I miss baseball. In early March, my sister and I had tickets to a spring training game between the Tampa Bay Rays and Detroit Tigers. We had recently begun to worry about the coronavirus in a non-abstract way back then and debated whether it was safe to go, then the game was canceled.
In the Before Times, when we all assumed there would be a normal baseball season and had a large field of primary candidates to consider, one argument for Biden’s candidacy was that he could put Florida in play. Few Dems were making that argument at the time, and most analysts wrote Florida off as a lost cause.
Not so much now. An article published yesterday in The Hill:
Biden seeks to beat Trump by winning Florida
Joe Biden is making a big play for Florida, putting President Trump on defense in his own backyard in a must-win state for the White House.
Trump won the perennial swing state in 2016 over Democrat Hillary Clinton by a little more than 100,000 votes, but Biden’s campaign believes he can put it back in the Democratic column given the Obama-Biden ticket’s victories in 2008 and 2012.
Biden has consistently attacked Trump on his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic as cases have risen in Florida in recent days, sensing a key issue in the election could turn his way in the Sunshine State.
I think that’s a smart strategy. The bungled coronavirus response devastated Florida’s economy and put its millions of senior citizens in an especially precarious spot. The GOP’s extra-loud “sacrifice your gran to save the economy” strategy has been poorly received by the many grans who live here.
According to FiveThirtyEight, every poll conducted in the state since March 15 shows Trump losing to Biden. The average lead in the state’s polls right now is +6.9 for Biden.
In a recent Miami Herald op-ed, Biden made the case that given the incompetent response to the pandemic, we can’t trust Trump to handle any other crisis. It was well-timed because the possibility of disaster is always on Floridians’ minds during hurricane season, which started a couple of weeks ago and conveniently (for election purposes) ends on November 30:
“His failure to prepare our nation for this pandemic or take decisive action to curb its impact has opened the door to follow-on crises. Our communities are now dangerously vulnerable to new outside shocks and natural disasters, like hurricanes.”
Yep.
If Biden wins Florida and its 29 electoral votes, Trump would lose the presidency even if he holds Ohio, Pennsylvania, Arizona, North Carolina and Wisconsin. And if Trump loses those five states in addition to Florida — a prospect that is by no means unrealistic according to the data we have at this moment — we’re looking at the possibility of a beat-down.
Insert standard disclaimer about counting chickens here. I don’t take anything for granted. There will be lying, cheating, suppression and domestic and foreign shenanigans. Trump Mini-Me/Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is dragging his feet on election preparedness on his master’s behalf already.
That said, I’m encouraged by the Biden team’s decision to swing for the fences in Florida. A healthy country would eject Trump by a historic margin, say 400 electoral college votes. I don’t believe we are a healthy country; Trump wouldn’t be president now if we were.
But going for a beat-down is the right thing to do, especially if your campaign slogan is about restoring the soul of the nation. We have two viable political parties in this country, and one of them, diseased for decades, has gone full-metal psycho. A narrow victory over Trump is preferable to taking an L, obviously, but it wouldn’t be the “Come to Jesus” moment that Republicans — and America — desperately need.
I’ve not been fully on board with the “Biden is exactly the right man for this moment” takes because I think our challenges are complex and structural and will require extraordinary vision and commitment to overcome. That said, Biden does seem to have the ability to project baseline competence and not scare the shit out of suburbanites. That’s exactly what we need to expand the map of possibilities, which is what it will take to curb-stomp the GOP. In that sense, Biden really is a great fit.
So yeah, Florida. And what the hell, let’s make a play for Georgia and Texas too. The polling there right now says swinging for the fences in those states isn’t exactly fanciful either, so let’s do this thing.
Open thread.
[Biden photo source: Medium post]
Baud
Let’s do this thing.
Jeffro
If Biden wins Florida, he will almost surely have also won PA, AZ, and NC at a minimum.
I have yet to see the latest estimates/polls but my best guess right now is that Biden is probably around 330-340 EVs if the election were held today. It will not get better for trumpov.
Roger Moore
A healthy country would eject Trump by a margin of 538 votes in the electoral college. A president who has not just bungled response to a pandemic but actually encouraged destructive behavior that acts to spread it deserves to be expelled from office and ridden out of town on a rail.
Gin & Tonic
If Biden could beat Trump in Florida now that Trump has (or at least attempted to) moved his “official residence” there, that would be so, so sweet.
PsiFighter37
I wouldn’t spend a dime in Texas. Let the folks organizing locally see if they can drag Biden over the finish line, but sinking money into 4 major media markets would be a colossal waste.
Eljai
I like your prudent sense of optimism there, Betty. I’m tired of the Michael Moore et al. takes that we can’t count Trump out because he’s a savvy salesman or something. They give him credit for being more powerful than he actually is. How about he’s a scared sack of shit who is very beatable? Don’t be complacent, obvs. As you say, the republicans will lie, cheat and steal. But maybe we can be relentless, determined, diligent AND confident and beat this sorry piece of excrement into the ground.
rikyrah
There are over ONE MILLION PEOPLE who couldn’t vote in Florida in 2016 that can vote in 2020. Will some of them be MAGA folk?
Sure.
They will vote for the same muthaphuckas who:
But, I doubt the majority are. That’s over ONE MILLION NEW VOTER POOL.
ONE MILLION NEW VOTERS can change any ballgame.
CaseyL
I remember election night coverage in November 1980, when Reagan won state after state. The newscast had a map of the US behind the anchor desk. Back then, GOP votes were coded in blue and Democratic votes were coded in red.
The newscasters, watching the results come in, said “It looks like a suburban swimming pool,” as Regan blue swept from coast to coast.
I want to see the US look “like a suburban swimming pool” again – this time, with Democratic victories sweeping from coast to coast.
The Moar You Know
The battlefield is white women. How do you win that?
Corona, Corona, Corona. 24/7. Trump has no defense or excuses. None. It’s the bone spur on his Achilles heel. BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF THAT WEAK SPOT.
HumboldtBlue
@rikyrah:
That’s a great point, now the struggle is to actually have the cast a ballot and have it counted.
And like everyone else, I too am optimistic even in the face of dire warnings from people who spend their time looking at polls and elections but I remember walking into the engineer’s studio angry as a motherfucker in June/July 2016 and talking to one of three liberals who worked in a wingnut space that Trump wasn’t very fucking funny anymore and the look of the polling was no longer a joke as well.
And the latest ad from Biden echoes the sentiments Betty highlighted above, Biden is decent, competent and experienced and we’re gonna need all that and more come January.
And yes, we need baseball back, I need the Phillies on in the background during our wonderful summer evenings.
catclub
grrr, no denominator. is 100,000 votes 0.1%? 1%? 10%? who knows.
Mary G
I am ready to fight like a honey badger for every vote in every state and I dare to believe we can crush the Republican Party like a beer can in a recycling center.
Soprano2
I feel you Betty, I miss baseball something fierce too. It doesn’t seem like summer because there’s no baseball. We’ve had quarter-season tickets to the Cardinal’s AA franchise here since the park opened in 2005, so I’m used to going to baseball games regularly. It’s so much fun to see the Cardinals of tomorrow today, as their tagline goes. There have been times when I watched the major league team that I could say “I saw that guy and that guy and that guy and that guy and that guy when they played in AA ball”.
And yeah, Biden should try to compete in FL. Curb stomping Trump sounds like a good plan to me. I don’t think Republicans will learn anything from it, though, other than to double down on the hate and anger.
catclub
@CaseyL: Important economic note on the 1980 election.
Economic growth that year was -5% and looking at the correleation of that statistic and presidential elections, that fact alone is enough to conclude Carter had no chance.
It is always different, but that is pretty good indicator.
