POTUS 2016 General Election Discussion Thread

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by bob

So pretty likely Trump creates his own news network once the election is over, right?

That seems to be the going theory amongst media analysts. He's going to milk every last drop of fame that he can from this.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

Leave it to Obama to fit it to his narrative. As I clearly stated, most people who voted for Trump are not voting for Trump. They're voting to give the finger to the GOP. They really don't care if he loses or wins the election.

I find this narrative very hard to believe. It's an interesting attempt at spin, though.

I guess if you're at all a decent person - not an idiot, bigot, racist, or misogynist - and you're still voting for Trump after all of this, you have to come up with a narrative to make yourself believe that you're doing this out of some kind of principle or sense of common decency.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

I'll go find a link, but I suspect that you may have missed a post that I made earlier about reformed vs. dispensational theology perhaps being a massive difference-maker in our circles.

At any rate, Erick Erickson brought down the HAMMER early this morning. Couldn't be prouder of him.

An Open Letter to the Christian Right | The Resurgent

Ben, thanks for that link. I have a couple brothers (not my twin) who at the least believe in God-though they may not be regular church-goers, try to live a "Christian life", and it kinda disgusts me with some of the filth they get from Trump on a daily basis and post it on Facebook. Nice to see someone from the Christian Right who can see through Trump. If Trump had a D next to his name, instead of an R, I really think some of these same people who are praising Trump in God's name, would be calling him the Anti-Christ right now.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

Ben, thanks for that link. I have a couple brothers (not my twin) who at the least believe in God-though they may not be regular church-goers, try to live a "Christian life", and it kinda disgusts me with some of the filth they get from Trump on a daily basis and post it on Facebook. Nice to see someone from the Christian Right who can see through Trump. If Trump had a D next to his name, instead of an R, I really think some of these same people who are praising Trump in God's name, would be calling him the Anti-Christ right now.

#EvangelicalsAgainstTrump isn't officially a trending topic, but it's getting a good bit of activity on Twitter right now.

[larrymcg421]

So that Rasmussen poll showing Trump with a 2 pt lead? The breakdown showed Trump getting 24% with African-American voters. That... won't happen.

[Butter]

Isn't it probably because of this guy?

PS: Got to that by googling "guy that counted 3000 times in presidential poll". God bless Google. It was article #1.

[bhlloy]

That's either the most incompetent survey organization in the world or a concerted effort by people to skew the polls

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by Butter

Isn't it probably because of this guy?

PS: Got to that by googling "guy that counted 3000 times in presidential poll". God bless Google. It was article #1.

That was the explanation for the LA Times/USC poll, which is the only poll besides Rasmussen that shows a close race. I'm not sure if something similar is causing it here, but there's no way Trump is getting a quarter of the black vote, and if he did, he'd be ahead by way more than 2 points.

[Jas_lov]

Rasumussen also says in their poll release, "While other pollsters show women abandoning Trump, our latest survey finds the two candidates running almost even, but women are more than twice as likely as men to like some other candidate or be undecided. Trump has a six-point advantage among men."

That's believable

[albionmoonlight]

The opposite of evidence is anecdote, so take this for what it is worth, but I see a lot of my conservative/GOP-leaning colleagues as hard anti-Trumpers now.

I certainly don't know a lot of Trump's base. But I have a sense that before he is going to be able to cut into Clinton's base, he's going to have to make up the ground he's lost among moderate GOP voters. They are either voting Clinton or Johnson or none of the above.

[larrymcg421]

So I was curious about what that Trump number among African-Americans would represent. Looks like it would be the best showing for a Republican since Nixon in 1960. Even Reagan only got 9% in a 49 state landslide.

2012: 93-6
2008: 95-4
2004: 88-11
2000: 90-8
1996: 84-12
1992: 82-11
1988: 88-10
1984: 89-9
1980: 86-12
1976: 85-15
1972: 87-13
1968: 85-15
1964: 94-6
1960: 68-32

[AENeuman]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I guess if you're at all a decent person - not an idiot, bigot, racist, or misogynist - and you're still voting for Trump after all of this, you have to come up with a narrative to make yourself believe that you're doing this out of some kind of principle or sense of common decency.

