I try not to pay too much attention to polling, but it drives me nuts that President Biden and his likely opponent — the disgraced, twice-impeached, coup-plotting conman with 91 criminal indictments — are polling evenly. (Current RCP polling average: Biden +0.7)
The country is as polarized as it has ever been in my lifetime, but sometimes I still wonder how the hell this can be. Writing for The Atlantic, Ronald Brownstein theorizes that four factors are keeping the race on a knife’s edge — two that favor Dems and two that give Repubs an edge:
- Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election made some voters perceive him as a threat to democracy, while others don’t necessarily take that threat seriously but are tired of the drama llama antics — advantage Dems
- Backlash to the Dobbs decision — advantage Dems
- Persistent discontent about inflation, even though it has moderated, and a belief that the economy was doing great under Trump — advantage Repubs
- Biden’s age (even though Trump is only three years younger!) — advantage Repubs
It’s maddening. Trump didn’t do squat to grow the economy. It glided along on the same upward trajectory he inherited from Obama until Trump bungled the pandemic response and it fell off a cliff. I know that’s not 100% fair — any president would have presided over an economic shit-storm during a pandemic, even if they handled the response rationally instead of lying about it like Trump did.
But if people mindlessly credit whoever is president for good things that happen on their watch, shouldn’t they mindlessly blame the president when shit goes south? I blame that stupid fucking TV show for the enduring perception that Trump is “good at business.” It may yet turn out to be one of the most consequential bamboozles of all time. Thanks for nothing, NBC!
As for the age thing, if Trump does become the nominee, there may be a chance the question settles itself as low-info voters get a look at Trump’s rambling, incoherent, self-pitying monologues. Trump is frequently in the news — always for negative reasons — but I don’t think people outside the con-media bubble have actually heard much from him. They may be in for a shock when they do.
I don’t know how on the mark Brownstein’s analysis is, but the factors he cites more or less match what I hear anecdotally in political discussions offline. It pisses me off that it’s even close now, but a year is an eternity in politics, and perceptions will shift, hopefully in the right direction. I think there’s a good chance they will, but meanwhile, living on the knife’s edge sucks.
Open thread.
schrodingers_cat
How accurate is the polling? IIRC there were several misses in the polling for 2020. RCP is right leaning. Averages favor extremums.
And our media loves to echo RW talking points.
narya
And then there’s the racism: it’s not that Biden’s old, it’s that if something happens to him then That Black Woman becomes president. No one will say that out loud, though.
Josie
There is a fifth factor. Maybe the polls are wrong, just like they were wrong about the red wave they predicted.
ETA: Or what Schrodingers cat said.
Albatrossity
People don’t look at the CURRENT rate of inflation. They look at the price of something and remember when it was much lower, and conclude that inflation is still rampant, even if that price hasn’t changed in months.
brendancalling
In many ways I blame social media for the political silos so many people live in. I really do. When you get out and live in real time, It’s so much better. I still dislike so many humans though, so—who knows. But social media blows.
As I type these words into this online community, I’m standing in a car on the Market Frankford line, heading into Center City. My friend and I are training for the Philly Marathon. Today is long run day on our regimen—12 miles—with eleven weeks til race day.
schrodingers_cat
@narya: But if you point out R voting white women (or any women for that matter) it is met with defensive howls of protest.
We need to target the R voting women and flip some of them. In purple states that could result in big gains for the Ds.
Betty Cracker
@Albatrossity: Yep. Seems to work that way with gas prices too.
Josie
@schrodingers_cat: I think the key will be using Dobbs to turn out non voting or seldom voting women, and those who care about them.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’ve been banging my head against the wall of the apathy of the lumpenmittel for that last seven years, I just don’t get how people could watch the sharpie-hurricane map moment and the “just drink bleach” thing and the Access Hollywood tape and… and…. and… and then say ‘Well gas is so expensive
ETA: remember the great Egg-flation crisis of four or five months ago?
narya
@Josie: Yup. I still think that backlash to Dobbs is underrated–it’s on the list, sure, but the list doesn’t assign a weight to anything. The evil anti-choice clown car is going to continue to double down.
evap
@brendancalling: Good luck! I trained for and ran one marathon, and I remember those long runs of increasing length fondly. Such a feeling of accomplishment when you finish. I did find that on long run days I couldn’t do anything else, I was so exhausted afterwards. Anyway, I hope the marathon goes well.
Michael Bersin
On Thursday I covered an open public town hall in Warrensburg, Missouri hosted by Rep. Mark Alford (r). Alford succeeded Vicky Hartzler (r) who ran and lost in the republican primary for U.S. Senate in 2022. Mark Alford was a long-time morning newsreader for the Kansas City metro area Fox affiliate. He stated at this town hall:
“…When I was on Fox Four, thinking I, what am I gonna do, I’m getting old, I’m not gonna be on TV much longer, I’m, I’m, they won’t let me tell the truth. So what am I gonna do? Uh, this seat opened up. Vicky Hartzler (r) was, decided to run for the U.S. Senate. And, uh, I really prayed about it a lot…”
Alford spoke for about a half hour and then took questions for another hour and a half.
It wasn’t a full house (If I recall correctly, Vicky Hartzler’s last open public town hall in the congressional district took place in 2015). There are plenty of Democrats and progressives in the district and they usually show up for these things when they do happen. Not this time. The majority of the audience consisted of true believers in the great orange victim and savior. Mark Alford is one of them.
A description on social media of a contact with Mark Alford (r) at a previous constituent “coffee” in a small rural town in the district a few weeks ago:
“…My favorite quote from the day was when he asked one woman what her biggest concern was and she replied, ‘How do you plan to get the stench of Trump off you?’ He turned and walked away…”
Rural Missouri Democrats can be badass when they show up.
Photos and audio of the hour and a half Q and A session in Warrensburg:
Mark Alford (r) – Town Hall – Warrensburg, Missouri – August 31, 2023 – Q and A
Damien
If you look into what pollsters say to each other in their publications and under the radar talks, they’re anxious about the fact that they don’t know how to properly reflect younger people and even older people who don’t have landlines anymore.
People don’t answer unknown calls, they don’t want to fill out paper forms, and online polling is open to bot manipulation no matter what. So pollsters are really…not doing great.