Marcopolo
A poll from KY finally dropped this morning. Looks like there is a real race of for the D Senate nomination. Apparently McGrath did not do well in the final debate & her response to why she initially sat out the KY BLM protests out was weak tea. Particularly since the Brianna Taylor murder by cop happened in Louisville.
I’ll be watching the results next Tuesday.
The bad news is that neither Booker or McGrath poll competitively against McConnell atm. And the same goes for the Biden/Trump numbers. KY is a very very red state.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Biden will hire competent people. He knows what that looks like.
Love the pic in the post, btw, especially the toddler in the playpen in the background.
raven
Me playin ball, 1952.
The Moar You Know
@catclub: You could Google it. I did.
Per the Florida department of elections site: total registered voters in FL: 13,731,883
100,000 is .07% of the voters. Minuscule.
MisterForkbeard
@Jeffro: Disagree – I think it’ll get better for Trump. Polls tighten as the election gets closer and people start coming off the fences.
In many polls there’s still 10% of people who say they’re ‘undecided’. I think a large chunk of those are people who just don’t want to say they’re voting for Trump, or who aren’t paying attention now but will see a lot of republican/russian propaganda in Sept/October.
That said, I do think that Biden’s going to do very well in terms of electoral college votes.
Ruckus
@PsiFighter37:
How is beating the fuck out of shitforbrains a loser? Biden is getting a lot of money thrown his way, really there is no reason to give up on most any state. South/North Dakota? OK. Maybe WY. That’s it. Everything else is in play. And rubbing it in, being vindictive, I don’t see that as a problem this time around.
Kay
@raven:
Cute. I love how baseball sounds. It reminds me of summer.
Marcopolo
@catclub: About 9.5 million votes were cast in FL in 2016. So 100K is about 1%.
Trump 4,617,886
Clinton 4,504,975
Johnson 207K
Stein 64K
Con/Reform/Other 50K
Tom Levenson
@catclub: 1.2%. Out of roughly 9.1 million votes.
ETA: others got there fire at, and included the minor candidates in the total.
MattF
The Far Side, on Trump.
MisterForkbeard
@Marcopolo: The matchup against McConnell surprises me – apparently the most recent poll puts McConnell ahead by 10+ points. The last polls I saw (early June) had him around +1 or +3.
I wonder if that most recent poll is a real outlier, or if KY is genuinely just super happy with McConnell’s performance in the last couple weeks.
I was also partial to McGrath – she’s super not ideal, but seems like a better choice in KY than a more liberal democrat. But if Booker wins he gets my wholehearted support, even if it’s a longshot against McConnell either way.
West of the Cascades
@PsiFighter37:
Would Biden spending money in Texas potentially help downballot Democrats?
Ruckus
@Soprano2:
It’s all our jobs to show them. The best of course would be to stomp shitforbrains so badly, that some of them will wake up.
Betty Cracker
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Me too, but as a mom, I’m thinking that toddler’s too close to the foul ball zone! ;)
@raven: Awwww!
sherparick
@Roger Moore: A mentally healthy country with a moral ruling elite would have never have elected Trump. Three generations of upper class white males (Boomers, Gen X, and then Millenials) have been reading Ayn Rand, listening to Rush Limbaugh, and watching Fox News or their clones & related grifters these last 30 years and they have all become ignorant, narcissistic, sociopaths. Trump is just an exaggeration of a typical American businessman these days, not a freak. So even if Biden wins, we are far from out of the woods in this twilight struggle for the country and democracy.
Marcopolo
@Ruckus: Safe Red states in 2020 probably include: AL, AR, ID, KY, KS, LA, MS, MO, NE, N Dak, OK, S Car, S Dak, TN, WV, and WY.
the utter dregs
I’m missing baseball a lot less than would be normal. The Ricketts family (besides racist old Joe, Nebraska governor Pete is threatening to withhold relief funds for counties that require masks) has soured me on the Cubs and I don’t really have a backup.
natem
Oh this is a hoot:
Yeah, good luck with getting President Tweety McShitter to curb his enthusiasm.
Calouste
@The Moar You Know: Unfortunately it is an issue that affects women more than men, but it’s quite possible that kids still can’t go back to school in October because of the lack of response by the shitgibbon, where in many other countries they can.
Rommie
One of the criticisms I’ve read about the 2016 campaign was ignoring MI/WI/PA and swinging for the fences in marginal states. There’s no way, no way, Biden or his campaign makes that mistake a second time, barring deliberate sabotage. So campaigning properly in the Midwest + the other swing states + some effort in a few marginal states? That seems a sound strategy. It’s also EXPENSIVE, which means I hope they have the cash to do it properly and not have to make decisions they may regret. (And I’m feeling dirty talking about massive $$$ in elections – wish that would change!)
Jeffro
Hear, hear! I know you’re writing in reference to the 2020 election but this should have been the case in 2016, and since it didn’t happen, OUT you go, Electoral College.
Calouste
@natem: That’s actually the easy bit. The hard bit is to have him come up with plans. Although the media will of course present any slogan as a plan.
HumboldtBlue
This commentariat is very experienced on what it was like in the 60s and this Atlantic piece takes a look at what 2020 has in common with those socially and politically turbulent times.
Paywall may be in effect:
Barbara
@MisterForkbeard: Traditionally, “undecideds” break for the challenger not the incumbent. That’s why being under 50 is considered ominous for an incumbent. Many rules seem to be broken where Trump is concerned but it’s unlikely that everyone in that undecided camp will end up voting for Trump.
Jeffro
@MisterForkbeard: vs at least another 100k dead from Covid, continued reporting on how trumpov let China slide because he was trying to get their aid in getting re-elected, the upcoming book by his niece, his taxes possibly becoming public, and above all else, his continued public mental and physical deterioration.
I factored all that in against polls tightening and still gave a net boost to Biden across the next 4.5 months. “Jeffro math” ;)
Jeffro
@natem: trumpov…highlighting Biden’s “policy shortcomings“???!?
LOLOLOLOLOL
Marcopolo
@MisterForkbeard: I don’t live in KY but I was rooting for McGrath (though telling all my friends to send their money elsewhere) until I learned about and then saw Booker’s kickoff video. That was about a little over a month ago. Since then I’ve paid a little more attention to the race. What I’ve seen is that Booker is just a better politician/communicator than McGrath & he has a great positive message. I honestly never expected McGrath would beat McConnell and don’t know which is the better matchup now but I do know who I’d want as my Senator (if I lived in KY) if he could be beaten.
mrmoshpotato
@Baud: Let’s do it! (Regular Show)
MisterForkbeard
@natem:
Republicans want an election about policy? I don’t think they’ve thought this through.
“Having policy” isn’t exactly a policy shortcoming, especially when most of the country agrees with those policies. You can contrast this with Trump, who basically just wants to fuck with minorities and keep the gravy train rolling for republicans.
MisterForkbeard
@Jeffro: @Barbara: These are both fair points.
A few weeks ago I made the point that Trump can’t just be consistently awful, he has to get worse for his polls to remain at the low point they are. Typically Republicans get embarrassed about him for a week or two and then go back to him. The stuff he did that embarrassed them in 2017 doesn’t worry them at all in 2020.
His incumbent status and the ongoing clusterfuck that is COVID is not going to help him here and may constitute “getting worse”. I do still expect the polls to tighten, but maybe it won’t be very much. And I hope they widen more.
@Marcopolo: Booker is a much better Dem, agreed. If he could beat McConnell I’d be all over it. Same with McGrath, though – McConnell is so bad that anyone, even a shitbird normal republican would be a vast improvement.
But do we really think America could handle two black dudes named Booker in the Senate? This may be a bridge too far. :)
HumboldtBlue
As many have pointed out, Trump has no defense for the virus response, and Americans know it.