Very well said. I think the first assumption by a supporter is: things are so broken that many rights should now be privileges.

[Butter]

I view much of the Trump vote as "Never Hillary" as mentioned... but agree with H_B that there is some major narrative-crafting to help people sleep at night right now.

[Subby]

In case you were feeling happy.

How Trump Took Hate Groups Mainstream | Mother Jones

[molson]

I got an email from the Idaho Republican Party justifying their continued support for Trump - this was after Idaho Senator Mike Crapo was the first sitting Senator to come out and say he couldn't support Trump.

The main rationale was that the Idaho Republican party had a duty to support all Republicans running for office in Idaho. And that while Trump apologized for the things he said in the leaked video (did he?), Clinton hasn't apologized for all of the terrible things she did. And then they did a bullet-point comparison of Clinton v. Trump to emphasize and simplify the idea that yes, in theory, Trump professes values that are more in line with the average Idaho Republican than Clinton does. No mention of Johnson.

The whole thing sounded very defensive. "Vote Trump - because we kind of have to, I guess".

Edit: So they were not very enthusiastic about Trump, even though based on 538 projections, Idaho is Trump's 4th-best state in terms of likelihood of victory, after Oklahoma, West Virginia, and Alabama. But that's more due to us being super-deep red that being into Trump. Cruz won the primary here. And we have a random recent college graduate with no work or political experience as the Democratic nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives just because nobody else bothered to run.

[nol]

Originally Posted by bhlloy

That's either the most incompetent survey organization in the world or a concerted effort by people to skew the polls

I posted that article a couple pages back. The main takeaway is that it's actually good polling - they just apparently got the luck of the draw where their sample included the one young black Donald Trump voter. Bad polling or statistical analysis would be to either say 'Eh, there's no way this guy's serious' and swap him out for a Clinton supporter so it shows Trump has 0% support among African Americans or to desperately point to that particular poll for months while saying "SEE?! TRUMP'S WINNING BUT LIBRUL MEDIA BIAS."

[larrymcg421]

But it seems to me that the problem is that one individual can affect the poll for a long period of time. With a phone poll, that same thing could happen depending on the respondents you get on any single day, but that error is minimized when you get a new group of respondents each day (or each polling period).

[nol]

That can be a bug or a feature depending on whether you want to see if/when a particular group of people's opinions change over time.

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by nol

That can be a bug or a feature depending on whether you want to see if/when a particular group of people's opinions change over time.

But even on that note it's not really working out because that guy stopped responding.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Butter

I view much of the Trump vote as "Never Hillary" as mentioned... but agree with H_B that there is some major narrative-crafting to help people sleep at night right now.

I guess I understand the "Never Hillary" vote if you're essentially a one issue voter with respect to, say, abortion. (The Second Amendment issue is stupid. Clinton isn't taking away ones guns no more than Obama did. And the gay marriage issue is pretty much over.) Similarly, if you are really, really concerned about the make-up of the Supreme Court and think that if Clinton is in office for 4 years she'll be able to stack more liberal judges than Trump would. In this case, it's probably just as much "Never Hillary" as it is "Never a Democrat".

Beyond those types of examples, I have a hard time understanding the "Never Hillary" faction. If you're a moderate and think that way and plan to either not vote or vote for a third party person, congratulations, because you are one privileged motherfucker not have to really worry about all the things Trump has claimed he'll do if he becomes president.

I am a lucky motherfucker. As an upper-middle class, white male, I likely wouldn't be that strongly impacted, or impacted at all, by a lot of Trump's fear-based policies. Heck, I might even be better off under some of his fiscal policies (to the extent he has any), but I could not in good conscience vote for him based on his stated policies alone, even setting side the fact that he is a misogynistic, bigoted piece of human garbage.

[Neuqua]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

Beyond those types of examples, I have a hard time understanding the "Never Hillary" faction. If you're a moderate and think that way and plan to either not vote or vote for a third party person, congratulations, because you are one privileged motherfucker not have to really worry about all the things Trump has claimed he'll do if he becomes president.