And while they acknowledge this to themselves and each other, they’re supposed to what? NOT do the polls they’re being paid to do? NOT report the results, however screwy they might be?
Nope. They do the work, they get wonky results, and the papers publish them.
I mean seriously, look at how off the wall 2022 polls were vs. results. Or the 2020 polls.
My point is that the pool from which these people are polling is smaller, more homogeneous, and more conservative than ever, every year. I don’t pay attention to the polls, because at the end of the day the reason they keep getting paid for and published is to get people scared, angry, and engaged with the content.
JCJ
JPL
Bill Richardson died and he’s only 75. Geez!
Roger Moore
@Albatrossity:
I remember someone commenting that year over year inflation is still dropping, and they thought that explained a lot of why people are unhappy with Biden. Very recent inflation is well under control, but the memories of inflation are still recent enough that people remain spooked by it. If we manage to go until the election without either a recession or inflation getting back out of control, people’s opinion of the economy will improve a lot.
George
Given all that is known about what the GOP has done to destroy the country, and the current indictments against TFG and his henchpeople, and the convictions of the wannabe coupers, I really don’t think racism or misogyny are the explanatory variables. Biden would be no less hated by the rightwing if he had a white male vice president. TFG would have been no less loved by the rightwing if Nikki Haley had been his vice president.
What we see in America now on the rightwing are the same sort of people who waved goodbye to the Jews when they were gathered up and put on trains in Europe in the 1940s. or the post-Soviet babushkas who long for the days of Stalin, or Russians now who think they somehow sit at the apex of European civilization.
Tom Nichols had a decent twitter thread a day or two ago about the juvenile attitude of the MAGA folks. They simply have become unhinged from objective reality, and the institutions–such as the media, religion, and even the GOP itself–that would have in the past provided negative feedback that reined in the rightwing crazies now, in sum, provide positive feedback. In essence, rather than extinguishing the fire, they add accelerant.
Even people who self-allege that they are on the left–e.g., Cornell West–find willing audiences for their anti-democratic tripe.
And, sadly, there are decent liberals who too often focus on criticizing the ten percent of what Biden has done with which they disagree, rather than focusing on the ninety percent with which they do agree. That level of pointless criticism too has negative impacts.
bjacques
I feel ya, BC. But as long as we go into the race feeling like it’s a knife edge and not a shoo-in for Joe, we’ll keep working and enthusiastically promoting him to cadge those few more needed votes.
Also, polls are worthless 14 months out. And so far Democrats have been picking up seats in the off-elections that were contestable. If we get Virginia back this November, it will be more wind in our sails.
Michael Bersin
@JPL:
And yet, Henry Kissinger is still around.
Roger Moore
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
You know about the sharpie hurricane map, drinking bleach, and Access Hollywood because you’re a political junkie who pays attention and cares deeply about this stuff. There are a lot of normies who don’t, but they do buy gas and groceries regularly, so inflation is more real to them than the latest “scandal” to show up in the news.
MattF
One should bear in mind that polls are very subject to errors and bias. I suspect the low polling response rate (which you never hear much about) plays a role as well— the people who respond to polls are the outliers and often have an ax to grind. The pollsters hope that the distribution of ax-grinders tends to cancel out any specific grievances, but who tf knows?
Alison Rose
The economy issue is so aggravating to me, partially because the reason people THINK the economy is so bad when it’s not actually that bad is because the media keeps insisting to them that it is. NYT today on the homepage: Biden Struggles to Make ‘Bidenomics’ a Plus, Not a Minus. And the subhed is “Wages are up, inflation has slowed and the White House has a new slogan. Still, President Biden’s poor marks on the economy are making Democrats worried.”
He gets “poor marks” because people are stupid and don’t understand how the economy works and that most of what might not be great is not the president’s fault, no matter who the president is. And because the media, including of course Fox, is doom and gloom all the time no matter what.
artem1s
the other issue you’re dealing with is that more and more is push polling. If you aren’t mentioning the big issues certain candidates are trying to hide, or if the poll is spin laden to favor a particular position, of course they are wildly off when election day comes round. Any real poll is so limited in it’s questions it has no chance of reflecting what’s going on in this climate.
At this point in the race for the 2020 election Bernie was still trying to get Dem voters to take an oath to crawl over broken glass if he ended up the nominee. It was all about taking Iowa and NH and pretending Super Tuesday and the southern African American vote wasn’t important. The article completely missed the most obvious advantage for the Dems. We know Biden will win the popular vote – GOPers know they have to cheat to win the EC.
trollhattan
@bjacques:
Too right. Assume it’s close as a close thing and act accordingly. Then if it proves easy, win-win.
I do remember the “red wave” of ’22 with a certain fondness. That should have been Trump’s political death knell but Republicans are slow, stupid and always convinced they’re right.
Betty Cracker
@Roger Moore: I buy that explanation to some extent, but Trump was an unmitigated disaster in office — divisive, embarrassing, deceitful, bigoted, etc., in extremely public ways that received a ton of coverage at the time. Some of that must have penetrated normie brains because Biden won. Also, you’d have to be living under a rock to not know about what happened on January 6 and that Trump is still lying about the election to this day.
MattF
@Betty Cracker: I do think that Trump’s lying and whining has gotten tiresome. It’s like the ever-battling ‘personalities’ in professional wrestling— there are the strong silent types and there are the whiners. Trump is a whiner.
Quinerly
@JPL:
I’m very sad about this. He was a hero of mine. Very approachable. On one of my trips out here before my move and during the Trump Adm, (I think Feb 2017) I saw him at a large table with a bunch a guys in La Choza Restaurant. I was there for a late lunch. I went over, told him how much I admired him and had followed his career. He stood up walked around the table to shake my hand. I said, “what can we do about Trump. I hate him.” I just sorta blurted it out. Kinda loud. He smiled, then looked serious. Reached out to pat me. And we ended up sorta hugging. He was a teddy bear of a guy.