From AP
natem
@Calouste:
Indeed, Trump doesn’t have the stamina to stick with the “Hey, your policy sucks because…” because he can’t help himself. He will always end up showing his ass on prime time.
JMG
Florida is one of the biggest states in the Union and its last six presidential elections have been very close. Not campaigning there would be insane for either party.
cliosfanboy
@Marcopolo: and Ohio, sadly
James E Powell
This describes several states where Biden currently has a lead. I might amend it to say he’s not Donald Trump and he’s not a woman.
Adam L Silverman
VP Biden has to consistently be ahead of the President in Florida by 10% in order to win Florida by 1%. He’s only polling above the President within the margin of error in Wisconsin, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. The election will be decided in states where Biden’s lead is within the margin of error. The battlefield is the electoral college. Texas is not in play. Neither is Georgia. Florida, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, because Biden’s lead is within the margin of error, may be in play. Or he may be losing by 1 to 4 points. Act as if he is.
natem
@MisterForkbeard:
What do you mean? Republicans are very thoughtful. It’s not like they do things like, say, pretend they have black children while having a meltdown, and then the next day tweet out a photo with his “son”
Barbara
@HumboldtBlue: Interesting article, especially the following:
That should give Democrats a significant opening. This is one of those issues where the allegiance of Republicans to donors is increasingly at odds with the views of ordinary people, regardless how they usually vote.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic:
1) He hasn’t moved his official residence there. He is prohibited from doing so by local zoning laws.
2) Until or unless the Biden campaign and the Florida Democrats get out and work for the Puerto Rican vote in Florida, all you’re going to get is the same result that Bill Nelson got against Rick Scott. Scott and his people spent every day engaging with this community, Nelson and his people and the Florida Democrats didn’t. Scott won.
danielx
@HumboldtBlue:
All true. A lot of what the Republican Party has become in the last sixty years amounts to one long hysterical scream of rage against the Sixties, and it continues today. Trump’s base would prefer to go back to the golden, never-existed paradise of the Fifties, when every white male had a decent paying job for the asking and women, children, n****rs and sp**s knew their place and by god kept to it, or else. And those are the ones who wouldn’t prefer the 1850s.
However…assuming (fingers crossed and a lot of hard work) Trump is beaten like a rented mule on November 3rd, CANNOT WAIT for reports of the tantrum he will throw on election night. When the music stops and undeniable reality hits him in the face like a big lemon meringue pie…
The Bunker overdubs will be epic.
hitchhiker
Baseball is part of summer, but it turns out you don’t have to wait on greedy owners to sort their shit out. They’re playing in South Korea, live games with announcers and commentary but no crowds. Our youtubetv subscription lets us watch, and it’s great. Good players who know the game, that lazy feel interrupted every so often by a brilliant moment or a tense one.
I may never give money to MLB again, and I’ve been doing that since the Detroit Tigers won the pennant in 1968.
MCA1
100% agree that Biden should be putting a lot of time and resources in FL. Its 29 EV’s plus just one of MI, PA or WI is enough to win. The most obvious path to victory for Biden is: hold Clinton-won states and reverse that Midwestern trio, but taking just one of them and Florida is probably the second clearest. And as a bonus, Florida offers the clearest path to a sizeable EC victory with over 300 EV’s.
As it stands right now, Ohio, North Carolina, and Iowa are all in play, and it’ll take more polling for me to trust it, but possibly even Texas. No recent state polling out of Georgia, but as of several months ago Drumpf was up 7 or 8 there, and his support erosion since April has been in that range, and Georgia’s seen some unique issues in recent weeks that might help Democrats, as well. And Arizona is looking more and more like it’s not only in play, but in the Biden column for the moment.
Agree with all of Betty’s concerns about voter suppression, ongoing foreign interference and other shenanigans.
A lot of people are also worried about how much faith to put into polling right now, but I’m not as concerned about that, frankly. Maybe it’s wishful thinking or confirmation bias, but we should keep in mind that polls weren’t really that far off in 2016 and the better pollsters have since adjusted their models to hopefully be better this time around. It’s also worth noting that (a) Biden’s national polling lead is larger than Clinton’s was at this point in ’16, (b) his lead is larger in the majority of the swing states than hers was at this time 4 years ago, and (c) most importantly, in June of 2016 the Republican Party had not yet coalesced behind Trump. That’s actually a huge difference between then and now: pre-GOP Convention there was still a lot of consternation within the party about their candidate, and a ton of people had not yet come back into the tent. Contrast that with right now, where soft Republican support seems to be falling away from the incumbent, and he is not going to be pulling in a lot of independents with a “sure, what the Hell, could shake things up” vote. He’s a known quantity with horrible approval ratings and two ongoing national crises that he’s massively mismanaged. So while there will be some gullible cult members pulled back in when Biden’s demonized as a horrible socialist and Trump’s ad campaign gets going full speed, I’m reasonably confident that that number is a lot lower than the number of people who got comfortable as the party rallied around Trump in 2016 and convinced them he’d be controlled by the Republican establishment.
joel hanes
@MisterForkbeard:
[Trump must] get worse for his polls to remain at the low point
Trump has only four tactics:
He will get worse.
danielx
@MisterForkbeard:
Clearly.
Trump doesn’t have policies, which require thought. Instead of policies he has impulses, invariably ugly, and instead of thoughts he has neurons which occasionally, soggily collide with each other.
MattF
@natem: That’s bullshit, and Rove knows it. He’s recommending a list of things that everyone knows Trump cannot and will not do. It’s a smoke bomb– meant to distract the enemy.
catclub
Of course I could, that is not my point. My point was the lazy author putting up a number with no context.
My other point is that most readers who are not obsessive readers of BJ will NOT google it.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Women who aren’t Hillary Clinton typically haven’t been on the receiving end of a 30 year defamation campaign in the media. Yes, misogyny plays a role, but Hillary definitely had some resistance that was specific to her as a person.
natem
@MattF:
Yeah I told you, that piece is a riot. The best part is the next paragraph Rove denies actually being involved with the campaign ???
Redshift
I also can’t agree that things won’t get better for Trump, because the polls always tighten as election day approaches. That’s not for several months, but we should remember it and not freak out. (And if it doesn’t happen, he’s in for a world of hurt.)
No complacency, I know if you’re five points up, fight like you’re ten points down, but I’m liking our chances.
frosty
@raven: I love all your pictures. What a collection!
Redshift
@MattF:
Or meant to make him look like a smart pundit when Trump inevitably doesn’t do any of that (even if it’s blindingly obvious he never would.)
Dorothy A. Winsor
@HumboldtBlue: What are you implying???
Stacib
@the utter dregs: I’m with you on the Cubs, and before these past couple years, I would have never imagined not watching every pitch from spring training through the end of their season. I have loved this team over 50 years, and I’m pissed the Ricketts have screwed that up.
LuciaMia
Love that old photo of Biden. But hey, who’s the kid in the cage? LOL
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Only Nebraska and Maine give out single EVs.
Kay
Biden does something to him. Even the insults are stale and oddly…irrelevant.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Even if winning could still be assured, get out there and vote. Every office counts, especially in a redistricting year.
Don’t just beat them, BURY them.
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I don’t know, Iowa Old Lady. What do you think is being implied?
MisterForkbeard
@natem: So basically Gaetz let somebody else live with him for a few years and now wants to pretend he has a black ‘son’ for political gain? Nice.
Kay
I just feel like they’re hedging their bets in a way they didn’t before. They are starting to think he might lose.
