The Politics Thread

[GoldenDogs]

I'm sorry, Carl... but we're past the tipping point now in this race. I'm with that the polls have been total BS... But we're in opposite corners as to the motives. You believe the mainstream media wishes to keep it close for a good story... I maintain they've kept polls close to keep Obama from totally collapsing ahead of the election so campaign donation dollars would keep flowing. Nobody wants to throw money away on a losing cause.

It was suspected the polls would magically "correct" themselves about a week or so ahead of the general election... and those predictions are likely holding true.

Look, if Mitt Romney wins by a clear and decisive margin... or worse, a blowout... then the mainstream media will, indeed, have some explaining to do. A Romney victory by any measure suggests clear and deliberate manipulation of public opinion polls by the mainstream media and a closer look should be taken as a postmortem on all of this. Of course, the mainstream media has already lost all credibility...

I hope all of our friends who post here who live on the Eastern Seaboard are weathering this nasty storm of the century okay... Hope everyone is safe this morning!

[DRW50]

I don't think there's a real tipping point in an election. Look at 2000. That was supposed to be an easy Bush win and clearly was not in the end.

If you meant something I said in the post you quoted, my apologies.

They don't get anything out of that. They only work for what gives them money and power. They wouldn't keep telling us Romney has momentum and is now a moderate hero if they wanted him to lose.

[Wales2004]

I went to him because you referred to the current Republican nominee and I know you mean that whoever it is at the time, and he just happens to be the one at this time. I'm unfamiliar with whatever any previous candidates might have said at past conventions. And I don't remember hearing anything about John McCain except for his stance against the MLK, Jr. holiday.

So unless I misunderstood you, what I got from you was that the Republican candidates make speeches at the NAACP convention that are similar in content to Bill Cosby's speech. Let me know if I misunderstood because if I haven't then I disagree that this cycle's candidate, Mitt Romney, said anything remotely close to Bill Cosby's message.

My position is that it's fine to make blanket statements about education pertaining to learning basic grammar and vocabulary. We can easily point to examples in the media of popular athletes or entertainers who have atrocious grammar, as an education problem--especially when some of the athletes have made it as far as college.

My issue is with the one size fits all solutions that people specifically seek to apply to black Americans based on this ingrained idea that they are monolithic.

When some of those Republicans, such as Newt Gingrich, claim that they are going to make black people work for welfare and wax on about black people taking personal responsibility, they're perpetuating the monolithic lie among other things.

They wouldn't make those broad statements about or to white welfare recipients or irresponsible white people, so while people feel all brilliant for "telling those black people" and others nod their heads in agreement, they should get smarter and direct that message to citizens/resident to whom it applies. And i know that anyone who thinks he/she is smart and not a racist couldn't be ignorant enough to believe that all black Americans a re lazy and ignorant--no matter how many people you've seen that seem to fit that description.

It's no different than when you work at a company where two employees slack off constantly and instead of the manager talking to the two of them, he drags the entire staff in to an hour long meeting to basically tell everyone else not to do something they aren't doing. The two problem workers continue to go on as if they've done nothing wrong.

[marceline]

Pretty much. Between the advertising and the increased ad views, the media has every reason to want to keep the horse race narrative up to the very last second. That doesn't mean that the race isn't close but it explains why they do things like report on one poll at a time no matter how much of an outlier. Because the "We have new numbers on the election!" angle is financially good for them.

[Wales2004]

I've lost track but it seemed like last week that Mitt Romney's camp had this victory lap theme going. I am surprised to hear him encouraging people to vote early for him so that they can influence the media's narrative.

It's kind of interesting that he now wants the media to start telling the public that he's leading in the early voting.

[Wales2004]

Never let the truth stand in your way when you can cause mass hysteria and win an election...

http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2012/10/flailing_in_ohio_romney_rolls.html

[marceline]

That ad was a BIG mistake on his part because it forced the CEO of Chrysler to publicly refute it. Not a good turn of events for someone who touts himself as business friendly. There is nothing Romney can do to win on the subject of the auto bailout. Not here in Ohio. NOTHING. It's a serious mis-calculation for him to keep trying because it keeps that subject in the spotlight. It's like him standing in the middle of town screaming, "Hey moderates and independents! Let me show you just how much I suck."