JPL
@Betty Cracker: MAGA is blaming President Biden for closing the schools before he was even president. Honestly, they’re racists and finally can put the others in their place.
indycat32
My sister in Ohio recently did a phone poll (she still has a land line so is polled a lot). The caller went through the usual stuff, then read a statement and asked “does that make you more or less likely to vote for X.” My sister said “it makes no difference”, and the pollster told her she had to pick one, “No difference” was not an option. So how accurate could that poll be? And I neglected to ask my sister what she did.
JPL
@Quinerly: OMG What a cherished meeting. Your story gave me goosebumps. My first thought was who know will be able to negotiate with North Korea. He was able to release so many of our citizens held by them.
Calouste
@MattF: Which is why he appeals to a lot of people, because by and large right-wingers are whiners. He’s one of them, they can relate to him.
RaflW
I blame our fucking innumerate and facile press for the enduring perception that Republicans are the “party of business.”
They’re the party of corporations, sure. But the US economy has — repeatedly, over decades — performed better under Democratic administrations than Repub.
It’s plain facts. Tons of data and even off-the-front-page reporting confirms it.
But from Chuckles the Todd to the entire Beltway media ecosystem, it is received wisdom, in the form of millions of press releases from conservative mimeograph-tanks (no thinking in those swamps) and GOP congressional fax machines to political beat reporters, whose entire ability with statistics is to say “Dow is up, bad news for Biden’s polling” (yeah, that’s ridiculous. But hardly unfair).
lowtechcyclist
@schrodingers_cat: Yes, there are R-voting women, and there are even more R-voting men. One would hope to see fewer R-voting women than men of any demographic, and the good news is that (a) you do, and (b) that gap has been growing over time.
But women and men don’t live independently of one another. They’re in the same communities, in the same families, in the same marriages. There’s going to be a lot of shared attitudes and beliefs.
You seem to expect women to vote as if this wasn’t the case, as if women and men had nonoverlapping lives. Your expectations are unrealistic, in the fundamental sense that they require our reality to be other than what it is.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Roger Moore: all true, though you’d think the bleach-and-lysol thing, coming as it did at the height of the pandemic, would have sunk in. Then again, trump damn near died of Covid a month before the election and got no small amount of votes by saying we were over-reacting to it.
@Betty Cracker:
I’ve been think a lot lately about O’Bro Jon Favreau’s Wilderness podcast– thinking he should follow up with some of the voters he interviewed. In at least two of the groups– Biden voting 20-somtihngs in Orange County and Black voters under 40 in Atlanta– the general consensus was that the media talked about January 6 too much (also, “politics”). McConnell, ruthless and unpatriotic but not stupid, figured out by the time of impeachment he could get away with lobbying his caucus to acquit.
Anoniminous
Due to the stupid fucking archaic Electoral College the last two presidential elections were decided by ~45,000 votes. No way national polling will pick that up. Have to look at the state polls and even then it’s doubtful any useful prognostics will emerge.
ETA: And what @Damien: said also too.
Betty Cracker
@Alison Rose: One under-covered aspect of inflation is that it tends to be a bigger issue in red states, and sometimes that’s directly related to Repub dumbfuckery. For example, in Florida, Repubs ignored the growing homeowners insurance crisis for decades, and now it’s so out of control that people can’t afford to keep or buy homes and rent is going through the roof.
Repubs enacted draconian immigration enforcement measures, and now farms and businesses are having trouble finding workers, so the price of food is spiraling upward. I can understand why Repubs don’t want to talk about this — blaming Biden works for them. But there’s no excuse for the DC hack media to ignore it, especially when DeSantis is a textbook case for why current perceptions are bullshit.
ETA: I saw an “on the trail” piece recently where DeSantis was in the parking lot of an Iowa grocery store commiserating with a potential voter about the high cost of food in Des Moines. It’s much worse in Florida! That should have been pointed out in the article, IMO.
Kelly
This Onion posting is about the Constitution but I believe you can expand it to all the imaginary problems the reactionary right are mad about.
https://www.theonion.com/area-man-passionate-defender-of-what-he-imagines-consti-1819571149
RevRick
The GOP has long been rated by the average voter as good for the economy, even though, besides a good run during the Reagan years, they suck. Since Coolidge the GOP has seldom produced anything like a good economy. The obvious puzzlement is why this disjunction between what voters believe and actual results?
I suspect it has to do with the fact that the local Chamber of Commerce white guys, who run most of the successful small businesses, create the impression that they must therefore be better at running government. And since most of what transpires in governmental operations is an opaque mystery, when GOP candidates rail against fraud and waste, the average voter concludes that where there’s smoke, there’s fire.
I think the only way of counteracting this mental bias of the average voter would be a sustained campaign saying, “The GOP sucks at running the government and economy” with a scorecard comparing results going back to Hoover.
RaflW
Since we have the bizarro Electoral College, I am more interested in how Biden is polling vis. the map that will deliver 270.
Having a raw majority vote nationally would be very helpful, given the absolute shitstorm that is coming on or about Nov. 8, 2024, but are the swingy states swingin’?
Villago Delenda Est
Polling is the MSM’s way to engage in the utterly moronic horse race narrative all the time.
Villago Delenda Est
@Albatrossity: “Why isn’t this Snickers bar only a nickle?”
MattF
@RevRick: ‘Everything is going great’ is the standard line from business people, even after they’ve filed for bankruptcy. Facts, shmacts.
Alison Rose
BTW, I know there was a post a few days back about Michael Oher and the infuriating revelations about his situation. A YouTuber I love did a phenomenal deep-deep-deep dive into this whole thing, and it was incredible. Warning: It is 4 hours long. I watched it in chunks over the afternoon and evening yesterday, and it is absolutely worth the watch. She covers Michael’s own history, who the Tuohys are, reviews the movie, reviews Lewis’ book as well as books by Oher and the Tuohys, interviews Steve Almond (who wrote the book Against Football), discusses the NCAA’s involvement, what conservatorships are, and lots more. It’s incredibly well-researched and also funny and just really terrific.