Kent
A 50 state strategy isn’t about running up the score in the electoral college. It’s about building local organizations and winning down-ballot races as well. If a major investment in Texas means that the GOP loses or comes close to losing its majority in either chamber of the state legislature that would be absolutely HUGE going into redistricting for the decade of the 2020s. And more Dem judges will make real meaningful differences in the lives of millions of Texans when it comes to things like criminal justice and police reform
Focusing just on the top of the ticket and electoral college is partly what led to the 2010 midterm disaster which set in motion a decade of gerrymandering and GOP control.
dmsilev
Actual headline just now, proving once again we’re in a really shitty timeline:
Facebook removes Trump ads with symbol once used by Nazis to designate political prisoners
“Too overtly Nazi for Facebook” is an impressive achievement of sorts.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Oh yeah, I remember how awful that was. We were slow to act and had to shut down the whole economy. Over a hundred thousand people died in just a few short months…wait, sorry, I’m being told that’s how the COVID response has been this year. Honest mistake.
Also, I’m always confused when they blame the VP for administration policies. The VP barely has any official power. This especially bugs me with the Ukraine thing. Yes, Biden was involved, but he was acting in a diplomatic capacity for policy that he didn’t put into place himself.
Raven
@HumboldtBlue: I’ve spent a good bit of time saying it’s still not as bad as 68 now but we’re gainin on it!
TaMara (HFG)
I’m optimistic enough that my meager campaign donations are going to flip the senate. If Hickenlooper can stop screwing up, he’s a shoo-in, so I’ll focus on longer shots.
I think Biden has this. I read an interesting take today that by October, if Trump’s numbers are as awful or worse than they are now, he’ll be a shadow candidate. His narcissism will not allow him to face losing badly. He’ll be out crafting his “I only lost because of bad people” message. And if he does lose, he’ll check out completely and spend the next three months “out of the office”
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Wonder if they can get enough together to override the inevitable veto.
First and foremost himself, followed by those he hired.
dmsilev
@Kay: As attack lines go, that one is remarkably incoherent. Biden gets a failing grade for how he handled swine flu, so what does that mean about Trump given that COVID-19 has killed ten times as many Americans and still is far from over?
Kay
@Redshift:
I just throw out polls that are “48 to 38” or thereabouts because come on- there aren’t that many undecideds. They’re lying and they will come home to Trump. I only look at 50 +.
Barbara
@Adam L Silverman: I am not going play predictive math. I would note that Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina and Pennsylvania all have Democratic governors in 2020, but had Republican governors in 2016. At the margins that could make a difference, and the margins were pretty darned tight in 3 out of those 4.
Philbert
400 is fun to think but get real, it’s gonna be close. Swing for the runs, not the fences. PA/MI/ and one of WI/AZ for the win. TX/GA etc? Fire up Beto for Texas! Fight there but not bigly, more to make the GOP spend money is such expensive markets. Put real effort into the Senate races. Remember 5% nationally is sadly probably a loss.
VFX Lurker
MI/WI also had Republican governors in 2016. In 2016, Michigan had malfunctioning voter machines in Detroit while Wisconsin successfully suppressed 200,000 votes via voter ID.
MI/WI both have Democratic governors now. Michigan’s already mailed an absentee ballot request form to every registered voter in Michigan.
MattF
Facebook removes an amazingly offensive Trump ad. No one is in charge in the Trump campaign.
H.E.Wolf
Reading this post and its comments has improved my day.
Remember when the Seattle area jackals held a postcard-writing meetup in February? We were swinging for the FL fences. If anybody wants to join in, here’s the link:
http://PostcardsToVoters.org
They’re on their 62nd FL county, writing to every registered Democrat to let them know how to enroll in FL Vote By Mail.
frosty
@Raven: The music in ‘68 was better. A crazy intersection of British Invasion, soul, and psychedelic.
Barbara
@Kay: This issue depends on how hard people are being pushed to express a preference. If it isn’t very hard, then you don’t really know what undecideds will do. And I don’t either. I think it makes the poll less useful, but I would not assume that every undecided will be a vote for Trump.
MisterForkbeard
@Kay: Aww, look who’s lying. The Obama admin got pretty good marks for their H1N1 response, even though they acknowledged they could have done better.
But the H1N1 results were a tiny fraction of COVID deaths, so… how well does that say Trump is doing?
HumboldtBlue
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Lot of Metamucil and Geritol ads?
@Raven:
And I think while the parallels between the eras are there, this movement — primarily because of Covid in my opinion — doesn’t have the “burn it all down” feel it’s much more aspirational, much more “Why are we putting up with this nonsense when we have tools to make real change to society?”
Folks have a lot of time on their hands and if nothing else, the most serious impact of the virus hit after people had spent late winter and spring in isolation and the chance to get out and be heard was a perfect complement to the horror of racial injustice in thi9s country.
I read an interesting Twitter thread yesterday from a prominent black journalist who pointed out the HUGE difference in the death of George Floyd at the hands of police compared to Philando Castile or Michael Brown was that he wasn’t shot.
Gunshot wounds are hard to see in the torso but watching a white man choke the life out of another supine black man was visceral and soul-shaking.
I think she’s on to something.
Kent
Not just ignoring WI/MI/PA but spending valuable time and money doing a “victory lap” in CA.
When you lose, every mistake haunts you. When you win they are all forgotten. I’m sure the Biden campaign will make plenty of mistakes. But they will probably be new ones, not the old ones from 2016.
Betty Cracker
@Adam L Silverman:
IIRC, the polling average in FL in 2012 had Romney slightly ahead of Obama (within the margin of error), and Obama won narrowly. Pretty sure the polls in FL for 2008 showed a very close race too, though most had Obama ahead by a point or two. So, I’m not sure where you’re getting this 10% business. But I agree the presidential election in FL will probably be decided by a percentage point or two because that’s the usual pattern.
Roger Moore
@Calouste:
I heard a poll that claimed 60% of parents are considering keeping their kids out of school in the fall, even if the schools are open for in-person teaching. That may change over time, especially if the parents have to go back to work, but it’s not a number Trump should be happy with.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Btw, even Facebook has apparently removed Trump ads using symbols that the Nazis put on concentration camp prisoners to identify just what their criminal identity was.
raven
@frosty: Ever heard of Radio First Termer?
NotMax
@MattF
From the story at your link:
88. Hardly coincidental.
Benw
I’m a Padres fan so I’ve been missing baseball since the mid-2000s :(
MCA1
@Krope, the Formerly Dope: Yeah, I meant one of those three states (and the 10-20 EVs that come with them).
PsiFighter37
@Kent: Money should be spent first on states we have to win (WI, PA, MI) first. And if money is to be spent in Texas, it should come from the DNC and the DLCC, not the Biden campaign. YMMV.
chopper
@dmsilev:
it’s standard GOP campaign stuff, assign your weakness to your opponent.
NotMax
@HumboldtBlue
Also too, Carter’s Little Liver Pills and Postum.
;)
catclub
@natem: OTOH, their policy is: More Conservative judges,
rolling back anything Obama did. stopping anything nancy Pelosi might want.
This is a winner with his voters.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Oh I gotcha. I was a little confused because OP stated would only need Florida, but looking back it didn’t include MI on the list of states that Trump could hold and still lose the GE. So slightly different thing being communicated I guess.
Another Scott
@Jeffro:
https://www.270towin.com/ has various scenarios. “Polling Map” shows Biden with 272 electors with 152 additional as “Toss Up”.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Roger Moore
@Kay:
The first sign of that was their decision to start talking about austerity instead of stimulus. If they thought Trump had a decent shot, they’d be doing everything in their power to goose the economy in the hopes it would help him get reelected. Talking austerity is a sign they’re worried about handicapping the Biden Administration.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Man, I hope this gets even 5% of the attention Hillary’s emails got. People need to know and this could break through to the “doesn’t understand the concept of dog whistles” crowd.