I am a lucky motherfucker. As an upper-middle class, white male, I likely wouldn't be that strongly impacted, or impacted at all, by a lot of Trump's fear-based policies. Heck, I might even be better off under some of his fiscal policies (to the extent he has any), but I could not in good conscience vote for him based on his stated policies alone, even setting side the fact that he is a misogynistic, bigoted piece of human garbage.

I can't stress this enough as the reason I'm voting Hillary. I am a Hindu, born and raised in the United States. I don't have the option of voting third party (though I guess I could in Illinois) because the 1 in a million chance that Trump actually wins will put me and my family in a very uncomfortable position over the next four years. I'm not even Muslim and I can't imagine what is going through their heads at the moment..

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by Neuqua

I can't stress this enough as the reason I'm voting Hillary. I am a Hindu, born and raised in the United States. I don't have the option of voting third party (though I guess I could in Illinois) because the 1 in a million chance that Trump actually wins will put me and my family in a very uncomfortable position over the next four years. I'm not even Muslim and I can't imagine what is going through their heads at the moment..

Yeah, this is what I was talking about back during the primaries. The Bernie or Busters are a demographic who wouldn't suffer under a Trump presidency nearly as much as the Clinton voters. It's easy to call for everything to be blown up when you're not in the blast radius.

[nol]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

But even on that note it's not really working out because that guy stopped responding.

At that point though, you're basically saying it's bad poll design that they cannot compel all the respondents to constantly update them on who they're voting for over a period of however many months.

Clinton is certainly not winning by enough of a margin that there should be no polls that show Trump with a lead, and the more polls like that you throw out because 'that's not gonna happen,' the closer you get to the flip side of "everyone in the locker room at my country club is voting for Trump so it's going to be a landslide."

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

fear-based policies. .

Or, as the sane portion of the population sees them: necessary for the survival of the nation realities.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Or, as the sane portion of the population sees them: necessary for the survival of the nation realities.

Yeah, because our country is such dire peril...

We have more to fear from your "sane portion of the population" than we do from anything outside of our borders.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I guess I understand the "Never Hillary" vote if you're essentially a one issue voter with respect to, say, abortion. (The Second Amendment issue is stupid. Clinton isn't taking away ones guns no more than Obama did. And the gay marriage issue is pretty much over.) Similarly, if you are really, really concerned about the make-up of the Supreme Court and think that if Clinton is in office for 4 years she'll be able to stack more liberal judges than Trump would. In this case, it's probably just as much "Never Hillary" as it is "Never a Democrat".

I think deep down it's just as much "Never a Democrat," but because it's HRC, it's more focused. Tribalism is a huge part of this. Ben Carson at least had the guts to be honest about it this morning: "it doesn't matter if Trump sexually assaulted those women; WE MUST PUT OUR TEAM IN THE WHITE HOUSE!"

Hostile Ben Carson Interview On MSNBC's Morning Joe: "Can You Turn Off Her Microphone Please" | Video | RealClearPolitics

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by nol

At that point though, you're basically saying it's bad poll design that they cannot compel all the respondents to constantly update them on who they're voting for over a period of however many months.

Clinton is certainly not winning by enough of a margin that there should be no polls that show Trump with a lead, and the more polls like that you throw out because 'that's not gonna happen,' the closer you get to the flip side of "everyone in the locker room at my country club is voting for Trump so it's going to be a landslide."

I'm not arguing that at all. I was responding to your argument that they may be looking for how a certain group of voters change over time. The fact that you can't compel people to participate is why that's a very difficult thing to do and why it might not be a very useful methodology for polling. That doesn't mean I think Trump can't or shouldn't be leading in any polls. I'm sure there are polls showing Clinton with huge leads that have some weird crosstab results.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

I think deep down it's just as much "Never a Democrat," but because it's HRC, it's more focused. Tribalism is a huge part of this. Ben Carson at least had the guts to be honest about it this morning: "it doesn't matter if Trump sexually assaulted those women; WE MUST PUT OUR TEAM IN THE WHITE HOUSE!"

