraph!!!
J R in WV
@Subsole:
Oohh,
Well said!! Thanks!
Just Chuck
Seeing a whole lot of new nyms with lots of concern trolling or just dedicated to bashing Biden. The Russians have landed.
grandpa john
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Hope he told her “I would rather look like an Idiot that to be one “
J R in WV
OK, Eggplant Parm for dinner, with sparkling CA wine… thanks California for the great selections of wine!!
Will be happy to vote for Mr Biden for President !!! He reminds me of my Rockefeller Republican father, who I loved and miss. Dad liked fast cars, like Joe. He marched with MLK’s people in out home town, which got me called those terrible names in school, which I got over pretty quickly once I saw the signs in the Jim Crow south. Joe is obviously not a bigot of any flavor!!!
Supported Senator Harris at first, then Senator Warren, and now former Senator and VP Joe Biden. No matter what else happens, will support Joe!
If Joe dies, I trust the DNC to pick someone else, NOT Senator Sanders who is a bad a Russian stooge as Donnie Trump is. Will vote for the Dem candidate no matter who, but won’t be working for Sanders hard like I did for Hillary.
Wife was on Rollingstone.com, and saw a headline… John Prine in critical condition from Covid-19. So sad, so — so angry, I will Blame Donnie Trump for the loss of every American hero and super star in his trump’s epidemic.
Chris T.
@debbie: I’m late to this party, but for alliteration: Diseased Donald.
Jado
@bbleh:
What do you with someone whose ideology is “I’d rather my Granny die under a Republican than vote for a Democrat. It’s the Democrat’s fault anyway, and now they finally say they can help. Too little, too late!! Those dirty Democrats should have instituted testing in February, but they don’t care about white people.”
I guarantee this will be said, almost verbatim, before the election
Uncle Cosmo
(Dead thread, I know but still…)
I can hear myself just fine most all the time, Cracker. Maybe you should try listening to yourself for a change. But here, I’ll save you the trouble:
As the tag says, I came to BJ for the politics, & stayed for the snark. The snark remains quite entertaining – I do savor the poison-tipped vituperation you (& others) launch at the Far Wrong from time to time – so I stick around, even though the level of political savvy here has only occasionally risen to the level of “disappointing.”