Brachiator
@The Moar You Know:
I was thinking about this today, and looking over some of the voter data. I hope to the 7 gods that Biden’s people are paying attention to this stuff.
White women voters are not a monolith. And Democrats need to give up the conventional wisdom that Trump voters cannot be reached.
Pew Research looked at validated voter data for 2016, and saw that Clinton won 45 percent of the white woman vote, to 47 percent won by Trump. A lot closer than the common belief.
Also, Clinton won about 55 percent of the white college women vote.
Younger white women, unmarried white women, Urban white women tend to lean towards Democrats. Conversely, while evangelical women are the toughest to win over, for 2020, Democrats need to reach out to white voters without college degrees and other groups who are not getting nearly as much from Trump as he has promised.
And yeah, Corona, Corona, Corona. Trump is killing his base, threatening their parents and grandparents.
joel hanes
@Kent:
A 50 state strategy isn’t about running up the score in the electoral college
Prezactly.
Also, if the Democrats do no messaging, then the only narrative seen by voters is Republican messaging, and so those voters will accept the Republican narrative.
Jinchi
Can they? Republicans have been throwing up obstacles to that. Is there any evidence that these people have been able to register, yet?
PsiFighter37
@Kay: I actually think this is a strategic move to keep crooked Trump-appointed IGs in place once Biden becomes president, so that they will have cover to go on wild goose chases.
JMG
@Adam L Silverman: Adam, I don’t think anyone is complacent at all. But I don’t think it’s helpful to say Biden has to lead Florida by 10 to win it by one. FTR, the last Democrat to win Florida, Obama in ’12, trailed Romney by a point in the RCP averages published the day before the election. If the election was today, Biden wins big nationally, at least as big as Obama-McCain. Of course, the election is not today, unfortunately. It could get much closer. But it could also not get much closer.
Another Scott
@Jeffro: Repost
(Emphasis added.)
Cheers,
Scott.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Now I’d like to see the text of the policy because of this suggestion. But hopefully the Ds in Congress would be wise to this if that were, in fact, the goal.
joel hanes
@frosty:
While I agree that the music in 1968 was more to my own taste, I think that’s because I’m an old, and my role is to be too old and white to grasp the hippity-hop. (I’m actually too old even to have fully embraced punk for its own sake.)
But I live with youngs, and some of the performances I see on e.g. The Voice are astoundingly good.
PsiFighter37
@Krope, the Formerly Dope: Alrhough TBH, I hope Biden fires everyone who was a political appointee that Trump put in place – even Chris Wray (FBI head). The only appointee put in place by Trump that I have (very) mood faith in is Jerome Powell. The rest need to get tossed at 12:01pm on Jan 20th.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Well I was born in the 80s and I totally concur that the music of 68 and the preceding several years was amazing. The 70s and 80s were mostly trash, but I find a lot to love from the 90s forward.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@hitchhiker: Speaking of the ’68 Tigers…all MLB games from 1973 back are in the public domain and this website has most World Series radio broadcasts going back to the 1930s, including Ernie Harwell and Pee Wee Reese calling all 7 games of the ’68 World Series. I listened about a month ago as it was before my time and I had no idea who won which games, what the scores were, etc. so it was almost like listening live. I did of course know who won the championship.
joel hanes
@HumboldtBlue:
Geritol ads
Geritol is/was primarily an iron supplement, and was marketed as such. ‘Iron-poor “tired” blood’.
It turns out that a significant fraction of older men are at risk of hemochromatosis if they take iron supplements, and so “silver” multivitamins for men were reformulated to reduce the iron. Old men who took Geritol in the 1960s may well have been harming themselves.
And remember, Geritol spelled backwards is “Letirog”
(Serutan was the soluble-fiber laxative made by the same people who made Geritol)
HumboldtBlue
@joel hanes:
As they say, this is an all-service blog.
As for baseball, Ken Burn’s Baseball is available for free on PBS.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
This is, IMO, ethically justifiable as part of wanting one’s own people staffing his or her administration; not,as Trump did, trying to protect oneself from an investigation or, as Bush did, punishing people who didn’t persecute political enemies.
joel hanes
@Roger Moore:
parents are considering keeping their kids out of school in the fall
Fearless predictions:
The pandemic in the US will get worse before September
Some parents will indeed keep their kids home.
Some of the re-opened schools will be forced to close again by November because of outbreaks.
Many teachers over the age of 60 will retire rather than work face-to-face with the children of their community.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
I have often wondered why there are SO many variations on multivitamins when their contents are very, very similar. Thanks for accounting for this particular one.
Betty Cracker
@Jinchi: This is the current status as I understand it: a federal judge ruled the Republican legislature’s requirement that ex-felons pay all fees, etc., is an unconstitutional poll tax. The state asked the judge to put a hold on the ruling while they appeal, and that request was denied. A couple of weeks ago, the state asked a full panel of the federal appeals court to hear its case. As far as I know, there’s been no ruling on whether than will happen or not.
MomSense
@Eljai:
I’m so doggone sick of MIchael Moore. He’s staking his credibility to continue to punditify on predicting a tRump win while conveniently leaving out the actions he, Wilmer, Wilmer’s campaign, and Wilmer’s supporters took to ensure a tRump win.
HumboldtBlue
The band of the Coldstream Guards honored Vera Lynn’s passing with a version of “We’ll meet again.”
Calouste
@MattF: Obviously the Nazis are in charge of the campaign. I know that doesn’t narrow it down very much…
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Wait, he still gots some?
I don’t honestly think Bernie or most of his campaign staff were trying to help Trump. Maybe a handful of his supporters and one noted senior campaign official whose name I forget but was responsible for a lot of the bad advice Bernie took here and there.
joel hanes
@NotMax:
Sanka
Margarines (“If you think it’s butter, but it’s not …”)
Liquid Prell
Mrs. Olson hawking Folgers
Mr. Whipple squeezing the Charmin
Ring around the collar
Cross your heart
Cigarette commercials
Baud
@MomSense: People give him credit for predicting Trump’s win. But he also predicted Romney would win in 2012. He basically just predicts “impure” Dems will lose because they are uninspiring, and he’s 50-50 on the final result thanks to Russia and Comey. And all that’s without taking account the assistance provided to Trump by Wilmerian forces.
MisterForkbeard
@PsiFighter37:
To be perfectly honest, I suspect it is not hard to find firing offenses or serious ‘lapses in judgment’ for almost anyone who has worked in the Trump Administration, not just political appointees. Even most of the career folks have been very quiet and should have spoken up about some of the more flagrant Trump violations.
Roger Moore
@HumboldtBlue:
Please, no. I for people who care about the history of baseball, I would strongly recommend Jules Tygel’s Past Time: Baseball As History. It’s much better as baseball and history.
Gravenstone
@TaMara (HFG):
That would be the best possible outcome. Although I expect there might be plenty of sycophants and hangers on who might still try to subvert the nation under his name in the interim between election and inauguration days.
Sloane Ranger
WWII icon Dame Vera Lynn died today aged 103.
Rest in Peace, Dame Vera. May there always be bluebird over the White Cliffs of Dover in memory of you.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: That’s a perfect description of MM’s shtick. I lunge for the remote whenever his gourd looms up on my screen.
Roger Moore
@Gravenstone:
If Biden wins, I predict the Trump lame duck period will be the worst since Buchanan.
Amir Khalid
@Krope, the Formerly Dope:
Sturgeon’s Law applies to the popular music of every decade. There was definitely crap music in the 1960s, and great music in the 1970s and 1980s.
Amir Khalid
@Roger Moore:
I predict Trump’s lame-duck period will be worse than Buchanan’s. Buchanan was merely inept. Trump will be spiteful.