JPL
@RevRick: They actually think that Hoover’s plan was working, until FDR won. He just needed more time.
phein64
Republicans are strong on defense, strong on the economy, and support law enforcement: I’ve heard that my entire life, but I don’t think it’s ever been true. I haven’t been around that long, born during the second Eisenhower Administration, but I can’t remember a single Republican President who left the economy in better shape than when they took office. Trump took the longest peacetime expansion and turned that beat around — according to the National Bureau of Economic Research (the people who know this stuff), the Trump Recession started in February 2020, before the pandemic hit. GW Bush took a surplus, looted the Treasury, and left us with the Great Recession. I suppose you could say that Reagan ending stagflation was a good thing, but only if you ignore the massive deficit spending that is still with us, the 16 months of contraction in the first term, and the erosion of worker buying power for the next 40 years. (Whose economy are Republicans good for?) And Nixon? He may not have started the Vietnam War, but he turned it up to 11, leaving us with Jerry Ford and “Whip Inflation Now.”
John Fugelsang always asks, “What economic trends did Trump reverse?” Same could be asked for any President, but only Democratic presidencies have a positive answer.
Betty Cracker
@RevRick: I like that idea, and it really should say it that plainly: “The GOP sucks at running the government and handling the economy — scoreboard.” Couldn’t hurt. It’s true.
Villago Delenda Est
@Michael Bersin: Death at crane machine: “Jimmy Buffett? Bill Richardson? Is Kissinger even in this thing?”
RaflW
@George: “the institutions … that would have in the past provided negative feedback that reined in the rightwing crazies now, in sum, provide positive feedback”
Yup. A whole bunch of institutions, and not just on the right, have fully bought in to “influencer” culture. Leaders have always had a tendency to see where the pack is heading and then pop their heads up to say “That way!” loudly. But Xitter/Insta/Cable-hit attention cycles now make everything from Heritage Foundation to a raft of conservative preachers more concerned about views and “likes” than setting a values path and pushing for it.
Unfortunately, I have absolutely no idea whatsoever how to move away from the attention economy.
Eunicecycle
I am taking some solace in the leaks coming from the Georgia special grand jury from last winter. I think that’s the info that’s supposed to come out next Friday. The jurors have hinted that the evidence we’ve seen so far is maybe 10% of the total evidence, and it’s overwhelming. Trump is toast, according to the jurors.
Subsole
I would like to point out that item #3 is entirely a function of media coverage decisions and emphasis choices.
Which is to say, this asshole is only viable because the media chose to commit numerous lies on Trump’s behalf, both by omission and commission. Consistently, deliberately, and with malice aforethought.
I know some folks think we are too hard the media. I assure you, we are not.
The only reason we are going though all of this right now is that those useless little chickenshits think their access and their book deals are more important than American Democracy, as an institution and a concept.
But I’m off today, after a very busy week. Not gonna let it run my blood pressure today.
Alison Rose
@Betty Cracker: It’s depressing how well it works for Republicans to fuck things up and then just go “the Democrats did it” and people eat it up. And then the flip-side, when they fight against passing something and then take credit for it afterward.
RaflW
@trollhattan: “I do remember the ‘red wave”’of ’22 with a certain fondness.”
I’m trying to remember the 11 seconds of mea culpas from the press for hyping that whole thing.
But I’m sure I blinked and missed it.
Baud
We’ve put our best foot forward, which is all we can do. I’ve accepted the fact that, given who our base is, we can’t really earn widespread support through good values or good governance. We’ll have to learn to scrape by.
Snarki, child of Loki
@brendancalling: “I’m standing in a car on the Market Frankford line, heading into Center City. My friend and I are training for the Philly Marathon. ”
Song lyrics:
You can’t get to heaven on the Frankford Ell,
Because the Frankford Ell goes straight to Frankford.
RaflW
@Subsol: +1000
Matt McIrvin
I keep having these grim thoughts that democracy is a dead man walking, and conventional political action won’t save us; we can’t live with these people any more– that some kind of open war is inevitable, whether we want it or not.
But it doesn’t seem like a very useful thought to have, because what do I do with that information? Get a gun and plan my bloody last stand? Prepare to flee the country and to hell with the rest of you?
Various people have noted in the wake of Dobbs that organized political and activist action to do something about it seems to be almost all women, for now– that men seem uninterested. I wonder if part of that is that men are more prone to get this brain worm where in dire political situations, they mentally jump straight to thinking about Armageddon and trying to win elections seems weak and inadequate.
johnnybuck
Because incumbent Presidents are at the lowest level of popularity in the summer of their third year. Because Republican voters have terrible choices running against TFG. (Same as 2016) I didn’t see a president on the debate stage and neither did they. Because polling 15 months out means nothing. Even Reagan in his third summer was no shoo in to be re-elected.
Anoniminous
@RaflW:
The plutocrats discovered they can spend hundreds of millions to buy politicians and the Infotainment mediums because they know will get tens of billions or hundreds of billions or even trillions back. See: Georgie Bush’s Great Mesopotamian Adventure Project for a New American Century.
RaflW
@Matt McIrvin: I have some of these thoughts. Emigration after Nov. ’24 is not out of the question if things go badly.
But I also see things like record-breaking new voter registrations in college towns in Ohio in advance of the recent state amendment vote, and I also end up donating to pro-democracy, pro-voting groups as well as Dem candidates.
Frank Wilhoit
It’s not any of the things that Brownstein talks about, or any of the things that any of his counterparts talk about. It is devolution. Nothing more, nothing less, nothing other.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Yes, testosterone is mostly albatross around the necks of the left side of the spectrum.
Soprano2
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Or the baby formula crisis? That one is over too, but you didn’t hear that from the press.
Mike in NC
I submitted a Letter to the Editor of our local weekly rag and closed it with a joke: ‘A racist, a fascist, and a rapist walk into a bar. The bartender says, “What will it be Mr. Trump?”‘
Our neighbors enjoyed it.
Subsole
@brendancalling:
Good luck!
Eunicecycle
@Betty Cracker: I just saw that the Saudis are cutting production so higher gas prices are coming.
Ruckus
@schrodingers_cat:
@narya:
The two of you hit it square on the head, nail driven all the way home.
The media is biased. OK not all of it, but all the big, highly listened to/read. Racism is so deeply ingrained in this country that I am and have been for a long time extremely impressed that we’ve come as far as we have.