I get that and totally agree. HRC does make it much more focused for a wide variety of reasons. I would imagine for a lot of good, right-minded, decent Republicans it has to be very, /very/ hard to have to vote fro Trump to accomplish this goal. That is some odious shit you have to eat there.

I've tried to think about it from this side of the line. How bad would a Democratic candidate have to be or what would a Democratic candidate have to do, for me to vote Republican?

[Butter]

Originally Posted by Subby

In case you were feeling happy.

How Trump Took Hate Groups Mainstream | Mother Jones

To go all JiMGa for just a moment, I kinda hope that the alt-right does get radicalized by a Hillary win... it would allow the Feds to take all of those motherfuckers down.

[albionmoonlight]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I've tried to think about it from this side of the line. How bad would a Democratic candidate have to be or what would a Democratic candidate have to do, for me to vote Republican?

I'm a Democrat.

And the closest analogy I can think of is if Sean Penn ran against Dick Cheney.

I'd vote for Cheney, but I wouldn't be happy about it.

[Butter]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I've tried to think about it from this side of the line. How bad would a Democratic candidate have to be or what would a Democratic candidate have to do, for me to vote Republican?

Some would argue that Hillary is just that candidate and we're blind to it (*coughtarconecough*).

But I was wondering that the other day myself. How left would they have to be? How left is TOO left... or how deranged is a bridge too far?

Hopefully won't have to find out.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by albionmoonlight

I'm a Democrat.

And the closest analogy I can think of is if Sean Penn ran against Dick Cheney.

I'd vote for Cheney, but I wouldn't be happy about it.

That's a good analogy. I can't fucking stand Sean Penn.

[nol]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

I'm not arguing that at all. I was responding to your argument that they may be looking for how a certain group of voters change over time. The fact that you can't compel people to participate is why that's a very difficult thing to do and why it might not be a very useful methodology for polling. That doesn't mean I think Trump can't or shouldn't be leading in any polls. I'm sure there are polls showing Clinton with huge leads that have some weird crosstab results.

Not even huge leads. I'm sure there are polls doing more or less the exact same thing as that one, but the 4 18-23 year old black males they're surveying all happen to be Hillary voters, so the results happen to look more "normal" to you or me.

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

That's a good analogy. I can't fucking stand Sean Penn.

Yeah, it's really bizarre to me how invisible people with extreme left-wing views manage to be. For the tired "both sides r just as bad" refrain to actually be true, there'd need to be a few sitting Congressmen and presidential candidates who want to defund the National Institute of Health because of vaccines or animal research.

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by nol

Not even huge leads. I'm sure there are polls doing more or less the exact same thing as that one, but the 4 18-23 year old black males they're surveying all happen to be Hillary voters, so the results happen to look more "normal" to you or me.

Right, but I think that gets normalized when you continually get a new group of respondents. Now I don't know why Rasmussen is getting such different numbers, because their results are more than just a one day anomaly (has hovered between 18-24% over the last 4 days).

It's not impossible that LA Times/USC and Rasmussen have tapped into some Trump gains among African-American voters that have been missed by other polls. Maybe Trump is on his way to the best showing for a Republican among that group in 46 years. I just think it's very unlikely.

Let me put it this way. If Trump had the lead in a poll with a more realistic spread among minority voters, I'd be far more worried, because that means Hillary hasn't secured the suburban vote that she needs. So these two polls don't scare me, but admittedly I won't be comfortable until the election is called on November 8.

[Subby]

Silver lining of this election. Alex Jones videos.

https://www.facebook.com/CAFE/videos/1711284269194459/

[nol]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

Right, but I think that gets normalized when you continually get a new group of respondents. Now I don't know why Rasmussen is getting such different numbers, because their results are more than just a one day anomaly (has hovered between 18-24% over the last 4 days).

If you treat "look at many different polls in aggregate" the same as "continually get a new group of respondents," that's pretty much what happens, and that's better than having every poll that shows African-American Trump support greater than 10 percent or some arbitrarily low number going "hmm this seems way off, better try again with a new sample" before publishing its results.

Anywho, here's the bold Trump strategy of the day:

Trump on President Obama and sexual assault: "Why doesn't some woman say what they say about me about him?"