HumboldtBlue
And to give the proper respect, I was reading a thread about George Floyd’s death and it’s impact authored by Karen Attiah and it’s worth a read.
And my brilliant friend Jen Fumiko-Cahill has some thoughts about Aunt Jemima as well as about Mrs. Buttersworth
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Is that the 90/10 rule?
Catherine D.
@joel hanes: Geritol was also aimed at women, IIRC, hence the odious “My wife, I think I’ll keep her” ads.
Obligatory Mary Chapin Carpenter
Miss Bianca
@TaMara (HFG): Do you really think Hick will win the primary? Romanoff won the caucus, how many people are actually going to vote in this Democratic primary?
It maddens me that we’re going through this caucus/primary bullshit for the Senate/House races. Just make it ONE GODDAMNED PRIMARY, ffs. Get it all over with in March.
Doc Sardonic
@catclub: Most people with a very minuscule understanding of the size of the state of Florida, or has made a visit to the Disney property in the last 20 years can figure out without much help than 100,000 is a very small margin of victory.
Gravenstone
@Roger Moore: Probably. I expect he’ll be a vengeful fuck, screaming for his closest advisers to give him any way they can think of to screw over everyone who “turned on him” (as he’ll see it). He’ll try to burn the whole country down.
HumboldtBlue
@Catherine D.:
That’s what I always thought that it was aimed at women with osteoporosis.
Amir Khalid
@Krope, the Formerly Dope:
Yes. In the classic formulation: “90% of everything is crap.”
jc
I didn’t like Biden’s latest ad, because he ended it by addressing Trump, saying “get to work” — Biden should be saying: if you’re not up to the job — and you’re not — get the hell out.
Brachiator
@MomSense:
I don’t remember when Moore had any credibility.
Miss Bianca
@raven: Ooh, this is sounding cool.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
I like the separate presidential primary/state primaries. That way if I want to take a different partisan ballot for each one, I may.
RobertB
@joel hanes: ‘letirog’ is ‘Geritol’ spelled sideways.
HumboldtBlue
Californians must now wear masks per the Guv.
MattF
OT. The Trump administration will allow workers to include private equity investments in their 401(k) accounts. This is a bad idea. It is hard to exaggerate how bad an idea this is.
mrmoshpotato
@Amir Khalid: Oh Dump’s lame fuck period will be the most dangerous in American history since the presidency is the only thing keep a metric shit-ton of this traitorous trash from being indicted and arrested.
Amir Khalid
@jc:
Biden can’t presume to fire Trump. He can only defeat Trump in November. But in the meantime he can demand of Trump, as every American can and should, that Trump get off his arse and start doing his job.
James E Powell
@Krope, the Formerly Dope:
I hear that. I’ve been saying that for years. Cost me a few friendships back in 2016.
mrmoshpotato
@Benw: Oh ouch. You have my sympathy.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
And yes, I know some music from the 70s and 80s that I liked. Mainly R&B, some pop. But I can’t think of another time period when the stuff I didn’t like as much I thought was awful.
Like I have a couple favorite new songs right now, but the songs that aren’t my favs I find to be mostly enjoyable. So many of the top songs from the 70/80s I just can’t listen to. Most of the Rock, for example, was all so similar and not in a good way. I saw the movie Detroit Rock City and I’m with the protagonist’s mom re: KISS. It’s just noise meant to scare normies.
joel hanes
@RobertB:
Good point. I repeated verbatim a joke that my seventh-grade friend told me, without vetting it for accuracy.
I regret the error.
Hoodie
I think you need to be careful about being seduced by polls in a place like Florida. I would want cross-tabs on enthusiasm and some consideration of the effects of GOP voter suppression before being too confident in favorable polls there. Florida always seems to be a heart breaker. NC might be a better bet, with a popular Dem governor leading a strong statewide ticket.
Brachiator
@MattF:
Forbes had a good piece about this.
This issue might deserve a little discussion in an appropriate thread.
Another area which will need redress by a Biden administration.
ETA: The other shoe here: conservatives salivate over the idea of eliminating Social Security and making all those funds available for private investing. Retirees would be swiftly impoverished.
JoyceH
@LuciaMia: “Love that old photo of Biden. But hey, who’s the kid in the cage? LOL”
Me too! Looked at the pic, thought ‘what an adorable pic of Biden… wait, what?’
We did dangerous stuff back then without even thinking about it.
On the other hand, the players are probably all young enough that the ball won’t be traveling at a dangerous speed. Or at least not a lethal speed…
Kent
I’m 55 so grew up with late 70s and early 80s rock like U2, Talking Heads, Ramones, Clash, etc.
To my 17 year old daughter, 1960s music is older than 1940s big band such as Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw and Duke Ellington was to this child of the 80s.
dmsilev
@HumboldtBlue: Per the LA Times,
The Orange County thing is bonkers. Death threats against the public health officer forced her to resign, and her replacement immediately changed the mask order to a “strong recommendation”.
catclub
@Krope, the Formerly Dope: BUt if you give blood, you might need that iron rich version. I was not pink enough last time.
Barbara
@Brachiator: Obviously, this is generally a bad idea. What I need to understand just how bad an idea it might be is whether private equity investments would continue to be available only to the high net worth individuals they currently are (to avoid registration with the SEC). Because if that is the case, this is more likely just a way to tax advantage private equity returns for high net worth individuals.
HumboldtBlue
@dmsilev:
Yeah it is, we are literally witnessing the “if only Obama would say that inhaling oxygen is really good for you” we’d be watching wingnuts suffocate themselves to own the libs.
Brachiator
@Amir Khalid:
The larger rule is that whatever music you liked in late adolescence tends to be what you consider the best.
@Krope, the Formerly Dope:
One of things I like about YouTube are threads where people rediscover good music from any earlier era. I see kids rediscovering disco and other 80s music, music from the 60s, early rock and roll, etc.
And there are the wistful comments where people note the music their parents loved and played when the commenters were growing up.
But one of my personal delights is jumping from watching Van Morrison sing “Gloria” during a rock tour in France to a more recent performance of “Madam George” at the Hollywood Bowl.”
Jeffro
@Another Scott: Thanks! I love that map.
I just clicked FL, AZ, PA, and NC to ‘blue’ and Biden wins with 324 EVs to trumpov’s 204.
Not a lot of (legal) paths to victory here, GOP. That sense of impending doom is only going to get stronger.
catclub
There are signs that retirement investors are pretty well behaved.
if the high fees of PE are disclosed, not many will go for those.
They will also have negligible performance history data.
Not helpful for most investors, but not exactly a monstrous setback.
Kent
Actually you can already do that in a lot of 401(k) plans through self-directed brokerage accounts. I don’t know the exact percentage, but something like 50% of 401(k) plans have options for participants to open self-directed brokerage accounts through which they can do things like buy private equity-based EFTs. A lot of people who want to throw retirement savings into private equity can probably already do so.
But yeah, dabbling in private equity (and also hedge funds and other similar “alternative” investments) is probably foolish whether you are a 401(k) account holder or managing a college endowment or pension fund.
low-tech cyclist
@joel hanes:
“Serutan spelled backwards is mud” – Bored of the Rings
Jeffro
Yup. And even today he’s claiming it’s ‘going away’. Unbelievable.
We’re still just surfing along on the top of that ‘first wave’. Nothing’s really being done. Who, me, do something? Whaddya want, I’m only the president*…
Barbara
@catclub: This is aimed at a very narrow slice of workers, basically, those who probably already have access to private equity investments through their employment. I don’t see Vanguard or Fidelity including these kinds of investments in their 40lk portfolios.