This latest mess, the racists and their not long ago ex president has and will for some time opened up their fear, they are losing the battle for racist “rights.” They of course will always exist, but their numbers have been dropping and will drop more. Communications and good sense have done most of the work, the law did a fair amount of it, and a large part of humanity did the rest. Most Are Goobers Always will continue to espouse rank stupidity and hate, it’s who they are, stupid fucking racists.
Anoniminous
Want to know why beef prices are so high?
Tyson – 25% of the market
Cargill – 21% of the market
JBS USA – 18.5% of the market
National Beef Packing – 10.5% of the market.
These four companies control 75% of the market. Beef prices on both the buying and selling will be whatever they say it is.
Capitalism: from each according to their ability, to each according to how much they can grab
RevRick
@JPL: Yes, the GOP elites did believe that. But John Maynard Keynes understood that there’s no “natural “ level of employment, and it’s quite possible for an economy to remain stuck at high levels of unemployment indefinitely. FDR didn’t have a well-thought plan to deal with it, but since he was willing to give anything a try, he managed to turn the economy around (and actually had manufacturing back at 1929 levels by the Fall of ‘36). But then he listened to the inflation hawks, slashing spending in ‘37, leading to the severe recession of ‘38. If only he kept the pedal to the metal, he might not have had the disastrous midterm of ‘38.
RevRick
@Betty Cracker: Even Jimmy Carter had a fairly decent record economically. Of all the Democrats, Obama had the worst record ( which was still better than the Bushes and Trump), and that’s because Bush handed him a disaster, and the Stimulus was too small.
bbleh
@schrodingers_cat: @Josie: @MattF: @indycat32: @Villago Delenda Est: in addition to all the biases, errors, and so on, there’s the simple fact that, this far out, the question most people are REALLY answering is, “what team will you say you’re on?” The actual race between Biden and Trump is just not real yet for the large majority of people. Even if the pollster mentions a few specific issues, or adds a bunch of qualifications to a question, people mostly slide right past it and respond out of tribal loyalty, and that means their answer is influenced not only by what they actually feel but what they want the pollster to hear.
All this — or any other similar poll — tells us right now is that, when asked to choose between Team D and Team R, people’s responses are split pretty nearly 50-50. It has only limited bearing on how people eventually are going to vote, or even how they would vote if the election were today.
Baud
@RevRick:
On what metric did Carter have a better economy than Obama?
Barney
“the disgraced, twice-impeached, coup-plotting sexual abuser conman with 91 criminal indictments” – I really think people should be reminding anyone who might possibly not vote for President Biden (OK, that may not be anyone here, but practice doesn’t hurt) that the sexual abuser Donald Trump has already been found liable for that by a jury. It’s not a matter of politics – he’s a scumbag, for reasons that you would have said, until 8 years ago, everyone agrees on. The jury certainly agreed – and those unsure about getting out and voting for Biden need a reminder. And those determined to vote Trump need a reminder that they are cheering on a sex offender, and are thus becoming scumbags themselves.
Baud
@Mike in NC:
Nice.
bbleh
@brendancalling: Good luck! The training is the hardest part. If you can get through that, get over 20 miles at some point, and not suffer serious damage in the process, you should do fine. (Just don’t start too fast when it comes to the real thing. Everybody gets excited and starts too fast, and that’s not good 20 miles later.)
Anoniminous
@Soprano2:
Why there was a shortage
tl;dr: Abbott controlled 40% of the infant formula market before they had to shut production due to contamination.
schrodingers_cat
@Josie: That too.
billcinsd
@Josie: The polls didn’t predict a red wave, the pundits did
Villago Delenda Est
@billcinsd: And the pundits have proven, again and again, that they know nothing, to such an extent that Jon Snow seems like a well informed individual.
Lapassionara
What frustrates me about the 2024 election is that with the wrong outcome, our foreign policy would swing 180 degrees. Ukraine would be annexed to Russia, and our NATO allies would have to start planning to go it alone.
We used to be able to present a fairly uniform front to the rest of the world, no matter which party controlled the WH. We were “the indispensable nation,” and the stability of our government brought numerous benefits, including that the US dollar was (and still is, at least for now) the world’s reserve currency. This could be the end of that era.
Of course, this is only one of the possible terrible outcomes of Trump (or any R for that matter) winning the 2024 election, but it is an outcome that not many people talk about.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
@billcinsd: Basked on a selective reading of biased polls; polls themselves being, at their best, an imperfect measure of voter sentiment.
Alex in OB
I think that polling in general is less accurate than in years past….despite Pollsters attempts to adjust to the changing level of engagement in the process itself. On the whole, I just find it difficult to believe that 2020 Biden voters will look at Trump and decide they made a mistake by not voting for him last time. I think that female and first time Gen Z voters will overwhelmingly turn away from any GOP candidate. As always….turnout will be the key.
Ruckus
@Michael Bersin:
Still henry, at 100 yrs old.
Tony G
I know that I’m not supposed to say this — but most low-information voters are low-information because they are stupid. Stupid people are not capable of judging the intelligence or stupidity of other people; therefore they will not be repelled by Trump’s incoherent gibberish. In fact, I’m convinced that one reason why members of the cult of Trump like him is because he is just as stupid as they are (and just as mean-spirited and selfish as they are). I hope the Biden soundly defeats Trump next year, but I have no expectation that Trump supporters will turn against their cult leader.
billcinsd
@Damien: You don’t think pollsters know those issues and/or don’t correct for them? In generals, polls work fine, of course this far out from an election, no poll is likely very good. Not because of methodology, but because of time.
Also, Republicans nomination circus has started and Biden hasn’t really started campaigning so Repubs rather have the edge in attention right now.
Ohio Mom
It’s one thing to read that inflation is abating and another to go shopping and see — with a few exceptions — that prices that are as high as ever.
For one example, I was looking at the Land’s End tee shirts that are a staple in my wardrobe yesterday and they are $10-$15 more than they used to be.
I know that some of this sticker shock is because prices were very stable for a good long time, they took a big jump all at once instead of a slow creep. A lot of that big jump was the supply chain issues brought by Covid but not all of it — some of it is good old-fashioned price gouging. Some portion of the increase is probably legitimate.
