The Politics Thread

[Vee]

They'll come to it slowly over the next week or so. They always grudgingly do, often with excuses made for the GOP/Trump.

People are tired of him. They were tired 4 years ago. And while the Biden dislike factor is already heavily overhyped by media and often Very Online, even if it were more legit a lot of people would still either crawl over glass to vote against an actual corpse vs. Trump. Or, if we're talking GOP votes he's lost before and tonight, just stay home again because they're still tired. And that's not even getting to Dobbs. The only people in the general public not tired of Trump are his remaining base and the mainstream media.

Edited March 6, 2024 by Vee

[DRW50]

I do wonder if some people have gotten amnesia over the last four years. I don't trust polls but any time I see them with people insisting their lives were so much better when he was President, I get wary. This seems to happen any time a Democrat has to clean up the mess of his predecessor.

[Vee]

I guess I don't see that many people doing that, beyond cherry-picked anecdotes from the NYT economy beat.

[DRW50]

There have been a few polls going around with this result that keep getting trumpeted everywhere.

[Wendy]

Polls, schmolls.

"Polls" predicted Dump would expertly dominate in his primaries. He has UNDER-PERFORMED in almost every metric predicted.

Polls said Hillary was a lock in 2016.

Polls screamed about Red Wave 2022.

The media hates it, but since Dobbs and the fall of Roe - among other key issues - polls have s-h-i-t the bed ever since.

Could Dump win? Anything is POSSIBLE, but without expanding the base he has left, not PROBABLE, IMO.

But that doesn't mean the nation should be complacent. Vote as if the nation and its democracy is on the line. It is.

[JaneAusten]

I guess people are just going to continue to believe the polls and the red wave that never happened. Biden is the most underestimated politician in my lifetime. He continues to outperform every expectation but somehow 2024 is the year it won't happen.

It's tiring and maybe that's the point. It's still Dobbs and will continue to be so.  In 2022 we were told women were over our rights being taken away. Every special election has gone for democrats because of - Dobbs. 2022 was going to be the CRIME election while Dobbs was rated by the MEDIA and POLLS as a 7% issue and what happened. It was the leading issue. And in what world are people really paying attention at this point. Trump is underperforming in every primary but he's dominating? Only in the minds of the online hoards and the media who has been wrong for years.  But this year of course their right. Didn't they also pump up Sinema.  And look where she has become. Just another lobbyist. Somehow in the back of my mind her final decision came when her biggest champion, McConnell, decided to step down. Where are she and Manchin? All they will be remembered for are sellouts if remembered at all.

[DramatistDreamer]

You think so? I guess we will have to bookmark this and see.

TBH, I doubt most people are paying that much attention maybe in the summertime, closer to Labor Day people will begin to tune in more but for now it seems like selected media outlets have the run of things to spin these narratives. Even BBC, which normally doesn’t adhere to the herd mentality of U.S. News had their American pundits on, one of them waxing on about the tedium of this year’s “Super Tuesday” and Joe’s age. People are just not being serious right now.

[Khan]

And I think she was, too, before James Comey and his stupid press conference.  To me, that was the moment when they effectively sunk her.

Sinema's is a cautionary tale for anyone looking to enter politics.  She got seduced by big money and paid the price.

[Taoboi]

I wonder that as well. re: amnesia. Because that's all I've seen so far. Thankfully, it also seem from what I've seen online that common sense is winning out. For now of course. 

[JaneAusten]

I'm honestly shocked at how many people here are discounting everything that has happened to date and things still undecided. Do folks here realize our SCOTUS is due to make a ruling on Mifepristone? Do you understand that that in combination with that idiotic IDF ruling is going to have on top of Dobbs. I stand by what I said. Most people are not paying attention and social media and cable networks with a total viewing audience of less than 5,000,000 viewers does not equal all of the voters. Pundits frankly are irrelevant.

[DramatistDreamer]

Also, why is it not making the news that Trump is going hat in hand to Musk (who himself has lawsuits to fend off) for a cash infusion? How is this not an issue?

[DRW50]

Polls also said Trump would lose in 2020, although he lost by less than they claimed. That's another thing I'm anxious over - he outperformed polling in two elections. On a positive note, the primary polling was also off for him in a number of states, but for the most part, I do think the polls can become a narrative and lead to a spiral. I saw Peter Welch, a senator from Vermont, parroting Nate Silver's line that Biden was hurt by not doing a Super Bowl interview. That's another example of the narrative becoming reality. 

I do hope that Democrats overperforming polling in 2022 is a sign for this year, but when so many people, in the press and in life, worship Trump as a god (the way so many Republicans and dead end leftists claimed Obama was worshipped, which was never true), it starts to feel like he just sails through unless you have a situation like 2020 with so many things breaking the other way.

[JaneAusten]

In what world was this reality? Because Welch agreed with that irrelevant loser Nate Silver? Or because a bunch of worthless pundits agreed with Silver? 

Edited March 7, 2024 by JaneAusten

[DRW50]

Welch gave Silver's talking point more weight because he's a senator. That means less people will dismiss it the way it should be dismissed.

[Wendy]

Doubtful.

The only poll I DO buy is the one about Congressional approval. Like SCOTUS, it is at an all-time low.

The average American has as much contempt for Congress as it does for Trump and/or Biden, depending on which end of the political spectrum one is on.

And Nate Silver has been face splatting for too many cycles now, hence his desperation to remain relevant.