Jeffro
@Another Scott: I had better start laying in a good stock of Advil and sugar-free Gatorade for the morning of Nov 4th! ;)
jc
@Amir Khalid: If the shoe was on the other foot, I doubt that Trump would say anything other than: shove off, loser. I think Biden needs to shiv Trump, not tell him to do his job. That horse has left the barn.
Jeffro
@PsiFighter37:
I know this thing is nowhere nearly over, but I sure hope Biden’s campaign is working overtime to figure out nominees/appointees/staffing and really hit the ground running. They are doing to need it.
catclub
I was guessing just the opposite, The 401k manager (vanguard or Fidelity or other) establishes a fund choice that invests in PE.
This ruling is allowing the 401k manager to establish those choices.
since there are ALL KINDS of ETF’s, I would guess even Vanguard could/would do it.
Frankensteinbeck
Trump won by the tiniest sliver and a technicality in 2016. Since then, we’ve had a wave in every single election. No nominee has ever had a polling lead as consistent as Biden’s over Trump, and he’s matching the best historic polling in all other categories. Trump is fucked. Now, let’s flip the Senate and crush Mitch McConnell’s hopes and dreams.
Benw
@mrmoshpotato: we’ll always have the SD Chicken in our hearts…
Ruckus
@MisterForkbeard:
All else equal, a white woman or a black man? In KY? But from what I’ve heard that young man is coming on strong.
Calouste
@Gravenstone: Which is why in modern democracies, the newly elected take their seats within a week of the election. Yes, in 1789 it took, weeks, if not months, to get from the outlying parts of the country to the capital. Now it takes 12 hours at the most.
hitchhiker
@Baud:
My sister volunteers at the theatre he restored in Traverse City. Says he’s known to be an asshole & avoided even by people who are fine with his politics and grateful for the film festival.
Jeffro
Many teachers younger than that have health conditions, or their spouse or kids do, that will prevent them from returning to the classroom.
Many states have teacher shortages already, so there will be some number of teachers who resign knowing that they can easily get rehired in a year or two (in their old school division or some other one).
States could help themselves out by making the kids’ mask-wearing mandatory (Virginia is currently “recommending” masks for students but requiring them for teachers/staff) so as to both lessen teachers’ chances of getting sick, and to increase the % of teachers who will return to schools to work.
HumboldtBlue
@dmsilev:
4,000 new cases to day in Cali a new record.
Fair Economist
@dmsilev: Thanks to Gorenor Newsom but I wish he had done this a week ago and saved the job of the competent and decent county health official driven to resign by death threats.
James E Powell
@Brachiator:
I’ve been reading arguments that begin with “Democrats need to reach out to white voters . . . ” since Reagan waxed us in 1980.
The truth is that Democrats have reached out to various demographics within the white electorate over and over and over with policies that those voters say they want. We have had some victories, but we have never reversed the White Flight from the Democratic Party that was triggered by the civil rights statutes of the 1960s and turned into a tribal identity by the forces of evil.
As far as Trump not delivering on his promises, how many times have we read articles that say more or less “Trump voters screwed by his policies still support him”? Trump delivered on the one promise they really cared about: he shows scorn for the people they hate. He delivers on that promise every day and that is why they will not leave him.
Brachiator
@Barbara: @catclub:
From the Forbes article previously linked:
If Trump is re-elected, there will be further moves to relax rules and encourage deregulation. Inevitably, more institutions will be “encouraged” to put money in risky investments. And suckers will lose their money big time.
Jeffro
@frosty:
@Amir Khalid:
@Krope, the Formerly Dope:
@Brachiator:
My daughter has been getting into classic and southern rock, and she pointed me to several websites that have ’50 most under-rated classic rock songs’, ‘top 10 most underrated songs by band’, etc.
And that’s why I am listening to “Out on the Tiles” right now. =)
Ksmiami
@MattF: and, as referenced on Rick Wilson’s Twitter, all the GOP ad talent is (checks notes), writing ads For Biden…
Krope, the Formerly Dope
@Jeffro: Got a link or name of the page?
rikyrah
@West of the Cascades:
yes yes yes yes yes
Beto didn’t win, but, man, he had coattails.
And, we have do help the downballot folks.
We should definitely spend money in Texas.
low-tech cyclist
@joel hanes:
I’m in my mid-60s, so the music of The Sixties was the stuff I grew up on. But I listen to alternative stations these days, and yeah, there’s a lot of good new stuff out there. For whatever reason, my soul just needs new music.
I have a weird love-hate relationship with the music of the ‘classic rock’ era. The stuff that’s on the playlists of classic-rock stations has all been played to death, and there are few of those songs I can stand to listen to one more time. But the stuff from that era that classic rock stations don’t play is still great. Heard Spirit’s “I Got A Line On You” in passing the other day, and that instrumental section in the middle totally rocks.
On the whole, I’d say the music back then was better, but it was an amazing time in the development of rock n’ roll, where the bands were feeding off of each other in a way that’s rarely happened since. The sheer pace of the change in the music back then was incredible.
Ruckus
@dmsilev:
Isn’t “Remarkably Incompetent” shitforbrains trademark?
MattF
@Brachiator: I’m no expert, but I’d think ‘illiquid’ would make life difficult for a retiree. Currently, one gets retirement income from 401(k) accounts by cashing in small amounts of your investments every month. How would that work with an illiquid investment? And how would that fit in with the Required Minimum Distributions? Sounds like a mess. Maybe, if you’ve already got other substantial assets, it could work… but it doesn’t sound good.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
That predates YouTube. When I was a kid listening to music on Top 40 AM stations, a bunch of them started playing “oldies” in their lineups. So I started falling in love with stuff from the early 60s alongside the late 60s/early 70s stuff I was already in love with.
Even got to where I could tolerate Elvis, though I was never super fond of his stuff.
Amir Khalid
@jc:
It would certainly be gratifying to see Biden berate Trump like you want, but it is not how Biden rolls. Besides, if Biden did that then he wouldn’t be conducting himself like a POTUS. He would be lowering himself to Trump’s level, undermining his selling point that he understands and respects the dignity of the office better than Trump.
Just Chuck
@danielx:
/slow-clap
Just Chuck
@Amir Khalid: Biden learned from “No-Drama Obama”. Obama mentioned he even drove Michelle crazy with how cool he kept in an argument.
Gin & Tonic
@catclub: Allowing it doesn’t mean the investor has to choose it, of course. I set up a 401(k) within a couple of years of when they were created, and have had a pretty good employer match, so by now I’ve got a few pennies in there, which has been getting more and more conservative as I get closer to ending gainful employment. If I were an idiot, this change might affect me in some way, but I’m not, so it doesn’t. But there will always be suckers.
Ruckus
@HumboldtBlue:
I think it is also accountable to phone cameras. There basically is a camera in everyone’s pocket. Small, light and not all that bad results. It’s a lot more difficult for the cops to lie when there’s proof from different angles.
Kay
@James E Powell:
I think Democrats could get more younger white working class women. The “cultural” differences between them and college educated women are exaggerated by political reporters, IMO. There’s a lot of overlap. They’re really quite different than white working class men. They’re more liberal.
They liked Obama, for example. I think they get overlooked because this country fetishes white working class men and just melds “women” into that group in a really disturbing sexist and classist way. They’re capable of thinking for themselves, just like white college educated women are.
I would put serious money into if I were running the D Party. They’re open to health care and paid leave proposals- the whole “family” genre of policy that Kirsten Gillibrand so ably put forth and Warren expanded on. Their lives are really hard.
Brachiator
@James E Powell:
Some Balloon Juicers are incredibly stubborn and adamant that Republican voters be shunned. But Democrats just make it harder on themselves if they insist on this strategy.
Again, white voters are not a monolith. Neither are nonwhite voters, but that’s another story for another day.