At any rate, I don’t expect the price of tee shirts to drop, these new prices are here to stay. The old normal pricing is now the clearance sale price.
it isn’t Biden’s fault of course but I can see why that misconception persists. And why it’s hard to counteract.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
Those are out there. Some people just don’t make it a priority. I have been deprioritizing news and politics in the last couple years myself and it is much more peaceful.
Also turns out no amount of relevant facts, however readily recalled, convince anyone.
prostratedragon
@Roger Moore:
Saudi oil price manipulation also needs to be called out from the housetops. A job for citizens who are not currently President, I would think.
No One You Know
@Matt McIrvin: Women have had so much more practice at coping with ugly difficult situations and irrational people, with possible results for getting it wrong ranging from temporarily embarrassing to lethally final.
No One You Know
@The Kropenhagen Interpretation: There’s some interesting research that information can’t be made motivation without a human interest story attached. Jonathan Franzen wrote about how nature writers have to use specific tones or approaches to engage readers who otherwise wouldn’t care about nature writing. Among the approaches are adversarial openings, facts linked to emotional appeals without going into purple purpose, and a few others. I think the article is in a recent edition of the Atlantic.
The Lodger
@Michael Bersin: Thanks for doing this and keeping a local focus. I’m not a STL guy myself, except for bar crawling in Soulard, I can’t imagine why I’d go there, but we need you.
narya
Since it’s a subject we’ve been discussing here, Chris Hayes opened last night with Paul Butler and Elie Mystal, talking about the sentencing for the J6 guys. They did a very nice job articulating how, first, yes, the justice system is two-tiered, but the J6 guys are the ones benefiting not the ones suffering from the disparity, and, second, that the goal should not be to go harder on the J6 guys but to raise the standards and improve conditions for everyone else. There were some horrifying shots of (I think) the Fulton County Jail, and a reasonably (given the time constraints and setting) nuanced discussion of the carceral state in this country. I didn’t agree w/ everything that was said, but it was good to see someone taking a serious stab at it.
wjca
@Damien:
Here’s a radical idea: if you are going to do phone polling, think about what your caller-ID shows. (If you don’t know, call your own cell phone and look.) If it doesn’t start out “Poll….”, fix it. And if it starts out “SPAM…”? Well now you know why people don’t pick up.
Michael Bersin
@The Lodger:
Other side of the state. Warrensburg is about fifty miles from Kansas City.
Ruckus
@Betty Cracker:
I look at SFB’s life, past and current and as a not quite as old fart as he is and who has attended funerals of everyone older than me in this family, and I see a senile old fart who I doubt will make it very much longer, sounding, even in MAGA terms, as anything but a senile old shit. And he’s on that way right now, only protected by his ardent, deranged supporters. I say this, with experience watching aging out adults for the last 20+ yrs, I don’t see him getting to the next election able to speak in any way coherently. Because once that incoherency becomes just slightly more pronounced, and it always does, only the very rabid, themselves rather incoherent, will be on board.
Quinerly
@The Lodger:
40 year Soulardarian waving from the Legal Tender Saloon in Lamy, NM. Just finished a Green Chile Cheeseburger…..in Paradise.
I do miss my old neighborhood….McGurk’s, Hammerstones, 1860’s, The Cat’s Meow.
Matt McIrvin
@Ohio Mom: I think the perception of inflation is inherently sticky because to the average person, “inflation” doesn’t mean “prices are rising”, it means “prices are higher than I expect”. Inflation could be over but people will still think inflation is high because there wasn’t *deflation* to bring prices back down. It’s why there were people out there who rated inflation as a huge problem even when there was none– their standards for what things should cost were from the Lyndon Johnson administration.
Quinerly
I’ll leave this here too.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/09/02/statement-from-president-joe-biden-on-the-passing-of-jimmy-buffett/
Ruckus
@wjca:
I wonder how many are like me, don’t have a land line and haven’t for about 20 yrs. The only reason I had one then was because I had to pay for a landline to get internet access when I moved there back in 1996. I’ve had a cell phone since late 1995. They work far better now, BTW.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
@No One You Know: Connecting to a story is important. That’s what I learned in journamalism class. Problem comes when the story, or narrative, becomes more important than informing people.
But thanks for the heads up, I’ll check out the article.
Roger Moore
@Betty Cracker:
Fair enough. I’m sure that some normie unawareness is willful ignorance rather than genuine obliviousness. And then there’s the question of how much of that willful ignorance is whistling past the graveyard unwillingness to confront the danger the country is in and how much is not wanting to see the obvious flaws of someone they want to support.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
It’s not “defenseive howls of protest”. It”s that you’ve been told over and over that there is no coherent, organized political entity known as “white women” in US politics and your odd assumption that women on this site somehow share some secret sisterhood with female Republicans is bizarre.
It’s true we’re both sets of white people. Is that the concession you’re demanding? Because that too goes absolutely no where. Democrats obviously try to appeal to white women just like they try to appeal to white men and black women and all the other groups. Is your point that Democrats should do more outreach to conservative white women?
“IF white women shifted 10 points Democrats would always win”. That’s also true of white men and – depending on the state! – Latino men and women. Everyone knows this. It’s quite literally why we have campaigns – to peel off 1 point with white women or three points with Latinos or 5 points with suburban voters or .7 on the Gulf Coast of Florida. Adding “white women” doesn’t make it more profound or edgy. No one” says it not because it’s some forbidden subject but because it’s obvious.
Ruckus
@Quinerly:
Damn!
If one has to go out, and we all do, that was a send off of all send offs. Few will get and few deserve that level. Jimmy did.
Michael Bersin
@The Lodger:
I wrote earlier:
“…I was stuck inside an insane right wingnut paranoid feedback loop for over two hours. I barely got out… “
As I’ve covered the Missouri General Assembly over the years I’ve asked Democratic Party representatives if the right wingnuts in the House are true believers or just cynical.
They’re true believers.
The republican base is the same.
There is no breaking through.
There’s a saying in music – “You can’t teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and it annoys the pig.”
If some politician or political consultant starts talking about “persuadables” grab your wallet and run away as fast as you can. No republican is persuadable. Period. They’re locked in (the vast majority) or they’re cowards.