I'll be honest. I haven't seen it on TV here in Cleveland. I'm not sure where his ad buy for that was. I see superPAC ads going after Obama and a flurry of ads for local races but not much from the official Romney Campaign anymore.

[Vee]

The only person whose campaign has collapsed is Romney's.

Everyone knows it. The numbers know it. It's been like this for weeks and it's only gotten worse for him. Rasmussen and Gallup are outliers, and the press knows it. And Chris Christie certainly knows it. The media has been trying to preserve the horse race, but it's been falling away from them for days. The only way to keep it up is to keep pushing the outliers.

"Unskew" the polls all you like, but the most conservative estimates have Obama at 290-295 EV.

And I haven't even mentioned the debacle that this national tragedy is for Mitt.

Edited October 30, 2012 by Vee

[George008]

How about NPR & ABC/Washington Post? realclearpolitics.com

[Vee]

RCP? Those crusaders against "anti-conservative, anti-Christian media bias?" LOL.

Edited October 30, 2012 by Vee

[George008]

Is that an answer? Are you saying NPR and ABC News/Washington Post are inaccurate?,

Edited October 30, 2012 by Casey008

[Vee]

I'm saying you're not showing me any actual polling to deal in.

I'm also saying that even RCP's electoral maps have Obama at 290 - and that's the one with no toss-ups in the mix.

[George008]

We've discussed FOUR polls in just the last few minutes...Gallup, Rasmussen, NPR, & ABC News/Washington Post. RCP has a link to all details with each poll. All you have to do is click on the poll title in the national averages.

It's good to know you agree with the "crusader's " electoral count while dismissing their national average.

Check the map by Friday to see the swing state polling. :-)

So..you've expressed your thoughts on the two most experienced and established pollsters as "outliers ", how do you translate the polls from NPR and ABC News/Washington Post?

Edited October 30, 2012 by Casey008

[marceline]

Lord knows I would never try to speak for Vee. Really. Never. But, I think it's important to remember that the term "outlier" traditionally doesn't refer to POLLSTERS it refers to specific POLLS. Gallup and Rassmussen may be "the two most experienced and established pollsters." (Although I contest that description for Rasmussen.) but that doesn't mean that they aren't capable of having the occasional flawed poll for whatever reason: sampling error, poorly written questions, technical/geographic issues, etc... No pollster is immune to outliers.

I just stick with Nate Silver when it comes to crunching polls. He's a slave to the numbers and nothing else. Dude's practically a Vulcan.

Edited October 30, 2012 by marceline

[Vee]

You mean these numbers, Casey? Here, I'll even put in RCP's laughable version of "national average."

You'll forgive me, but I think the Obama edge in many of these and the very tight race otherwise looks pretty good - particularly since RCP is a known, slanted and shamed right-wing organ.

As for Scott Rasmussen, he's another infamous right-wing hack who has been criticized heavily by the media for years now because of inaccurate and poorly-sourced polling which often tightens just before Election Day. And then there's Gallup, which has been a laughingstock for months but particularly in the past month, or as the New York Times puts it, it's Gallup vs. the World.

The ABC poll completely avoided and low-sampled the Northeast, and really, there was no point in polling during Sandy because of that. But some people will poll anyway to try and preserve a horse race.

If you really want to go with this, though, and never step outside the right wing noise bubble courtesy of Breitbart, Drudge and RCP or look at the real numbers, sampling and other factors, then good luck, Casey. Just don't look at me with doe eyes on Election Night like you guys did in 2008 when everything was 'good news for John McCain.' Republicans are always baffled when they lose, but a large part of that confusion stems from the fact that they never get out of the RW bubble, and only accept the facts and numbers that they choose to believe. All inconvenient truths are blamed on bookish homosexuals like Nate Silver.

Edited October 30, 2012 by Vee