College educated voters tend to favor Democrats. Non-college educated voters overwhelmingly voted for Trump. This suggests to me that Democrats are not really listening to them.
And note that I do not believe in pandering. There may be some areas where Democrats should not bend. But there could still be room to move.
This is just historically wrong. White racists started breaking away from the Democratic Party and were looking for somewhere to go from 1948. Nixon’s callous, cynical political calculation was to break the back of an emerging racist third party by formally welcoming Dixiecrats and other vermin into the GOP.
Republican voters started rebelling over health care, and the manifest lies coming from the GOP. Recall all the stories about Republican officials cancelling or fleeing from town hall meetings rather than confront angry voters who favored expanding ACA or resolving issues that the GOP refused to face. And the GOP outright lied about protecting existing conditions. The midterm elections revealed weaknesses in previous GOP strongholds.
Trump’s base probably cannot be moved. But this is not the entirety of the Republican Party.
Kay
@James E Powell:
Younger white working class women with small children are really grateful for the Medicaid that covers most of their children, for example. They don’t care that much that THEY don’t have health insurance but their children not having it just kills them. Biden could reach them just on that.
Jeffro
@Krope, the Formerly Dope: There seems to be dozens of them…here are a few for starters:
Society of Rock
I Love Classic Rock
Digital Dream Door
I might need to add more Thin Lizzy to my iTunes collection… =)
Brachiator
@MattF:
Problems will crop up down the line when pension programs are allowed to invest more of their clients’ money in these plans.
And the recent tax law made changes to the minimum distribution rules. I’m still not sure of the impact of these changes, and I have to keep up with this stuff.
Immanentize
@Kay: THis is very true about Moms. That is also why the focus on education (instead of cops?) is a winner for Dems.
Brachiator
@Kay:
This is true. Lots of overlap. Putting religion aside for a moment, younger and unmarried white women who do not attend college tend to vote more for Democrats.
I also suspect that younger women who may oppose abortion may not be as hostile to birth control in general than an uninformed man or a complacent married conservative woman.
Brachiator
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
Sure. But YouTube lets people actively search for related music. You can fall down throw quite a rabbit hole of discovery.
Kent
Democrats have ALWAYS reached out to white working class voters. In every election, always. On paycheck issues, health care, infrastructure, education, etc. etc. On hundreds of issues. Biden’s platform of issues has dozens of topic of interest to white working class voters. What they haven’t always been willing to do (and shouldn’t do) is pander to the specific fetishes of certain white working class men, such as unlimited 2nd Amendment rights to carry automatic weapons in the local Target store. Or other similar culture war nonsense.
James E Powell
@frosty:
One of my COVID Isolation projects concerned the British Invasion and I ended up reading every Billboard Hot 100 chart from January 1961 through December 1970. I was pretty impressed with myself at how many songs I remembered the lyrics to.
One thing that really stood out was that the songs were so diverse. We were still almost all on AM radio and although there were many regional variations, we were generally listening to the same hits. The Top 20 for this week in 1968:
Late 50s & early 60s, the radio audiences were separated white and black. It become one audience in the middle of the 60s then at some point in the early 70s the radio audience separated into several audiences. How much was it that we separated ourselves and how much was it us being separated?
PsiFighter37
One other thing I hope Democrats do – attach every single last item that McConnell has let die in the Senate to a must-pass fiscal bill that can go via reconciliation, if Democrats take back the Senate. Mail-in voting and other protections at the very top of that list.
Barbara
@catclub: An ETF is not investing in a private equity. I assume you mean that a regulated ETF could, in effect, provide access to private equity investments. I am not going to speculate, except to say that this would be tough to manage because one of the hallmarks of private equity is that you have to commit to an investment level at the front end and you cannot normally get out of it as the fund starts calling in the money. Maybe there are different models, but true private equity raises commitments in advance and then goes about finding investments.
Patricia Kayden
Kent
I don’t think they are talking about direct investment in private equity, which could be illiquid. They are talking about investment in mutual funds or EFTs that do hold private equity and those are indeed liquid. It’s really no different than say holding a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) index fund. the REITs themselves may be somewhat illiquid. But not the mutual funds that hold them. I can buy and sell Vanguard’s REIT index fund to my heart’s content even though some of the REITs it holds are somewhat illiquid: https://investor.vanguard.com/mutual-funds/profile/VGSLX
Kent
Congress doesn’t work like that. All bills not passed in this Congress automatically die when the next Congress is sworn in. They will have to go back and pass them through the House and Senate again in 2021 as new bills. They don’t just sit there on the shelf waiting to be approved by future Congresses.
RepubAnon
@Eljai: That’s it – we can be confident of winning and still work as hard as we can for victory. What we can’t afford is thinking we’ve got it in the bag. Trump’s like a cockroach – you have to keep stomping until the job’s throughly done.
@PsiFighter37: I disagree – we need to challenge the Republicans in their home turf. It may not work this November, but if we keep pushing, it’ll work in some future November.
James E Powell
@Kay:
Totally agree with you on the white women, no college demo. It’s the key to a Democratic wave. That demo went very hard for Trump – CNN had it 61/34. In the big Democratic 2018 victory, the same source had that demo going Republicans 56/42.
Side note: the data I see on this demo is not broken down much by age. I don’t know why, but I most often see 18-30. There is so much difference between the younger and older halves of that bracket that I don’t think it’s useful.
Our probable point of disagreement would be how much effort and resources should we devote to chasing young voters of any demo.
Brachiator
@James E Powell:
One of the whole points of radio was that it could be integrated in a way that TV or live concerts were not.
Various YouTube videos of the Beatles have been popping up for me that reminds how revolutionary the 60s were, and not just with respect to quality of the music. In interviews around 1965, the Beatles were continually asked what they would do after the bubble burst, the implication that their brand of pop music was just a passing fad. In one interview, John cheekily responded that he was still looking for the bubble.
Also around this time, a Time Magazine article scolded the group for writing songs about prostitutes and lesbians (Day Tripper and Norwegian Wood, from the Rubber Soul sessions).
A great reaction to this stuff.
The harshest of critics had no idea what was coming next, and not just from the Beatles.
Also, arguably, the Beatles inspired rock criticism as an independent form of journalism.
jc
@Frankensteinbeck: Everyone thought Hillary had it in the bag. I assume Trump is going to cheat massively (again), and steal the election, and then when anyone tries to investigate, Barr will shut it down. Their scum-baggery can’t be over-estimated. I hope I’m wrong.
Patricia Kayden
Kay
@James E Powell:
18 to 30 is good although I would extend it to 40.
Campaigns are awash in money. They’re swimming in it. They could do a test case in one state for between 100,000 and 250,000 dollars and see what happens- depending on how big the state is.
They can take some risks! It’s not like one more day of tv ads in Florida is going to make a difference. This is small risk/big reward.
Biden’s up in Michigan and they’re gonna be there anyway. Try it in Michigan.
Morzer
@MisterForkbeard: Booker T((w)o) Washington!
Morzer
@Kay: I think this is exactly the right strategy – and it’s also going to take the Democrats in the direction of the right things to do.
different-church-lady
@Roger Moore:
A healthy country would not have a major party that would allow someone like Trump to be nominated in the first place.
geg6
@Rommie:
This thread is dead but it simply isn’t true about PA. She and her surrogates were here in the Pgh. area many times and her ads were ubiquitous. Total bullshit.
joel hanes
@Brachiator:
One of things I like about YouTube are threads where people rediscover good music from any earlier era
In my youth I had little interest in actual jazz or in the American songbook vocal tradition. In my adulthood that’s all changed, and I’m now more likely to be listening to Ella and Louis or Ellington or Basie or Billie Holiday or Sarah Vaughn than to classic rock.
columbusqueen