The plan in 2024 and beyond should be field, field, and more field. We need massive turnout of Democratic voters, or we’re doomed.
Quinerly
@Ruckus: I have teared up at this bar in Lamy, NM after reading it. First time I have cried over Bubba’s death. Bartender has tried to make me laugh. He sez, “we aren’t out of the 16 Oz PBRs…..yet.” Made me laugh….
Ruckus
@MattF:
Trump is a whiner
YES, yes he is. What’s that other part that often gets one to that point of whiner? The lack of acceptance of their greatness. Problem is – for him – that we’ve all seen his greatness. Or better yet his total lack of greatness. I feel primarily because of his total lack of actual humanity of any kind other than totally crappy. Which is why I call him ShitForBrains – SFB. He’s not an abnormal human, he’s just one who is extremely self obsessed, without zero to show for any. He’s not the only one with this attitude, he’s just the most vocal, whinny, self centered, useless one.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
And I’ll be honest with you, I DON’T think you say it over and over as some sort of political commentary. I think you say it over and over because your point is that some white women don’t vote for Democrats because they’re racists. Which is fine. I would even agree. But I’m not clear why you think it’s my job to go out and convert the GOP female racist vote because after all we’re both white so we have this commonality and we’re secret pinky swear sisters. We’re not. I think Democrats don’t try to convert them for a reason- it’s a waste of time and money.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
We can make an deal- you won’t tell me to go out and convert wingnut white women and I won’t tell you to go out and convert any wingnut Indian Americans who are supporting Haley or Ramaswamy because for me to do so would be bizarre so I wasn’t going to do that anyway.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
Is that like a agreement?
Ruckus
@Quinerly:
Now that’s a good bartender.
Ups your spirits – in both possible ways.
Roger Moore
@RevRick:
I think the Republicans are the party of business, at least in the sense that they give businesses what their owners want. It’s just that many business owners don’t care about what you expect them to. They’re doing all right for themselves, so they don’t care nearly as much as you’d naively expect them to about maximizing their long-term profit. What they care about is improving things in the short term and having power over their employees. That basically means they want to be able to cheat on their taxes to goose their short-term profit and they want to be able to sexually harass and generally abuse their employees to their hearts’ content. They’ll take those things over 1% better average annual economic growth any day.
Ruckus
@The Kropenhagen Interpretation:
You are reading too close to the ideals….
dlwchico
I think a lot of Trump supporters are people that don’t do politics but do do Trump, if that makes sense.
I have an aunt that lives in Indiana. She has lived there pretty much her entire life as far as I know.
She is in her 80s.
Super nice lady who spends most of her time volunteering for the Special Olympics.
She is also a Trump supporter.
My mom (who is about the same age but pretty liberal) is good friends with her and they avoid talking about politics.
I was talking to my mom the other day and I was baffled how my aunt continues to support Trump.
My mom said “She just doesn’t know anything. She doesn’t follow politics, she just hears what is on Fox news and believes it.”
According to my mom, my aunt didn’t even know that Pence had been the governor of Indiana before becoming VP.
Ruckus
@dlwchico:
There are a lot of ill informed people in this world and a lot of them here in the US watch faux news.
It’s on TV, it must be truthful, right? I mean why would faux news lie to their customers? For money you say??? How can that be?
YES IT’S SNARK…..
RaflW
@Ruckus: If my cell phone said “Public Policy Polling” or even “Rasmussen” I’d strongly consider answering.
But when it says “unavailable” of course I’m not friggin’ gonna answer. The only people who answer polls are the terminally lonely, the blithe, and the stupid.
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: I am not telling you to convert anyone.
trollhattan
Burning Man now 80 less burn. OTOH the whole daily duststorm issue is dealt with.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Ruckus: Trump doesn’t speak coherently, but he will not shut up. He talks over everyone. It’s dominance vs. logic, and some people are impressed by dominance. They think it’s presidential.
Brachiator
@RevRick:
Coming late to a dying thread.
Yep. I think this would help a lot.
ETA. This is also a problem in the UK, where voters mistakenly believe that the Conservative Party does better with the economy than Labour. The data shows otherwise.
And even more than here in the US, the biggest right wing newspapers will ignore the reality and also regularly produce misleading stories about the success of the Tory government and the failure of Labour.
And again, here in the US the media will interview economists who oppose Joe Biden’s policies much more often than they will interview Administration officials who can show where these policies have worked.
wjca
And that may be the root of the problem right there. Lots of people have internalized the idea that companies are a constant battleground between labor and management. Thus if one side has a long-standing reputation of favoring labor, not to mantion being actually labeled “Labour”, well of course the other side must, simply must, be the party of business. And thus better for the economy overall — note that a good economy is described as “business is booming!”.
Getting past the labels to reality using mere numbers to reflect reality is always going to be challenging. Especially when the audience disliked having to learn maths in school.
Hob
About the economy… something I think gets missed sometimes in the obvious point of economic indicators being way better than people think is that there are still a lot of highly visible reminders of economic damage that are right in people’s faces, and even though it shouldn’t be hard to understand how those are basically about the pandemic and not about anything Biden did, they do work to make people suspicious of any kind of “actually things are relatively good” message. What’s happened to retail is a big one— when you see a lot of big familiar stores closing, or stuff being randomly unavailable due to supply chain problems, it’s impossible not to feel like things are deeply fucked up. The pandemic’s impact also made homelessness worse, drove up petty crime, all stuff that creates a more visceral reaction than any improvement in employment stats. It also took the familiar kind of flailing/babbling by corporate management about how everything has to be adjusted and reinvented, and how we shouldn’t expect to be able to rely on anything, to a new level that makes it harder to feel good about being employed. Again none of this is a reason to blame Biden, but I think it’s important when talking about why don’t people feel better about the economy.
Uncle Cosmo
@indycat32: Interesting example of a “message testing” poll. It’s actually a version of the non-political market surveys that are the bread & butter of market research organizations, who after all need to make payroll when it isn’t election season. These might run a whole slew of different product messages by the responders and ask if they are more or less likely to buy the product based on the message. The one(s) that get the best response(s) are the ones that show up in paid advertisements or on product packaging.