— Jonathan Lemire (@JonLemire) October 14, 2016

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by nol

If you treat "look at many different polls in aggregate" the same as "continually get a new group of respondents," that's pretty much what happens, and that's better than having every poll that shows African-American Trump support greater than 10 percent or some arbitrarily low number going "hmm this seems way off, better try again with a new sample" before publishing its results.

I'm not sure what you're even responding to here. I've never said you shouldn't look at these polls, with whatever flaws I find in them, in the aggregate. I think that's exactly what you should do. I've also never argued that you should artificially manipulate the results when you get numbers that may not look right. I've simply said that I look at these individual polls with a suspicious eye and gave arguments to why the methodology in one of them is flawed.

[cuervo72]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

While it's not quite the same, the Mole has spawned

Wonder if they have a version in Morocco.

[nol]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

I'm not sure what you're even responding to here. I've never said you shouldn't look at these polls, with whatever flaws I find in them, in the aggregate. I think that's exactly what you should do. I've also never argued that you should artificially manipulate the results when you get numbers that may not look right. I've simply said that I look at these individual polls with a suspicious eye and gave arguments to why the methodology in one of them is flawed.

But the methodology of looking at the same cohort over time isn't flawed. When I looked more closely at the USC poll earlier in the summer, the margin of error was large enough to include zero percent African American support for Trump. That's not uniquely flawed, it just relies on a small sample size in certain demographics that makes it more susceptible to outliers. Other polls do the same thing; odds are that one of them is going to get 'burned' by it.

[Ben E Lou]

Meanwhile at the 'Blacks for Trump' tent:

"I thought YOU brought the black guy" pic.twitter.com/Hr8p0ul6gj

— JustJanis (@jsavite) October 12, 2016

[cartman]

Maybe their last names are Black.

[ISiddiqui]

Originally Posted by cartman

Maybe their last names are Black.

LOL!!! FTW!

[larrymcg421]

That's similar to a great joke Seth Meyers told at the White House Correspondents dinner...

"Donald Trump said recently he has a great relationship with the blacks, but unless the Blacks are a family of white people, I bet he is mistaken."

[JPhillips]

It was only a matter of time before Gloria Allred got involved.

[mckerney]

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by stevew

True. I would imagine there will be some serious threats against her.

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

Fixed that for you to align with my thinking. Hope I'm wrong.

Listening to Trump's rhetoric in recent speeches, he is whipping people into an angry frenzy and encouraging them to violence. There are absolutely going to be incidents at polling stations and more generally if Clinton wins.

To quote a famous Republican:

Originally Posted by JPhillips

Do you have any data to prove your contention?

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

They're no different than me. I'm just glad we have something other than a rehash of the same old thing.

Originally Posted by JPhillips

So Trump voters are representative of the GOP base, just like Obama said.

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

Leave it to Obama to fit it to his narrative.

Originally Posted by JPhillips

I would be very surprised if you could show any data proving that. Look at Trump's positions and the positions of his voters and it's pretty clear the vast majority support what Trump is selling.

Oh you guys!

[SirFozzie]

Trump spent 20 minutes today at one of the rallies wondering why Obama doesn't get the same amount of accusations aimed at him..

Mainly because he isn't a narcissist who thinks with his Johnson, or if he does, tries to actually pretend he isn't?

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

It was only a matter of time before Gloria Allred got involved.

I look at it this way, elected or not, Trump's going to single-handedly drive economic growth in the legal sector. We should all be very grateful.

[nol]

Welp



from a 1998 interview with Chris Matthews on CNBC in which Trump was asked if he'd ever run for president

[larrymcg421]

OMG. I just don't even know what to say anymore. So the first round of evidence Trump has released is a witness to debunk the airplane story...

Trump camp puts forward witness to refute sex assault claim | New York Post

Nothing groundbreaking in there. Just he said, she said stuff that Twitter could argue about forever. But then there's this. Two years earlier, this same guy made this accusation:

Tory child abuse whistleblower: 'I supplied underage rent boys for Margaret Thatcher's cabinet ministers' - Mirror Online

This is who the Trump campaign used as their witness. I'm almost more offended at his incompetence than his lack of character.