When it comes to political poll results, you can trust none of what you see in public sources, and between 1/2 and 1/3 of what’s been done for campaigns or party committees.** The public sources are designed, at best, to produce clickbait (of the “ain’t it great/ain’t it awful” variety) to get eyes on the webpage – unless you know a lot more about sample selection and precise wording/order of the questions than those bastards ever want to reveal, you have no idea what the actual meaning (if any) might be. The non-public polls are divided between message testing, push polling (to inject a meme into the body politic that generally will damage your opponents), and honest-to-goodness polling that aims to find out how a candidate is doing (in different regions or subgroups) in order to allocate resources. And again, unless someone with some survey-research chops gets to do a deep dive into the poll’s methodology, it’s probably impossible to understand what it actually means – if anything at all.
** “People say believe half of what you see,/ Son, and none of what you hear.”( And yes, I did in fact hear that through the grapevine…;^D)
The Lodger
@Quinerly: You’re actually the source of everything I know about Soulard. Awesome responsibility, I know.
Hob
@Frank Wilhoit: From reading your comments here and on a few other blogs, I feel like you often have a pattern of saying that the real key to some issue is exactly one thing— as if, in order to avoid being a sucker, it’s essential to deny all nuance. Ironically your original Crooked Timber comment that led to “Wilhoit’s Law” was not really as black and white as the way it gets quoted these days, you went on there to allow for some more nuance, but nearly every time I’ve seen you weigh in on things since then it’s been in this form of “literally the only important point is the one I see, no one should bother talking about anything else.” I’m sure there are plenty of counter-examples I’ve missed, and that I’ve written things like that too, but I do think it’s worth thinking twice if you find yourself making a lot of sweeping declarations like that.
Brachiator
@Hob:
Excellent points.
Even though the economy is doing so well that it can absorb these negative factors, the problems are big and seem to be getting worse.
Unemployment is low, but I can still see homeless encampments spreading here in Southern California. I go to the supermarket and see that the prices for items I commonly buy shot up big time after the pandemic started to fade. In addition, a number of items I used to buy are no longer available at all.
Odie Hugh Manatee
It’s the media, Betty. If you consistently feed people the same thing over and over again and again across many media outlets, it becomes reality for people too busy with their lives to investigate if it is otherwise. “Everyone is saying it” so it has to be true. These messages are tweaked for the right and the squishy middle while intending to dispirit the left. It’s what happens when the wealthy people control the major media outlets and they have the 1st Amendment and freedom of the press to hide behind while they destroy our democracy to pad their bank accounts.
What to do to counter this? I have no fucking idea.
feebog
Looking at national polling can give you a distorted view. Remember that Biden won the popular vote by almost 5% in 2020. But we have an electoral college, so state by state polling is much more important. Here is the most recent polling from reputable polling outfits in four states:
Virginia, Roanoke College – Biden +9
New Mexico, PPP- Biden +8
Pennsylvania, Franklin Marshall – Biden +2
New York, Siena – Biden +13
Biden is leading solidly in two of three swing states, narrowly in the third and about the margin you would expect in New York. In other words, things do not appear to be much different than 2020 at this point.
cmorenc
One big structural problem Trump faces that Biden doesn’t is that he will have far more difficulty attracting any voters not already firmly planning to vote for him than will Biden. Biden’s challenge OTOH is motivating enough turnout to overwhelm Trump’s smaller, but stubborn electoral base. How successful Biden / Democrats are in motivating turnout will determine how close the actual popular & EV is to a tossup vs a 10-point pop vote and EV blowout in Biden’s favor.
JimV
I watched “The Apprentice” a couple times and it told me that Trump was a dumbish, narcissistic authoritarian who surrounded himself with yes-men. However, I agree that NBC tried to portray him as something else.
The whole premise, that the project leader and one or two (I forget) workers have to argue who gets the blame and Trump the God fires the loser, told us something bad about our society. Loosely based on the popularity of “The Survivor” no doubt, which was also a noir psychodrama.
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: I think there are big differences between the East Coast and the West Coast that drive some of this disconnect. There are plenty of homeless people in the East, sure, but it’s nothing like the level of visibility and sense of crisis that the problem has on the West Coast. And the weird supply-chain issues and sporadic shortages on the store shelves are basically done here, and have been for a year or more. Gasoline prices aren’t that bad either.
Ked
Stop using RCP.
Stop looking at RCP.
Stop thinking about RCP.
Stop driving people to RCP.
Stop using RCP.
The acronym starts with R. The people running it are a bunch of R’s. There are plenty of useful and unbiased alternatives – even ones that are not gratuitously slanted the other direction. Every time you buy into their narrative, you’re conceding ground to them.
Stop.
Using.
RCP.
(And fuck the polls 14 months out – they have nothing to do with the election.)
Frank Wilhoit
@Hob:
In this case, devolution manifests as the other things, and that is the general pattern. It is a question of what is explanatory and what to focus on. I certainly could have explained that aspect better.
way2blue
I don’t understand why Democratic Senators & Representatives aren’t in their districts pounding what the Biden administration has done to bolster and improve every aspect of America. People don’t figure this stuff out on their own if they’re not focused on it. They need to hear it from their trusted officials. What gives?
RaflW
@way2blue: Are they not doing this?
Or is the press not interested in covering it, because our f**ing press is so terrible — and part of the terribleness is the steep cuts in local reporters, city desk editors, etc.
Ella in New Mexico
@billcinsd: I used to be able to ask 2500 randomly called people a question. Due to their number and diversity, they roughly represented the larger population, and so, statistically their answers were a decent estimation of the general opinion of a given community.
Now 100 people answer their phones. Majority are people who have no problem answering a phone call from someone they don’t know. People who own landlines and have blindly answered their phones since 1957 this way cuz it was almost always someone they needed or wanted to talk to. People who live in rural areas, are older, less tech savvy (even avoidant). Living on retirement funds and going to church on Sundays.
75 out of 100 are the above demographic and heaven knows none of my under 40 adult kids are in the 25%.
If I tried to conduct and evidence-based study of a medical issue with the sample above I’d be kicked out of the DNP program.
I don’t care how much they massage the statistics or apply corrective algorithms this is why polling, especially 15 months before an election, is practically useless.